John’s Comments (group member since Aug 23, 2012)

John’s comments from the Read a Classic Challenge group.

Impressive. Great job crushing this year's challenges.

Great job everyone! Keep those classics coming! We still have a few weeks to add to this year's stats.

Got a friend who likes to read classics too? Send them an invite to our Facebook or Goodreads groups. The links are on our website: http://readaclassic.weebly.com

- The Moderators

Thanks for the suggestion Lisa Ann I will pass that along to Dave for his lists

For anyone participating in our banned books theme for September, Amazon has 25 banned books including the ever popular, The Handmaid's Tale ($0.99) on sale today for Kindle.

http://www.amazon.com/b/ref=s9_al_ft_...

Z for Zachariah by Robert O'Brien. 1974, 249 Pages.
I really enjoyed this as a teen and again as an adult. Dark apocalyptic themes that play off of innocence. I am a big fan of Robert O'Brien, who is also the author of the Secret of NIMH. Read this in paperback, as I couldn't find it for Kindle.

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, 1883, 183 pages. Audiobook.
Great adventure story by one of the masters.


The Dragonbone Chair by Tad Williams - 1988, 672 pages. Not sure if this counts as a classic (I leave that to my other moderators), but I would consider it an essential epic fantasy.

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September Theme: Banned or Challenged Books

Banned Books Week is the last week in September (and actually leaks a bit into October), so we are hitching our wagon to ALA's annual tradition and doing "Banned Books Month" in our monthly themes. ALA has an excellent resource for all things Banned (or Challenged) Books at http://www.ala.org/bbooks/ and here are some highlights.

First off, each year ALA creates a "Top 10" list of the most challenged books of the last completed year (i.e. 2014 this year). Usually there are the "perennial" representatives: And Tango Makes Three, It's Perfectly Normal, and so on. The list naturally skews towards children's and YA books. However, visiting the list for this year was The Bluest Eye (Toni Morrison, 1970), so classics routinely make the list as well.

Also of interest, particularly to our group, is the "Banned or Challenged Classics" page, based on the Radcliffe Publishing Course 100: http://www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlyc...

I encourage you to explore the whole site if you have the opportunity!
-David (and the Moderators)

August Theme: Diaries or Letters

Hi Classic Readers,

Before we storm into September, allow me to apologize to Anne Frank and Mary Shelley for not giving them a proper introduction in August, which was our Diary/Letters month. Those fans of the epistolary classics should not feel deterred from trying one out even though the official month has passed. Examples include a diverse range of titles, from Bram Stoker's Dracula to Stephen King's Carrie. The format was especially popular in the 18th century, with Samuel Richardson and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe being especially exemplary of the format.
-David (on behalf of the moderators)

I also recommend:
The Berlin Diaries by Marie Vassiltchikov

The Lisle Letters for any fans of Tudor England (6 vol version or 1 vol abridged version).

The letters of Abelard & Heloise: http://sacred-texts.com/chr/aah/index...

The book of Margery Kempe: http://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/publ...

July Theme: Canadian Literature

Happy July everyone! Although I've completed all my traveling for the season last month, my brain was on vacation until now and I am only now getting our theme for the month broadcasted.

First, a bit of advice. Do not Google "Canadian classics" unless you want to learn about cigarettes. To help you out, here are some helpful links to get you acquainted with the literary traditions of our neighbor to the north (for some/most of us).

From Qwiklit - contains a few more recent titles near the end.
http://qwiklit.com/…/the-great-write-...

More of an author list from the National Post:
http://news.nationalpost.com/…/ten-au...…

The 50 Greatest, according to Ballast magazine (half fiction, half NF, includes a few more recently published titles):
http://ballastmag.com/…/the-50-greate...

June Theme: Science Fiction & Fantasy

June has the honor of being the month that is a favorite among your moderators (well, two of them for sure) - Science Fiction & Fantasy classics. Although there are a few titles that can be retroactively considered science fiction (Frankenstein), the genre is fairly young and most of the classic literature is firmly in the 20th century. To whet your appetite, here are some attractive lists of the Masterworks series for Science Fiction and Fantasy. The series are compiled by Orion, a British publisher, so there is some slant toward what may have been a bigger deal in the UK. For example, I didn't know who Olaf Stapleton was.

SF Masterworks:
https://www.worldswithoutend.com/list...

Fantasy Masterworks:
https://www.worldswithoutend.com/list....…

For the super-fans, check out their Gateway series, an extensive collection of more obscure classics:
http://www.sfgateway.com/books (No fancy covers here!)

May Theme: Books about a Journey

Hi folks, it's May, the time where we start thinking about where we want to go, what we want to do, and, most importantly, what we're going to read for the summer! This month we designated "Books About A Journey" as our theme. As you will see from the sample list below, a journey can take many forms.

Homer: The Odyssey
Virgil: The Aeneid
Dante: The Divine Comedy
Miguel de Cervantes: Don Quixote
Jonathan Swift: Gulliver’s Travels
Mark Twain: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Joseph Conrad: Heart of Darkness
Jack London: The Call of the Wild
Agatha Christie: Murder on the Orient Express
J.R.R. Tolkien: The Hobbit
Jack Kerouac: On The Road
C.S. Lewis: Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Hermann Hesse: Siddhartha
Robert Pirsig: Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Antonie de Saint-Exupery: The Little Prince
Hunter S. Thompson: Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas

When searching for lists, I found using the term "quest" helpful, but use care when using "travel". Half the time it took me to lists of beach reads, or books that are good to read if you are traveling to a certain place, though there isn't much of a journey in the book itself.

Anytime in the year is fine. Welcome!

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O'Brien, 1971, 233 pages.

Took Turns reading this with my daughter at bedtime. I logged it two years ago, so I am only counting toward her books read. Great book. We are currently watching the movie, so I guess it also counts for this month's theme.

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April's Theme: Classics adapted into movies!

From Dave: "Some nice person on IMDB put together a list of classics adapted to film and/or TV. This is probably as good a place as any to start our April theme.

Coming to theaters in 2015: Frankenstein (again), and Far From the Madding Crowd.

Feel free to suggest more. Even better, make April your chance to read the book one of your favorite movies in based on. (Count of Monte Cristo, anybody?)

IMDB 50 Classics:
http://www.imdb.com/list/ls050543383/

Here is another list:
http://www.listology.com/list/classic...

Here are the long awaited results of the 2014 Read a Classic Challenge.

Also posted on:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/60542...
Our Blog: http://readaclassic.weebly.com/blog

Overall Totals
99 = Total Readers
766 = Books Logged
576 = Separate Books Logged (not including repeats)
212,656 = Pages Read

Most Read Books
The Blue Fairy Book 10
Jane Eyre 7
Wuthering Heights 6
Nineteen Eighty Four 6
Voyage of the Dawn Treader 5
Little House in the Big Woods 5
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe 5
The Martian Chronicles 5
The Great Gatsby 5

Most Read Authors
Jane Austen 15
Ray Bradbury 8
Charlotte Bronte 7
Frank L. Baum 6
Jacob Abbot 5
Louisa May Alcott 5
Lloyd Alexander 5
Maya Angelo 5

Longest Books
2487 pages = Bible (American Standard Version)
1796 pages = The Complete Sherlock Holmes
1472 pages = Gone with the Wind
1462 pages = The Count of Monte Cristo
1392 pages = War and Peace

The goal of Read a Classic Challenge isn't to read the most books or page numbers, but those statistics can be fun. Overall many returning readers posted some solid stats this year.

In statistics, outliers are the people/data points that fall well outside the normal curve. This year John K. falls into this category having logged an astounding 232 classics adding up to 49,432 pages. We aren't sure how he finds the time, but that is some serious professional reading.

Top Readers by # of Books
John K. 232 books, 49,432 pages
Rachel 42 books, 13,330 pages
John S. 37 books, 8599 pages
Shana O. 30 books, 6711 pages
Brian S. 27 books, 7673 pages
Bonnie W. 24 books, 6954 pages
Martha J. S. 21 books, 8244 pages
Crystal W. 19 books, 6631 pages
Betty J. 18 books, 4805 pages
Aaron M. 18 books, 3854 pages
Deb C. B. 17 books, 5341 pages
Shirley K. 17 books, 4165 pages
Patti St. J. M. 16 books, 4011 pages
Angelique 15 books, 3,486 pages
Megan R. H. 14 books, 3619 pages
Liz H. 13 books, 3431 pages
David K. 11 books, 3814 pages
Pamela B. P. 11 books, 3634 pages

Top Readers by Page Numbers
John K. 232 books, 49,432 pages
Rachel 42 books, 13,330 pages
John S. 37 books, 8599 pages
Martha J. S. 21 books, 8244 pages
Brian S. 27 books, 7673 pages
Bonnie W. 24 books, 6954 pages
Shana O. 30 books, 6711 pages
Crystal W. 19 books, 6631 pages
Deb C. B. 17 books, 5341 pages
Betty J. 18 books, 4805 pages
Shirley K. 17 books, 4165 pages
Patti St. J. M. 16 books, 4011 pages
Aaron M. 18 books, 3854 pages
David K. 11 books, 3814 pages
Megan R. H. 14 books, 3619 pages
Pamela B. P. 11 books, 3634 pages
Angelique 15 books, 3,486 pages
Liz H. 13 books, 3431 pages

Group Reads
10 = The Blue Fairy Book by Andrew Lang
5 = The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
3 = Silmarillion by J. R. R. Tolkein
3 = In God We Trust (All Others Pay Cash) by Jean Shepherd

Earliest Books
Homer's Illiad & Odyssey 800 BC.

Books By Time Period
B.C. = 10
0-1000 A.D. = 16
1300-1500 = 3
1500s = 25
1600s = 23
1700s = 20
1800s = 230
1900s = 439


Geographic Stats
Readers by Country (3 Countries)
France = 1 reader, 1 book
UK = 2 readers, 4 books
USA =60 Readers, 761 books
Unknown = 36 Readers, 100 books

Readers by US States (22 Known States)
CA = 8
DE = 2
FL = 1
GA = 1
ID = 2
IL = 3
IN = 1
KS = 4
MA = 2
MD = 2
MI = 1
MO = 1
NC = 1
NH = 2
NY =7
OR = 3
PA = 1
RI = 1
TN = 2
VA = 10
VT = 1
WA = 1
Unknown = 25

Top Locations with the Most Readers
VA = 10
CA = 8
NY =7
KS = 4

Hope that you enjoyed all these statistics. Keep on reading and be sure to encourage others to join in too!

- Your friendly neighborhood Moderators.

March's Theme is Women Authors for Women's History Month. Recycling last year's list because of limited time. Got a good book or author suggestion or recommendation for Women's History Month? Add it in the comments.

Suggested Reading for March
Women’s History Month

Pre-1700
• Sappho
• St. Hildegard of Bingen
• St. Catherine of Siena
• Julian of Norwich
• Margery Kempe
• Juana Ines de la Cruz

18th Century
• Mary Wollstonecraft
• Anna Laetitia Barbauld

19th Century
• Louisa May Alcott
• Kate Chopin
• Emily Dickinson
• Harriet Beecher Stowe
• Jane Austen
• Mary Shelley
• Anne Bronte
• Charlotte Bronte
• Emily Bronte
• George Eliot
• Elizabeth Gaskell

20th Century
• Edith Wharton
• Willa Cather
• Virginia Woolf
• Agatha Christie
• Doris Lessing
• Iris Murdoch
• Zora Neale Hurston
• Sylvia Plath
• Katherine Anne Porter
• S. E. Hinton
• Margaret Mitchell
• Laura Ingalls Wilder
• Harper Lee
• Pearl S. Buck
• Ayn Rand
• Carson McCullers
• Flannery O’Connor
• Toni Morrison
• Maya Angelou
• Octavia Butler
• Ursula K. Le Guin
• Anne Tyler
• Joyce Carol Oates
• Joan Didion
• Marion Zimmer Bradley
• Amy Tan
• Madeline L’Engle
• Sandra Cisneros
• Margaret Atwood

Various “Best Of” Lists around the Internet:
http://www.thebookescape.com/Feminist...
http://neurotaylor.com/2013/02/04/50-...
http://www.nypl.org/.../celebrating-w......
Contributions of women to pre-modern Asian literature included here:
http://people.cohums.ohio-state.edu/....

Monthly themes are now located in the message above.

One of our more popular themes from last year is back for February's Black History Month.

Fiction
Chinua Achebe – Things Fall Apart
Alice Walker – The Color Purple
Ralph Ellison – Invisible Man
James Baldwin – Go Tell It On the Mountain
Zora Neale Hurston – Their Eyes Were Watching God
Richard Wright – Native Son
Toni Morrison – Beloved
Octavia Butler – Kindred
Samuel Ray Delaney, Jr. - Babel-17

Non-Fiction
W.E.B. Du Bois -- Souls of Black Folk
Booker T. Washington – Up From Slavery
Frederick Douglass – Narrative of the Life Of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave
Richard Wright – Black Boy
Alex Haley – Roots
The Autobiography of Malcolm X (w/Alex Haley)
Why We Can’t Wait – Martin Luther King, Jr.
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings – Maya Angelou

Drama/Poetry
August Wilson – Fences
Lorraine Hansberry – A Raisin in the Sun
Langston Hughes – Collected Poems
James Weldon Johnson – The Book of American Negro Poetry
Claude McKay – Complete Poems
Sterling Brown – Collected Poems
Phyllis Wheatley – Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral

Websites for more suggestions and reading ideas:
http://www.playbill.com/features/arti...
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/bhmlit...
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/bhmpeo...
http://www.nypl.org/locations/tid/64/...
http://aalbc.com/books/thebesttitles.htm
http://aalbc.com/books/thebestauthors...

Got more suggestions? Leave them in the comments below.

Diana that is a great list of science fiction classics. Now that I am a little older I have to go back and reread Fahrenheit 451 again.

Thanks for sharing, Bob. I got a good chuckle out of your review.

Aaron, I hope you enjoyed Foundation. I really liked the subtle manipulations of Salvor Hardin which resulted in the line "Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent."

The Skull by Philip K. Dick, 1952, 24 pages. NY

I never know whether or not I like Philip K. Dick's writing. His stories are often filled with good ideas that are sparsely/poorly explained. The Skull is no exception at 24 pages, but I found it interesting. If you like stories about time traveling Assassins, Cold War Macarthyism, and religious prophets/martyrs, this one is worth a look.

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