Bookish Questions – What book have you always meant to read?
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What book have you always meant to read and haven’t gotten around to yet? Anything you feel embarrassed never to have read?
Ya know, as much as everyone seems to love it, I have never read Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. Come to think of it, I’ve never read any of Austen’s novels. I feel like this is something I should get around to someday, it’s just never been a top priority in my TBR list. I’d much rather read a new sci-fy or fantasy novel than take the time to read P&P. Especially since I already know the plot. It’s impossible not to, with all of the screen adaptions and retellings out in the world. So, perhaps I will get to it someday, but that day won’t be today.
As far as being embarrassed to have not read something, I don’t have that. I have no problems saying that I haven’t read a book. I was too busy reading other ones. Besides, it might give the person I’m talking to a subject they can tell me about. Maybe they can convince me why I should take the time to read it.
Do you have a book that you’ve been meaning to read, but just keep putting off?
Having failed to get through The Brothers Karamazov, though I tried twice, and three times failed to manage (The Life and Opinions of) Tristram Shandy (psssst! It’s not really that funny anymore, though what it was like 200 yrs ago I don’t know), I don’t feel bad about not having read stuff, either. P and P is not my favourite Austen; I think I may have told you I prefer Mansfield Park (the book, not the horrible movie made by a woman who actually boasted she’d never actually read it!). But I’m odd like that.
A book I keep promising myself I’m going to read is War and Peace. It was on my paralell reading list in highschool (AP they call it now) and I started it, partly because the TV series was so popular in the mid-70s…but trust me, 15 was far too young to tackle that book. Let alone being from a small rural Midwestern town, so all that business with the Russian names and nicknames went straight over my head and I thought that 4 people were about a dozen!
I’d also like to actually read Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway, which is one of those books that university students like to pretend they have read and often haven’t. I did read Orlando in the 80s and loved the richness of the language, but I will warn you–it bogs down in the middle.
I’m still in a bit of a book slump as described in some of my Goodreads reviews, so though I am paging through Moll Flanders I am of course finding it predictable–but that’s my problem, not Defoe’s. Me, I’m just grumpy! I turn 54 on Thursday but I promise that’s not it. I’m just tired.
You should read some Shel Silverstein poetry. It’s fun and nonsensical- perfect for reading slumps.
Another author I always feel slightly guilty that I’ve never actually read, is Marcel Proust. Why this should cause me to feel bad I have no idea. I went so far as to download A La Recherche du Temps Perdu etc from Gutenberg and I think I may have started the first volume, but I didn’t get very far before going back to my usual light fodder.
I guess I’ve outgrown reading to be seen reading, if you know what I mean. But someday….maybe….I’ll make it down Swann’s Way.