A Message From Stephen: Best Novel of All Time
Dear Constant Readers: This is fun, if you're into "bracketology," or even if you're not. If you go to Best Novels of All Time on the Huffington Post, you'll see a series of face-offs (To Kill a Mockingbird versus The Great Gatsby, for instance). I urge you not only to vote, but to use Twitter and Facebook to spread the word.
BUT.
Uncle Stevie says YOU MUST NOT VOTE FOR A BOOK YOU HAVEN'T READ. Which was why I couldn't vote for Moby Dick. Everyone says it's great and blah-blah-blah, but I drown in whale-oil every time I try it. My bad, people, I admit it. So…you may have to leave some brackets entirely blank. But this way it's fair.
And no, you can't vote for one of my books, 'cause I didn't make the cut. Still…happy voting, and spread the word. I'm guessing the champ might be Great Expectations, but I've been wrong before. Once in 1972, and once…mmm…no, that time I was right.
Vote! It's a great warm-up for November!
Launch the Huffington Post
BUT.
Uncle Stevie says YOU MUST NOT VOTE FOR A BOOK YOU HAVEN'T READ. Which was why I couldn't vote for Moby Dick. Everyone says it's great and blah-blah-blah, but I drown in whale-oil every time I try it. My bad, people, I admit it. So…you may have to leave some brackets entirely blank. But this way it's fair.
And no, you can't vote for one of my books, 'cause I didn't make the cut. Still…happy voting, and spread the word. I'm guessing the champ might be Great Expectations, but I've been wrong before. Once in 1972, and once…mmm…no, that time I was right.
Vote! It's a great warm-up for November!
Launch the Huffington Post
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Tina
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Aug 23, 2012 10:34PM
I'd love to vote but I am still reeling back from the "And no, you can't vote for one of my books, 'cause I didn't make the cut" comment. How, why, they should be fired. Sigh, not one? Not even one?! How did Lolita make the cut and not even green mile, Shawshank Redemption, etc. Lolita is about a pedophile! There is nothing endearing about a pedobear! Sigh, Oh well. Best of luck to next year's voting!
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Comon Stephen, the stand makes the final 4 anyway
Sadly, I have only read one book on this list! I really need to start reading more classics!
Interesting choices they pitted against each other.
Brie wrote: "Sadly, I have only read one book on this list! I really need to start reading more classics!" do me a favor and skip lolita >.< I am surprised you haven't at leased read Emma, Invisible Man The Great Gatsby and To Kill a Mockingbird.
Oooh Great Expectations wins for me.....hands down! That was the first "serious" book I read when I was an early teen. It created a life long love of literature :)
Tina wrote: "Brie wrote: "Sadly, I have only read one book on this list! I really need to start reading more classics!" do me a favor and skip lolita >.< I am surprised you haven't at leased read Emma, Invisibl..."Tina: The Great Gatsby is the one that I did read. lol
that's funny steve, i haven't read Moby either!
The only one that I have not read is "Madame Bovary." I am going to download it tonight and read. Thank you for suggesting this link....Always,
Constant Reader
I lost interest when he wrote Huffington Post.
I've only read 1 book on that list (to kill a mockingbird), though I've read a book by the author of Great Gatsby (Benjaminn Button; hated it) so that might count. Really out of all those books there's probably like 2 that I'd even bother reading if I had the chance. What kind of shoddy best books list is that. Very disappointed.
How could the Stand or Dark Tower Series not make the cut???
Kristin wrote: "I liked Lolita.... :S"I don't know why >.< It is so disturbed, I get that I am supposed to feel bad for the guy, and understand why its hard when he is being seduced....but no I am sorry I just cannot. He is an adult, he can remove himself from temptation. Further, lusting over a child (I don't care how they are acting) is never healthy, he has serious problems and he manipulates and justifies his actions throughout the book. Perhaps the book just rubbed me the wrong way...but I throw this book with O.J.'s "If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer " in that both will forever haunt and disturb me. Looking into the abyss be wary of what looks back, I don't think I ever want to be able to relate or understand that kind of perverse mind.
Tina wrote: "Kristin wrote: "I liked Lolita.... :S"I don't know why >.< It is so disturbed, I get that I am supposed to feel bad for the guy, and understand why its hard when he is being seduced....but no I am..."
It makes me wonder if this was something the author himself dealt with in real life...Ugh!
Or maybe it is just fiction, meant to explore something taboo, a darker side of being human. Concluding that Nabokov was a pedophile because he wrote about one is a bit shortsighted.
I'm getting ready to read "The Stand" for the first time. I'm so excited that it made this list!
Hit a nerve eddy lol? no but you don't write about something and produce such convincing and quality results without doing a lot of research or discussion on it. To even think of writing about it disturbs me because at some point it was his idea or fantasy. Though fiction the novel still came out of HIS head. Further, book, paintings, music often give more insight into a persons character and soul then any other method. To not question the origin of the story from the author and think it is completely separate, that there is no cross over at all and complete compartmentalization exists is rather naive, wouldn't you say?
Hi Tina,Tina wrote: "To not question the origin of the story from the author and think it is completely separate, that there is no cross over at all and complete compartmentalization exists is rather naive, wouldn't you say?"
No, but I think there's a partial truth in there. By their nature, people are interested in their dark sides, everyone has them. If this wasn't true, there wouldn't be antagonists, no conflict, and therefore no novels. Nabokov wanted to explore one of the darkest facets of humanity available. By doing so, he had to imagine the mind of a pedophile as well as he could, construct it from the darkest crevasses of his mind. The ability to put a colorful imagination to paper makes a great writer, not a pervert.
Stephen King, who's topic we're so boldly hijacking, writes about edgy subjects all the time, and in explicit detail. Does that make him a pervert or a psychopath? If so, what does that make the people who enjoy his books?
Back to the basic topic, I read Crime and Punishment at age 14. (I would have rated that the best of all time.) Have been hooked on the classics since then. And I tried Moby at least twice and could not get past the required 50 pages (before I quit a book). Mr King, you are my most favorite author of our time! The first I read was "On Writing." Inspirational and educational. Thank you so much for sharing your creativity with us.
If I can't vote for The Stand, what's the point?
i agree with Eddy. it is a testament to the greatness of a writer if they have us wondering where the characters' personality leaves off and where theirs truly begins; the willing suspension of "disbelief" allows us to accept either reality. it's like the proof of how good an actor is - they can be so natural you think they are inhabiting the character's soul simply by playing a role and making it look easy. personally i can't pick a favorite by stephen king/richard bachmann simply because i have enjoyed SO many; from Gerald's Game to From a Buick 8 and the one with the twin that had the remains of the other twin inside him (there was an automobile involved in the title perhaps?)...even the recent one that was non fiction about the red sox - superb. any writer with such an uncanny, twisted imagination is a hero of mine. how dull would life be without the stories penned by mr king? i'd be dead by now fer shure.
