Posted on 04/12/2013 8:28:36 PM PDT by MNDude
There are hundreds of books that are considered classics and probably even more over-hyped ones on bestsellers lists. Which do you think are the three most overrated books?
It was like listening to your dad reading a story to you.
But The Sun Also Rises was really hard to get through. It wasn't until I read the Cliff's notes that I picked up on the whole "impotence" theme. I did NOT get it when I read it. Unless you know that going in, it makes no sense whatsoever.
BTW, some writers nail it with short stories, but suck at full-length novels. Like John Updike.
“Babbit” was made into a charming movie in 1934. Warner Bros., with Guy Kibbee.
Everything by Ralph Waldo Emerson. Had to read his work in high school here in New England.
The Last of The Mohicans was unreadable. Long, boring and did I mention long & boring. And lets not forget boring. And long.
One of the few movies that was much better than the book.
Ethan Frome: Not to be read by anyone that is prone to depression. If more people read this horror story suicides would skyrocket.
“Catcher in the Rye” hands down.
I can still remember my report on Catcher in The Rye form High School. I declared that Holden Caufield was a self absorbed Manic Depressive whose rambling narration about his inability to get it together wasted several hours of both our lives. The teacher responded and I quote: “Thank you for your diagnosis Dr. Roth.” I got an A. Almost thirty years later I still get a smile thinking about that red sentence scrawled across the margins of my paper.
“Catch-22” is a reworking of “The Fateful Adventures of the Good Soldier Švejk in the World War” by Jaroslav Hašek - Joseph Heller himself once said that he would never have written “Catch-22” had he not read “Švejk” to begin with; it was the inspiration for his book.
You might be interested to know that Mark Twain was of a similar opinion:
50 shades of Gray; ANYTHING by Dan Brown, anything by Judith Krantz or other “Romance writers.” Absolute swill, the whole lot.
Agree on Moby Dick. I forced myself to read it recently. It was a painful experience.
Yes. I was excited to take the book to read on a trip but it just made every minute of travel seem like it would never end. So many words to say so little.
The koran was compiled from bits and scraps that had been lying about for 200 years after Mo was assassinated. The book was purportedly given in two parts; the last given part is the last words of Allah and overrules anything which came before and which is in conflict.
How to tell which part is which. The easy way to tell the difference is: any verse which sounds vaguely nice is likely plagiarized from the Bible or Torah and is first given; any verse which sounds vaguely warlike or hateful is the second given. The first given is therefore discarded and should be disregarded in your service to allah who has predetermined everything down to the molecular level.
To understand what is being said you must read the Hadiths and Sunnahs which chronicle the life and sayings of Mo, these are Talibari, Muslim, Isaq and Bukhari; Hadiths are Mohammed’s word to his followers, The Sunnahs are the history of Muhammad and his motto (sic) was “Kill, kill, kill”.. Or you could safely go with just killing, converting, or collecting money from everybody who is not a muslim, or not in your sect, or not in following the particular version preached by your imam; see Victor Mordicai: “Islam operates in this way: Kill the Jews on Saturday, the Christians on Sunday, the Buddists and Hindus are pagans - so kill them first, then everybody else. Next we kill each other.”
You personally are expected to wage jihad, killing as many of the hated others as possible, going to a glorious martyrdom to Paradise, where before entering you will have to wait in line as Paradise (according to Mo) only holds 72,000. If you do not follow this path, then others are obligated to kill you.
There’s the short course on understanding and making sense of the koran. Hope this clears up you well-founded confusion.
Catcher in the Rye
Scarlet Letter
A Separate Peace
So, so terrible...
Don Quixote was horrible.
James Joyce makes you miss Don Quixote.
Dickens had good stories but got paid by the word, so was long winded and boring.
Balzac was pretty good.
At least The Old Man and the Sea had the decency to be short.
But hands down you’re never going to outdo Dumas’ Count of Monte Cristo. Great story, moves well, and reads like a summer blockbuster.
Any book containing allegory, symbolism, stream of consciousness, but not containing gratuitous violence and hardcore sex, spanning more than 10 pages, or written before yesterday can be avoided as overrated. Follow these rules and you can safely remain illiterate.
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