News:

And we're back!

Main Menu

Best 19th-century fiction?

Started by merithyn, December 14, 2011, 12:18:26 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

merithyn

I'm looking for good books to read published on or before 1910.

Suggestions?
Yesterday, upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
I wish, I wish he'd go away...

Eddie Teach

Hugo, Dostoevsky, Verne, Wells, Twain...
To sleep, perchance to dream. But in that sleep of death, what dreams may come?

fhdz

Dickens' Our Mutual Friend.

Melville's Pierre.
and the horse you rode in on

Barrister

Quote from: merithyn on December 14, 2011, 12:18:26 PM
I'm looking for good books to read published on or before 1910.

Suggestions?

What about the Good Book itself? :)
Posts here are my own private opinions.  I do not speak for my employer.

Brazen

Anything by Dickens and the Sherlock Holmes novels are an easy way in. Start reading A Christmas Carol now for a little seasonal cheer :)

Ed Anger

Quote from: Barrister on December 14, 2011, 12:27:28 PM
Quote from: merithyn on December 14, 2011, 12:18:26 PM
I'm looking for good books to read published on or before 1910.

Suggestions?

What about the Good Book itself? :)

Good fiction choice there.  :lol:
Stay Alive...Let the Man Drive

Admiral Yi

Kipling.  Kim I found boring but his short stories are great.

garbon

"I've never been quite sure what the point of a eunuch is, if truth be told. It seems to me they're only men with the useful bits cut off."
I drank because I wanted to drown my sorrows, but now the damned things have learned to swim.

Razgovory

Quote from: Admiral Yi on December 14, 2011, 12:35:07 PM
Kipling.  Kim I found boring but his short stories are great.

I like his jingoist poems.  His just-so stories are pretty fun.  Or at least when I read them.  That was a quite a bit ago.
I've given it serious thought. I must scorn the ways of my family, and seek a Japanese woman to yield me my progeny. He shall live in the lands of the east, and be well tutored in his sacred trust to weave the best traditions of Japan and the Sacred South together, until such time as he (or, indeed his house, which will periodically require infusion of both Southern and Japanese bloodlines of note) can deliver to the South it's independence, either in this world or in space.  -Lettow April of 2011

Raz is right. -MadImmortalMan March of 2017

merithyn

I've already read my way through most of Jane Austen's books, multiple Sherlock Holmes novels, Kipling's The Jungle Book, and am now on The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne.

I love Jane Austen and Sherlock Holmes (though I cringe at the constant mention of Holmes' drug addiction). The Jungle Book was cute and light, which I expected. Are most of Kipling's like that? I am entirely bored with Verne. He seems to love to get into the scientific specifics far more than I'm interested in, with entire chapters being about some scientific way to figure something out. I'll plod through the rest of this book, but I'm not thinking I'll dive into anything else of his soon.

Dickens is definitely on my list. I've read Great Expectations several times and A Christmas Carol, too. I'd like to try something different of his.

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall sounds interesting. May put that high on my list.
Yesterday, upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
I wish, I wish he'd go away...

Barrister

#10
You might enjoy Dracula and Frankenstein.

Moby Dick was rather dense, but still a good read as well.

Would you consider some Russian authors?
Posts here are my own private opinions.  I do not speak for my employer.

Richard Hakluyt

George Eliot is good, Middlemarch is probably the one to start with.

Have you considered Thomas Hardy? He can be heavy going but is usually rewarding.

For lighter stuff there are Trollope's Barsetshire Chronicles, the CofE in the 1860s.........lots of fun  :bowler:

merithyn

Quote from: Barrister on December 14, 2011, 01:03:38 PM
You might enjoy Dracula and Frankenstein.

I've read both, and enjoyed them both.

Quote
Moby Dick was rather dense, but still a good read as well.

Would you consider some Russian authors?

Read Moby Dick in college. Not something I'd do again by choice, though it wasn't really awful, just, as you say, incredibly dense.

Russian authors would be lovely if I can find the translations. :)

Quote from: Richard Hakluyt on December 14, 2011, 01:06:13 PM
George Eliot is good, Middlemarch is probably the one to start with.

Have you considered Thomas Hardy? He can be heavy going but is usually rewarding.

For lighter stuff there are Trollope's Barsetshire Chronicles, the CofE in the 1860s.........lots of fun  :bowler:


Add these to my list. I did read the Vicker of Wakefield a couple of weeks ago, which I thought was fun, especially since I've watched the modern TV show of that title. :D
Yesterday, upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
I wish, I wish he'd go away...

Valmy

Quote from: merithyn on December 14, 2011, 01:23:42 PM
Russian authors would be lovely if I can find the translations. :)

I loved this book:



So wonderfully absurd.
Quote"This is a Russian warship. I propose you lay down arms and surrender to avoid bloodshed & unnecessary victims. Otherwise, you'll be bombed."

Zmiinyi defenders: "Russian warship, go fuck yourself."

The Brain

Moby Dick. Nostromo if you don't mind a crappy ending.
Women want me. Men want to be with me.