Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion
Archived Chit Chat & All That
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How many have you read? (Reading the books on our group bookshelf)
Thanks Pink and Sue!!! A big congratulations to you, Sue - what impressive progress - and to all who have make progress with the list. May 2017 be even better!!! ;-)
I'm new to this group, but I've read 42/84. Some I read in high school - a long time ago! I read quite a few this past year. A few were childhood favorites that I've read dozens of times, like Heidi and Little Women. Hopefully I will check off a few more in 2017.
Sue wrote: "Karen wrote: "I read 40 book from are group list this year.I also have a couple beside my bed to read in the new year"
Great job Karen!"
Thank you:-)
Ok, I found the correct list. I've read 52 of 168.Here is a list of the ones I read for the first time this year.
A Tale of Two Cities
Wuthering Heights
Emma
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
The Bell Jar
Northanger Abbey
Bleak House
The Pickwick Papers
The Picture of Dorian Grey
The Scarlet Pimpernel
Great Expectations
A Tale of Two Cities was my favorite, closely followed by A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. My least favorite was easily The Bell Jar.
Everyone is doing so well with reading from our bookshelf. Congrats to all of you! Here's to reading more books in 2017!!
since I last reported (40 at beginning of August)I have dnf'd 2
and finished 6:
MountainsOfMadness - 3-star
WeHaveAlwaysLivedInTheCastle - 5star
DavidCopperfield - 3star
UnbearableLightness - 4star
TomSawyer - 3star
GulliversTravels - 2star
which puts me on 48
I counted 66 currently from the bookshelf. Too many to list, but some notable ones are:Lolita 5 stars --#1 on FAVORITES list
Moby Dick 5 stars--#2 on FAVORITES list
The Catcher in the Rye 1 star--#1 on LEAST FAVORITES list
The Stand (1978) 5 stars--#2 on STEPHEN KING FAVORITES list
The Stand (1900) 0 stars--#1 on STEPHEN KING LEAST FAVORITES list
Pride & Prejudice 3 stars--#1 on AUTHORS TO NEVER READ AGAIN list
Squire wrote: "I counted 66 currently from the bookshelf. Too many to list, but some notable ones are:Lolita 5 stars --#1 on FAVORITES list
Moby Dick 5 stars--#2 on FAVORITES list
The Catcher in the Rye 1 sta..."
Oh interesting! I'm pretty much in agreements with most of these.
Although I don't know which book you mean for this -
The Stand (1900) 0 stars--#1 on STEPHEN KING LEAST FAVORITES list
Pride and Prejudice is one of my least favourite Austen, but it was also the last novel of hers I read.
OOPS! I meant The Stand (1990). I consider them two books for a lot of reasons that I won't get into here. The 1978 version of The STand is one of King's best, but in 1990 he republished it with a whole lot of material (some which was edited out in 1978 and some which was new) to tie it more closely to his Dark Tower mythology; however, with a few exceptions, the added material really does nothing for the overall book except make it a sprawling unfocused mess. I classify it as a vanity project that every author is entitled to, but it was really unnecessary. It's just too bad the original is out of print. Millions of readers will never know how great the book once was. As for P&P, I read it after I saw the BBC production with Colin Firth (which I enjoyed immensely). It was the out-of-my-comfort-zone read for the year and I got to check Austen off my TBR. No big deal.
Squire wrote: "OOPS! I meant The Stand (1990). I consider them two books for a lot of reasons that I won't get into here. The 1978 version of The STand is one of King's best, but in 1990 he republished it with a ..."Maybe this is the reason that I thought The Stand was awesome when I first read it around 1980 or so and wasn't so impressed when I read it again last year. I knew material was added but since I couldn't compare, I didn't know specifically what was new.
Well, The Kid was new and if I'd never encountered him, I wouldn't have cared. If he was edited out in 1978, it was a good thing. If he was a new creation of King's, shame on him for unleashing him on us Constant Readers.
Hmm I wonder which version of The Stand I read. It was the first book I picked up outside of school reads in my teens, so around the early 90s and I immensely enjoyed it, but don't think I ever quite finished, nor can I now remember a single thing about it!
I'm currently at 134/171 for bookshelf reads.My latest read was-
An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde.
My review: www.goodreads.com/review/show/1846570110
Duane wrote: "I'm currently at 134/171 for bookshelf reads.My latest read was-
An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde.
My review: www.goodreads.com/review/show/1846570110"
Great job!
I have read 42/168 (listed as of 22February), and am currently reading my 43rd. I'm in awe of Emily and Duane.
I just enriched my top-ten-votes with three 5-Star reads:Mrs Dalloway
Maltese Falcon
Beloved
(54 total btw)
Well done everyone! It's great to see how you're progressing through our classics shelf!I thought I'd better check my own progress again, as it's been 5 months since I last updated, when I'd read 95 books. I'm now up to 106 and I'm currently reading another 3, so it's very slow progress for me, but at least the number is creeping up!
Looks like 137/174 for me at the moment.Sadly, I let a few Old School reads slip by without reading them, so I haven't been keeping pace the last few months.
Pink wrote: "Hmm I wonder which version of The Stand I read. It was the first book I picked up outside of school reads in my teens, so around the early 90s and I immensely enjoyed it, but don't think I ever qui..."I know I *started* the Stand. I'm 99% sure it was the 1990 version. Beyond a lot of people died, I don't recall a darn thing about it. I don't even recall if I finished it. I *do* recall not enjoying it all that much.
Myst wrote: "I *do* recall not enjoying it all that much. "That is sad. The OOP 1978 version is so much better. But I've always lived my life by something my father taught me: You can't change the way people feel about you, you can only change the way you present yourself. So I must give deference to King; he can present The Stand the way he chooses.
But I don't have to like it.
I have read 43/174. Some of my favorites are:
-The brother karamazov
-The unbearable lightness of being
-War and peace
-One hundred years of solitude
You are all inspiring. I'm still at 45. Almost done with The Three Musketeers, and will read The Count of Monte Cristo later this year, so that will be 47. I have this feeling that I won't make fast enough progress to keep up with books the group adds, but I will have fun trying ...!
Kathleen, I'm always treading water and barely keeping up with the books we add to our shelves! Never mind, it means I have lots of good books still to look forward to!
Same! I'm usually only able to keep up with new additions because I've already read about half of the books picked. The months where there's multiple full-length books I haven't read are generally the months I slip a bit further behind.
Pink wrote: "Good luck Emily, you're doing amazing already!"Thank you! The nice thing about reading "classics" is that there is a strong likelihood that I'll like them, since they've already been judged by many others to be awesome books. :) So I'm very much looking forward to reading the others on this list.
Pink wrote: "Well done everyone! It's great to see how you're progressing through our classics shelf!I thought I'd better check my own progress again, as it's been 5 months since I last updated, when I'd read..."
It's hard to read these at a super fast rate since so many are "long reads"!! Finishing a long read and then going to a shorter read makes that shorter read fly by, though.
Going through the list, 87. There are some I started and discarded as well. It is also likely I read some of them and have forgotten. I did that with The Good Earth (not on that list, I don't think but a classic). I was sure I'd never read it, but when I read it so I could teach it to my eldest who was still homeschooling her freshman year of high school, I realized I'd read it before and remembered the actual story, just not the title or author.Some of them I will never read because I don't like the authors or because they are Russian and I just do not like novels that dark anymore.
But there are books there I do want to read someday!
I went through the list and so far I have read 31/172 (18%) and two more books are currently in the works.
Melanti wrote: "Looks like 137/174 for me at the moment.Sadly, I let a few Old School reads slip by without reading them, so I haven't been keeping pace the last few months."
Good job Melanti. I'm missing some of the old school books as well, like Don Quixote, The Count of Monte Cristo, 2 or 3 of the Russian novels, and a couple of Dickens.
Duane wrote: "Good job Melanti. I'm missing some of the old school books as well, like Don Quixote, The Count of Monte Cristo, 2 or 3 of the Russian novels, and a couple of Dickens. ..."There's about 10 or so books from the shelves that I know I won't ever read, including Dickens. I hated having to read him in school, so if I wasn't forced to read something back then, I'm not going go force myself now.
I've skipped most of the longer Russian stuff and Les Mis. I put a couple of those on my Old & New Challenge for the year to help prod me to tackle them.
Counting the ones I have currently started (I am always reading at least 10 books at one time) I have read/am reading 44...? Aw crap, I lost count! Maybe 46....Still, there are so so many 'WANT TO READ's on this list! I love me some classics! --Jen from Quebec :0)
56, I think! Although not every one of them is marked here as "read". I decided last year to mark as "read" only the books I've read since joining Goodreads in 2013. That way I'll re-read the ones I read in high school.
In April 2016 my status was 92/142 which is 65%
Today my status is 133/175 which is 76%
So, I have made progress in percentile.
There are 34 books on the list that I have on the TBR and really mean to read. There are 8 books on the list that I have no desire to read, so I am not shooting for 100%. I need to make these 34 high priorities if I can.
Today my status is 133/175 which is 76%
So, I have made progress in percentile.
There are 34 books on the list that I have on the TBR and really mean to read. There are 8 books on the list that I have no desire to read, so I am not shooting for 100%. I need to make these 34 high priorities if I can.
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I also have a couple beside my bed to read in the new year"
Great job Karen!