Time for These Classics
Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by The Broke and The Bookish. Every week they post a new topic/top ten list and invite everyone to share their own answers. I'm so obsessed with lists - so it makes perfect sense that I'd love this feature!
Top Ten Classics on My TBR
After discovering Jane Austen in middle school, I knew I'd found one of my passions: classic literature! In high school and college, I read a lot of them - and enjoyed it! Well, I will admit that there were clunkers along the way. Lately, however, I rarely find myself picking up these books I used to love so much. I did start my Consider This Classic feature after I wrote a post about the classics conundrum - so I have found some ways to keep my love for classics alive. But there are so many classics still on my TBR! Here are the top ten:
1. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë
2. Villette by Charlotte Brontë
3. The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
4. Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens
5. A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle
6. Middlemarch by George Eliot
7. Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
8. Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell
9. The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James
10. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
Have you read any of these classics?
If so, where should I start?
I love classics too, but I haven't found many occasions to read them since I graduated and started blogging, as so many are long and just take longer to read. I am going to try to read some more this year, though!
ReplyDeleteMiddlemarch, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, and Vanity Fair are all on my mental TBR list, as are A Passage to India, Great Expectations, and Agnes Grey.
And those covers are just the prettiest ever. I want them!
I've read and enjoyed both The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and The Woman in White. They're both pretty revolutionary for their time. One on social themes and commenting on women's roles and rights in Victorian England the other as an early detective novel. Middlemarch is on my TBR and I'd like to get to Cranford and Wives & Daughters sometime. Maybe Little Dorrit too (love those miniseries). Also those covers are all lovely, one could become quite obsessed with them. Dracula is on my classics TBR.
ReplyDeleteI enjoy reading classics! All of the classics I have read, I have loved and I really need to read more of them. I Especially want to read Jane Eyre, after reading a fantastic retelling of it called Keeping Katea couple weeks ago!
ReplyDeleteThese editions are so gorgeous... I only read Vanity Fair from your list and I liked it very much. It's a hefty one, though, so you'll need time and determination to get through it ;)
ReplyDeleteI made a resolution to read more classics this year, so this post is a great addition to my tbr!
This is my TTT for this week (fantasy heroes): http://ofdragonsandhearts.com/?p=1265
The only one on your list that I've read is Villette, which was tough for me, but I am glad I read it. Lucy Snowe is a prickly character who really tries to keep the reader at a distance, which was hard for me. I am hoping to read The Tenant of Wildfell Hall this year as part of a reading challenge I'm doing. I'm also hoping to reread Frankenstein this year. I have never been great at reading the classics for fun, but it really is just a matter of finding the right ones for me!
ReplyDeleteI love a good classic. I'm going to try and read at least ten this year. I recently read A Study in Scarlet actually, it was a good short story but I think it wasn't enough Sherlock Holmes for me to connect with. I do however love The Portrait of A Lady. It's long but has a great payoff. It's not your typical Regency Romance and I liked that. Great topic and great choices. Enjoy!
ReplyDeleteCassi @ My Thoughts Literally
I LOVED Little Dorrit! Really, really good! The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall was also really good, but very dark.
ReplyDeleteI haven't read Wives and Daughters yet, but Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South is one of my favorite books.
Em @ http://theyabookbutterfly.blogspot.com/
I haven't read any of those particular classics but I've got four of the ones you've listed sitting on my physical TBR pile: Villette, The Woman in White, Wives and Daughters, and The Portrait of a Lady. I find classics, especially of the enormous size as many of those are, to be easier to get through when you do them as a buddy read. They keep you motivated and classics are usually easier to understand when you have some back and forth with someone else who is reading it alongside you. [:
ReplyDeleteI used to read classics all the time, but I honestly can't remember the last time I cracked one open. It's been years! I read a few Henry James novels in high school, including The Portrait of a Lady (pretty sure I wrote a research paper on that one), but I haven't read any of the others on your list. I know I own a bunch, so I'll have to take a good hard look at my bookshelf and add some to my TBR for 2015.
ReplyDeleteMost of these are on my list as well. I made an attempt at Villette, but I didn't love it nearly as much as I loved Jane Eyre despite several people saying Villette was better. Hope you get to some of these soon! :)
ReplyDeleteWhat a fantastic topic for Top Ten Tuesday!! I love this list, and I love those Penguin editions. My first choice would be The Woman in White--it's one of those books that keeps you turning the pages, whereas some other classics, like Middlemarch, take more work (you know what I mean!). Of course, Middlemarch is WONDERFUL. I LOVE The Woman in White--I discovered it when I was studying in London for the first time and had such a ball reading it. Then I would say The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, then Portrait of a Lady, then Villette, then Middlemarch! I loved Villette, but there was a certain point in the book when it really got going for me. Portrait of a Lady was a book club pick and we had such a fabulous discussion after it. So many good books in this list! Can't wait to hear what you choose first. I still need to read Cranford and Little Dorrit.
ReplyDelete-Katie @ Bookish Illuminations (@KatePoseyPhd)
I read A Study in Scarlet last year, or the year before, and I really liked it. I am hoping to get to some more of the stories this year.
ReplyDeleteI vote we read Middlemarch, Vanity Fair and A Study in Scarlet together this year. Yes? I also admire your love for classics. While I do occasionally get the urge to read classics, it's very rare and not a regular thing, though I do hope I can form a habit of reading more than usual this year!
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