Jason’s Comments (group member since Nov 26, 2012)

Jason’s comments from the Classics Without All the Class group.

Angie, Jane Austen is not a classic author. Period, end of story. There are dozens of classic satirists, and her work does not match up with theirs--anyone who reads them can see this.

ALso I haven't checked all the previous posts or the list you already have, but here's what comes to mind:

1) You must put aside the ban on poetry because THe Iliad is the single greatest book ever written, and much (all?) of the great literature is based off of both that and The Odyssey. Both are translated into prose by Samuel Butler, and thus don't really serve as poetry, though recognizing dactylic hexameter is part of understanding them.

2. Once you do that, you'll recognize that you should read Beowulf, The Song of Roland, Troilus and Criseyde, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, El Cid, The Niebelungenlied--medieval epics carry the most bang for the buck. Also while we're at poetry (often translated into prose, which makes them into novels), you should read The Decameron, The Canterbury Tales, Virgil's Aeneid, Dante's Divine Comedy, The Pharsalia, Paradise Lost, and Paradise Regain'd (though you can't understand Milton without reading his political works). I'm guessing Lucretius' On the Nature of Things is too philosophical for this group. Also Le Morte D'Arthur (Malory)--can't skip Arthurian legend. FOr the philosophical background of the medieval works, look at Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy, which is itself presented as a piece of classical fiction.

3. As far as satirical novels go, one should start with Rabelais (Pantagruel and Gargantua) and Cervantes (Don Quixote), and then also Swift (not only Gulliver's Travels, but also The Battle of the Books and his shorter essays as well) and Fielding (both Tom Jones and Joseph Andrews). Then you might look at Sterne (Tristram Shandy) and Pope (The Dunciad). Spare yourself Dickens, it's a waste. But between Cervantes and Swift the voice of satire changes, because Pascal writes THe Provincial Letters. Read that too.

4. At the same time that English satire came to life, the English travel narrative also developed; Robinson Crusoe is a must. One also should look at Treasure Island. One might look at Voltaire's Candide, because he was an Englishman in a Frenchman's body. Same goes for Montesquieu's The Persian Letters. Also, though it's not a travel narrative, Montaigne's Essays provide a lot of background philosophy for them.

5. Now, in terms of American literature...one must read Walden. Also one must read Twain--lots of him. Old Times on the Mississippi, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg. And one must read The Scarlet Letter (built on The Odyssey) as well as The House of the Seven Gables. And one must read The Red Badge of Courage (built on Iliad and Odyssey as well as Nietzsche's philosophy). And one should read Emerson's essays and also Representative Men (though we've cut out nonfiction here, too). And one should also read Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. And also Poe's short stories (especially The Cask of Amontillado, Murder in the Rue Morgue, THe Imp of the Perverse, The Masque of the Red Death, The Tell-Tale Heart).

6. Science Fiction: Frankenstein (again requires having read The Odyssey) and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

7. For Dostoevsky I think it goes without saying that Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov are his best works. The Idiot is good, but not at the same level.

8. Ancient histories are very much like novels, rather than like history books. It's worth considering Herodotus' Histories, Livy's account of the rise of Rome, much of Plutarch's work, Suetonius' The Twelve Caesars, and especially Xenophon's The Persian Expedition in that light. One might also read The Annals of Imperial Rome (Tacitus) and The Histories--same reasons. And also Florentine Histories (Machiavelli), though he is closer to a modern historian.

I think this is plenty for now. That's 51 of the greatest books ever written, and another dozen or so short stories, so that'll keep most of you occupied for a full year.

Totally understand if Principia Mathematica doesn't go on everyone's list lol.

Also blanked completely on Brave New World (Huxley) and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (Joyce). Would suggest Ulysses as well. I also highly suggest Hemingway's short stories--"The Killers" in particular--and The Master and Margarita (Bulgakov).

Jeane wrote: "Jason wrote: "In no particular order:

For Whom the Bell Tolls--Hemingway
John Brown's Body--Steven Vincent Benet
1984--Orwell
Light in August--Faulkner
History of the English-Speaking Peoples--Win..."

In no particular order:

For Whom the Bell Tolls--Hemingway
John Brown's Body--Steven Vincent Benet
1984--Orwell
Light in August--Faulkner
History of the English-Speaking Peoples--Winston Churchill
The Love of the Last Tycoon--Fitzgerald
Saint Joan--George Bernard Shaw
The Crucible--Arthur Miller
The Education of Henry Adams--Henry Adams
The Decline of the West--Oswald Spengler
Principia Mathematica--Bertrand Russell
Relativity--Einstein