Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Back to the Classics - My tentative reading list

While I procrastinate on writing my review of Colson Whitehead's Zone One, I figured I'd start putting together a list of books to read for the Back to the Classics challenge. This has proven to be more difficult than I thought. Below is my tentative list of choices. The ones that have a little story around them (because I can't stop talking) are the ones I'm fairly sure of. The ones that are a list of titles are some suggestions so I don't forget them, but those are very much up for debate. And yes, I know there's only one option under Romance but it's still tentative. I can't think of any romances so suggestions are welcome.

Any 19th Century Classic
Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
The War of the Worlds by HG Wells

Any 20th Century Classic 
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Reread a classic of your choice
Slaughterhouse-Five by Vonnegut. I read this when I was about 16, loved it, and then read a bunch of other Vonnegut (Breakfast of Champions being a favorite). But I haven't read the guy in awhile and it seems to make sense to go back to the beginning. Well beginning for me.

A Classic Play
Twelfth Night by Shakespeare. I was originally thinking of reading Midsummer but realized I should probably pick something I haven't read, not something I've read a bajillion and 12 times.

Classic Mystery/Horror/Crime Fiction -  
The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I read a few pages of this when I was trying out the iBooks app on my iPod. Now seems like a good opportunity to actually finish it.

Classic Romance
Emma by Jane Austen

A Classic translated from its original language to your native language
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov. I would have never come up with this one except my good friend has been bugging me to read this for awhile and he offered to lend me his copy for the challenge. So how could I pass that up?

Classic Award Winner
The Confederancy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk
The Hours by Michael Cunningham

Classic set in a country you (realistically speaking) will not visit during your lifetime
The Hobbit by Tolkein. I might hate myself for this. I read the first 2 LotR books and really tried to make it through RotK and couldn't do it. But I've had The Hobbit sitting on my shelf for years so I should just suck it up and read it.