The Classics Club is hosted by Jillian from A Room of One's Own. The basic premise is to read at least 50 classics in five years. The definition of classic is very loose, and basically encompasses the usual suspects, such as Dickens or Austen, but also any book that you believe is a classic. A classic book or story is not easily defined. To me, it means those books usually termed as "classics", in addition to, those books that resonate or have meaning to me. For example, The Outsiders, by S.E, Hinton had a profound impact on my young life. I easily identified with the Greasers, the have-nots.
I am also a big fan of science fiction, so I included several sci-fi titles on the list. Mostly this list consists of books I've always wanted to read; what I have always considered classics. I also own quite a few of these titles, so it serves two purposes. Reading classics and reading from my bookshelves.
This page will serve as my tracking page for the classics I will read. If I start a classic and it stinks and I can't finish it, I will substitute something else. I've already started a substitute list at the bottom of the original list and will add to this this as I think of classics I missed.
My date range for this reading list is April 1, 2012 to March 31, 2017. (Wow so far into the future...weird!).
As for personal prizes for milestones, I don't have any. Reading books = fun! That's my prize, plus the personal satisfaction I will receive upon completing this club.
Jenny's list of 60 Classics
- Diary of Anne Frank - Anne Frank
- Red Badge of Courage - Stephen Crane
- Divine Comedy - Dante
- The Three Musketeers - Alxandre Dumas
- Middlemarch - George Elliot
- Bleak House - Charles Dickens [post one] [post two]
- Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
- Behind a Mask - Louisa May Alcott (short story)
- Romance of Tristan and Iseult - ?? (short story)
- 1984 - George Orwell
- Animal Farm - George Orwell
- Beloved - Tony Morrison
- Lady Chatterley's Lover - D.H. Lawrence
- East of Eden - Steinbeck
- The Princess Bride - William Goldman (Self proclaimed fairy tale classic)
- The Best of H.P. Lovecraft: Bloodcurdling Tales of Horror and the Macabre
- The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway
- A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway
- Casino Royale - Ian Fleming (Self proclaimed spy classic)
- The Monk - Matthew Gregory Lewis
- Wrinkle in Time - Madeleine L'Engle
- Rebecca - Daphne duMaurier (re-read)
- The Picture of Dorian Grey - Oscar Wilde
- ?? - Guy de Maupassant (short stories)
- The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
- ?? - H.G. Wells
- Evelina - Fanny Burney
- Don Quixote - Miguel de Cervantes
- The Princess of Cleves - Contesse de La Fayette
- Fanny Hill - John Cleland
- Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
- Atonement - Ian McEwan
- Howards End - E.M. forester
- Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
- Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
- The Heart is a Lonely Hunter - Carson McCullers
- Tess of the D'ubervilles - Thomas Hardy (re-Read)
- The Castle of Otranto - Horace Walpole
- My Antonia - Will Cather
- The Great Gatsby - F.Scott Fitzgerald
- One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kesey
- Call of the Wild - Jack London
- The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
- The Joy Luck Club - Amy Tan
- The Outsiders - S.E. Hinton
- Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
- Journey to the Center of the Earth - Jules Verne
- Talented Mr. Ripley - Patricia Highsmith
- Arrow of Gold - Joseph Conrad
- Katherine - Anya Seton
- Much Ado About Nothing - Shakespere
- The Island -
- The Thornbirds - Colleen McCullough
- There Be Dragons - Sharon Kay Penman
- To Say Nothing of the Dog - Connie Willis
- Possession - A.S. Byatt
- Hedda Gabler - Henrik Ibsen
- Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
- I am Legend - Richard Matheson
- The End of Eternity - Isaac Asimov
Others that I will choose if one of the above sucks;
- The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
- Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card
