In my absence from the blog for the better part of three months, I missed the last Classics Club Spin (#35) and don’t want to let another one go by without participating. I have worked through a few titles on my list in the meantime and their reviews are on the docket… if I can ever get my non-Classics Club review for The Secret History posted. Stay tuned for that in the next, oh, give or take five years. Probably before my Classics Club list is completely finished. Not guaranteed, but definitely maybe.
But of making many books there is no end, and reviews requiring writing seem similarly interminable, so I still want to keep reading momentum going by doing this spin.
Looking back at my Classics Club list, I haven’t read even one selection from my “Poetry, Verse, and Plays” section, so all eight of those titles went into the mix to boost their chances. I have read one title from each of the sections “Novellas and Short Story Collections” and “Essays and Treatises” but I figured we should keep them in the game so I threw in 50% of the remaining titles from each (two titles from “Novellas,” one title from “Essays”). The nine remaining entries are randomly pulled from the novels I haven’t started yet.
Put it all together (again, randomly), and here’s what we got:
- Leaves of Grass (1855) by Walt Whitman
- The Idiot (1869) by Fyodor Dostoevsky
- The Aeneid by Virgil
- Pygmalion (1913) by George Bernard Shaw
- The Stone Angel (1964) by Margaret Lawrence
- Love in a Time of Cholera (1985) by Gabriel García Márquez
- The Left Hand of Darkness (1969) by Ursula K. Le Guin
- Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) by Harriet Beecher Stowe (re-read)
- Indiana (1832) by George Sand
- The Dubliners (1914) by James Joyce
- Paradise Lost (1667) by John Milton
- Dune (1965) by Frank Herbert
- The Gambler (1887) by Fyodor Dostoevsky
- Barnaby Rudge (1841) by Charles Dickens
- The Communist Manifesto (1848) by Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx
- Beowulf, Unknown
- The Waste Land (1922) by T.S. Eliot
- The Iliad by Homer
- The Canterbury Tales (c. 1400) by Geoffrey Chaucer
- To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) by Harper Lee (re-read)
I honestly don’t know how I’m feeling about this list as a whole… the novels ended up being not that varied: both remaining re-reads appear as do most of the later 20th century entries that I had on my list. Currently hoping for a pick from one of the other categories to spice things up. Though I have been reading more of the 19th century ones recently so maybe these novel selections will be a change?
This has been my fourth Classics Club Spin! Check out my whole list here.
wow, you’ve got some big ones here. Of the 8 I have read, Paradis Lost is probably my favorite. Good luck!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I read part of Paradise Lost for an English class, but have always wanted to read the whole thing. I would be happy to have it come up this spin! Thanks for stopping by! I will have to check out your list, too
LikeLike
I’ve only read a couple of these. The T.S. Eliot is on my TBR (but not my CC list), so I’d be interested to know what you think of it should it come up in the spin.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’ve heard it is modernist in that it alludes to all sorts of classical literature so it can be pretentious and hard to understand–definitely will be interesting to read if I get it!
LikeLiked by 1 person
That sounds a little intimidating, but I still want to read it eventually. I’m thinking there are some religious themes in it, as well. Perhaps I’ll save it for my second CC list!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, definitely religious themes too! Eliot has an interesting career/bibliography development, though I confess to knowing little about it firsthand. Perhaps reading The Wasteland will lead to me exploring more!
LikeLiked by 1 person
My only experience with him was Murder in the Cathedral when I was in school, decades ago!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I loved The Stone Angel so I’m rooting for it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Great to hear it’s loved! Fun fact: Margaret Laurence’s hometown is about an hour away from where I grew up–I’ve been to see her house there and the graveyard where the statue is that supposedly inspired The Stone Angel. Definitely have wanted to read it ever since!
LikeLiked by 1 person
So glad for you #20!
LikeLike