[ SECRET POST #3986 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #3986 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 51 secrets from Secret Submission Post #571.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

... but don't just say that you hate us. Tell us WHY!

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

Wuthering Heights. Dry writing first and foremost, although some of that was the era. Even my professor didn't seem to like it.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

Same. Writing is really dry, the whole story-with-in-a-story framing device makes it worse and none of the main characters are very likeable or interesting, IMO.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

I don't hate it, but I also never saw it as a beautiful tragic romance. It's a weirdly voyeuristic series of glimpses into the lives of these people who are very far from the saintly protagonists you find in every other book of that era.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

This was going to be my answer! I actually like a lot of literary classics, but I just can't through Wuthering Heights. I have tried to read it three separate times and each time I give up, frustrated and bored to tears. Its frustrating because I think the themes are kind of interesting, I just can't get through it, and I've had so many people rave about it to me, it just makes me feel like I'm missing something :/

(I had a similar experience with Jane Eyre. Why can't I read the Brontës?)

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

I hated Wuthering Heights because I couldn't connect with any of the characters. I just wanted someone to root for, but I couldn't stand any of them.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[philstar22]

Yes. Also unlikeable characters. All of them.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[kaijinscendre]

All of Shakespeare. I could never really get a hold of the language so it made them very frustrating to read.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[replicantangel]

I have two - Catcher in the Rye and The Scarlet Letter.

Holden is obnoxious and unlikeable. Yes, he's a teenager, but there are loads of books with teenaged main characters on journeys about discovering life where they aren't totally gormless. He just wanders around, making poor decisions and being generally abusive, especially towards women (yes, in fairness, he is also the victim at times). The plot is just not there for me. I don't know. Maybe I just don't get Salinger's point, because I certainly don't see one.

The Scarlet Letter is just boring and sanctimonious. I get the message, but I have problems with how Hawthorne is trying to convey it. Yes, part of the problem is I'm reading a very old book in the modern era, but still. I don't see why school children are continually subjected to that dreary thing.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

This probably doesn't count as a literary classic but I had to read it for school so...

Dune. I fucking hate religious bullshit in my sci-fi.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[type_wild]

Effi Briest has got to have the most effed up pacing in the history of ever, and TBH I don't get why it's even considered a classic in the first place. Kinda suspect German literature might've been somewhat of a vaacum between romanticism and (what corresponds to) modernism, and Effi Briest is just somehow the best that's around to represent the period or whatever.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[feotakahari]

I’ve already spilled volumes of ink over my hate for Nathaniel Hawthorne, so I’ll try something different this time. A Separate Peace completely failed to grab my attention. I got the impression the book was written by and for a specific generation of Americans who grew up during World War II, and I couldn’t relate to the main character’s mindset and experiences.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

I had to read L’Étranger and take an oral exam on it as part of some advanced IB French requirement, and I HATED the book and its main character. I utterly sucked at French (it's a miracle I even passed the advance level at all) so having to read a book I found so unlikable made dealing with the language that much harder. If he were a real person, I guess the main character might be clinically depressed, or something, but as a fictional character I wanted to beat him over the head. I don't have a lot of patience for that kind of emotionally detached, life is meaningless, the universe is indifferent, it's absurd to even bother with anything attitude. Yes, the universe is indifferent. Get over it and find something constructive to do with your time.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

Great Expectations.

It's frustrating, because there's a good story buried in there under a pile of Dickensian padding. Also, we're stuck in the POV of the least interesting and least likeable character. I always got the feeling that there was a better novel happening off-screen.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

I didn't get anything more out of actually reading the entirety of The Lord of the Flies or Animal Farm than I did from reading the summaries. I hate allegorical novels.

We get it. You have a point. Beat that metaphor like an actual dead horse.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[mrs_don_draper]

I enjoyed the chapters about Grapes of Wrath that focused on the family more than the chapters that were allegories for how the government/capitalism was destroying the middle and lower classes. I did enjoy the book over all, though.

I really disliked Mrs. Dalloway for the same reason the Anon didn't like To the Lighthouse. I couldn't seem to follow her thoughts at all, which made my quizzes on each chapter difficult. I'm not much of a Virginia Woolf fan.

I read most of Scarlet Letter, but the ending kind of lost my interest. I remember my teacher saying it was "scandalous" because she had sex outside of her marriage, and I was disappointed that there was no sex in the book other than that she had a magical daughter.

I liked Handmaid's Tale A LOT, but it left a lot to be desired in back-story. How did they end up that way? Beyond just "everyone in Congress was killed," I mean. And what was going on in the rest of the world? In all American-centric dystopias, I always assume the rest of the world is perfectly fine and going about a normal day since America is always super fucked up in general. But I'd still like to see that in the book!

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[sparrow_lately]

I’m so sorry, everyone, but I just can’t get into Moby-Dick.

Oh, and A Seperate Peace is just bad.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[fishnchips]

Goethe's "The Sorrows of Young Werther". A whole book in letter format about a guy whining about his unfortunate love life until he kills himself. Ugh. No.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

I can't stand Jane Eyre. I find Jane kind of boring and Rochester is a jerk and that section with missionaries goes on forever.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[rosehiptea]

I already went off about Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man but I also really, really hate Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Huge amounts of description of the countryside for no damn reason and some really unlikable characters (not all of whom were supposed to be unlikable.)

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[dahli]

It's in spanish, but "El Tunel".

Talk about unlikeable protagonists, though ngl the drama and seeing where their horrible choices took them was interesting.

Dante's Divine Comedy, thought this is more a love and hate relationship. The book reads as a better-than-thou book so it could get obnoxious to read at times, but then you find out it was indeed written as a better-than-thou book against the church. I can't find it right now but it was basically Dante sticking it to the church for kicking him out (they later on took him in).


There was also a book I read in third grade, one of those "make your own adventure" book where I ended up getting killed by asteroids in the end. Screw that book, it put me off from reading for a long time because of how traumatized I was.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[cakemage]

I used to joke that The Old Man and the Sea was so dry that by the time I finished reading it I was dehydrated. I really can't stand any of Hemingway's writing because of how dry and plain it is, never mind his misogynistic tendencies. I do respect his love of his cats, though. Not enough to take "hating hemingway" off of my LJ/DW interests, but still.

Also on my "hating authors" interest list is Jack Kerouac, as I read On the Road for my Mid-Century Masculinity course about 8 years ago and hated every page of it. It was rushed, disjointed and the main characters were unlikable, selfish assholes.

I also have "hating joseph conrad" on the list, 'cause I think Heart of Darkness is overrated racist shit.

Ayn Rand is also on that list (I probably don't have to go into too much detail as to why), though really I pity her more than I hate her. It must have really sucked for her to go through life as such a joyless shit-pail.

Speaking of shitty writing, I'd probably better get back to work on my Yuletide fic...

Candide by Voltaire

[(Anonymous)]

I had to read it in a class for college. It was supposed to satire, but damn if it didn't read like the worst parody mixed with terrible erotica.

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[(Anonymous)]

... but don't just say that you hate us. Tell us WHY!

Classic literature be like, "You got a problem with us? You say it to our face!"

Re: Tell us that one literary classic novel you hate...

[greghousesgf]

I was out all day yesterday so I'm late to this party but god do I hate Ethan Frome. Ethan is a jerk, Mattie's a fucking airhead, we're clearly supposed to hate Zeena but I just feel sorry for her, the closest they come to a romantic or sexy scene is over a pile of dirty dishes, Ethan and Mattie spend the entire book doing nothing but moaning over their situation until they decide to do the dumbest thing possible which is commit suicide, which they do in the dumbest way possible which is ride a sled downhill and deliberately hit a tree, so they're both paralyzed and poor Zeena gets stuck caring for them. FUCK. THIS. BOOK.