Themis-Athena added 47 books to this list. Add your votes »
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Good -- the more the merrier! :) ]]>
Themis-Athena added 73 books to this list. Add your votes »
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Themis-Athena
took the never-ending book quiz.
| questions answered: | 15695 |
| correct: | 13037 (83.1%) |
| skipped: | 3372 |
| best streak: | 103 |
| questions added: | 415 |
Wow. That was fast, Bettie -- thanks!! ]]>
That's part of what I meant -- these are books dealing with something we can all empathize with, even if we've never been married (or do live in a happy marriage) ourselves. Which is probably why it is, in turn, such a prevalent subject in literature, too.
I still wonder, though, why people seem to be particularly drawn to this topic, or these books for that matter -- is it because after having turned the last page they can happily conclude "Thank God my own bad relationship is long over and I am NOT married to a guy like Karenin myself now," or because deep down inside they're saying, "yes, that's EXACTLY how things are" (even if they're reading a novel set in 19th century Russia, which for all practical purposes couldn't possibly be any further removed from their personal circumstances)?
Of course all great literature is great because it deals with universal subjects and feelings. Put this generally, that's nothing more than a truism, though. And if you think of how many people, especially these days, principally read books in order to be entertained, you'd think they would empathize much more with a hero (or more often than not, a heroine) who in the end overcomes the challenges (s)he meets -- call it happy ending or whatever you will. (Which would certainly also be more in tune with what's understood to be a role model in modern society: we're told to learn from those who successfully overcome their challenges, not those losers who commit suicide or crawl into the farthest recesses of some dark hole to live out the rest of their lives in total oblivion.)
Not here, though; a substantial number of the books on this list, and certainly the majority of the top 10 or 15 entries, deal with people who ultimately FAIL -- for whatever reasons, but the point is still that their stories are depressing in the extreme, and even if the hero(ine) doesn't commit suicide in the end, their outlook is far from uplifting. And you would expect that their being set in a society different from our own (and, like "Anna Karenina," concerned with an in-depth analysis of that society, too -- whatever the Hollywood version, the book is about much more than Anna's own relationship tangle, after all) can't exactly add to their accessibility, either.
Now mind you, personally I do find it extremely gratifying that these books (or, for that matter, something like Sylvia Plath's "Bell Jar," which has to be one of the most depressing and yet one of the most brilliant books ever written) still enjoy the readership they have. I just wonder how they manage to beat the odds (and what that says about modern society, or at least modern society's perception of itself)? ]]>
Yes -- indeed! ]]>