All right, Dr. SmartyPants. What *haven't* you read?

[antecedent]

I've read plenty of obscure works, or the lesser known works by literary superstars (The Heavenly Twins, anyone? Blood Meridian? Homage to Catalonia?) but I tend to fall tragically short on canonical works. I still haven't read Macbeth, which is probably my biggest literary embarrassment. I hadn't read Hamlet until the summer between second and third year when I finally managed to read it (at the gym of all places). I'm also comically short on most theory, though I've read bits and pieces thanks to a 20th century theory survey course.

I have read Ulysses though, and that paired with reading Middlemarch and Paradise Lost probably count as my greatest literary reading achievements in my undergrad.

[ComeBackZinc]

Woolf being called awful has physically ejected me from this thread.

[pinkrobot]

I've read most of the stuff people are listing.

But my big gap is female writers. No Austen, no Brontes, no George Eliot, No Woolf, No Chopin, etc, etc, etc.

Started many of them, but they're all just so awful.

Woolf being called awful has physically ejected me from this thread.

Female authors being termed "all just so awful" has physically transported me into periods in time when women began or sustained their careers under male pseudonyms.

You know, like the Brontës, George Eliot, etc., etc., etc.

Edited January 18, 2012 by pinkrobot

[Two Espressos]

I've read plenty of obscure works, or the lesser known works by literary superstars (The Heavenly Twins, anyone? Blood Meridian? Homage to Catalonia?) but I tend to fall tragically short on canonical works.

Blood Meridian is otherworldly (in a good way). I've never encountered anything else like it, and Judge Holden is probably the most unsettling character in all of literature. I'd easily put Blood Meridian in the top 5 greatest novels I've ever read. Even though there are many excellent works I've yet to read (Ulysses, etc), I'm nearly positive it will stay in that top 5. Forever.

Just thinking about that book chills my blood.

[wintergirl]

But my big gap is female writers. No Austen, no Brontes, no George Eliot, No Woolf, No Chopin, etc, etc, etc.

Started many of them, but they're all just so awful.

Wow. That's quite a generalization to make!

[HunkyDory]

Ha, maybe I should clarify--I find those female novelists from ~1800 to ~1930 boring. Like, just can't sustain my interest. That's what I meant by awful--like I'm gonna come in here and say that everyone has been wrong on the Brontes' this whole time? Yeah right, it's Just not my cup of tea.

There are a number of female writers I like though. I was just reading some of Bernadette Mayer's Sonnets, and earlier I finally found a copy of Sharon Mesmer's "Annoying Diabetic Bitch." Exciting afternoon.

Glad Grunty understood what I meant when I said they were awful, some people here sound like they're going to plotz.

Edited January 18, 2012 by dokkeynot

[Loimographia]

Well when you say that your gap is female writers, you're not just referring to "those female novelists from 1800 to 1930." those are two entirely different things. So yeah, people are going to take offense. And "they're not my cup of tea" is hardly equivalent to "they're just so awful." I'm glad you like female writers and hey, if you don't like the style/subject addressed by that era of women, I'm not going to blame you (I for one have read Emily Bronte's other works beyond Jane Eyre, and while I love the latter, found the rest insufferable). But you're stating two different arguments.

As for myself, as a medievalist, I'm always I little saddened that I haven't gotten around to reading all the Canterbury Tales. I've read just about everything else by Chaucer (and took two courses on his work as an undergrad) but not his main opus. To anyone who doesn't really like Chaucer though, I offer them House of Fame.

[Timshel]

Pretty much everything that was on the GRE Subject Test.

[Jbarks]

Pretty much everything that was on the GRE Subject Test.

Like. Haha!

[HunkyDory]

Pretty much everything that was on the GRE Subject Test.

When did you take it? October had very little Identification, and what ID-ing there was was fairly simple IIRC

[marlowe]

I've read most of the stuff people are listing.

But my big gap is female writers. No Austen, no Brontes, no George Eliot, No Woolf, No Chopin, etc, etc, etc.

Started many of them, but they're all just so awful.

Weak, bro. Though you are quite successfully trolling the poor patrons of Grad Cafe.

(I for one have read Emily Bronte's other works beyond Jane Eyre, and while I love the latter, found the rest insufferable). But you're stating two different arguments.

As for myself, as a medievalist, I'm always I little saddened that I haven't gotten around to reading all the Canterbury Tales. I've read just about everything else by Chaucer (and took two courses on his work as an undergrad) but not his main opus. To anyone who doesn't really like Chaucer though, I offer them House of Fame.

You mean Charlotte, of course. Wuthering Heights was not really my thing, but Jane and The Professor are awesome (if we are talking about the sisters as a single entity).

You haven't read Canterbury Tales (but have read House of Fame and, I suspect, Troilus)!? If you are a medievalist, you've got to get on that. I have heard (on mediocre authority, I'll admit), that being able to teach and publish on Chaucer is an unofficial requirement for hiring in the field.

[Loimographia]

Gah, you are correct. I read almost all the Bronte works in high school, and all the sisters kinda blend together in my memory. Most of what I remember is that The Professor and Villette have essentially the same plot (and are semi-autobiographic), but the former was written while she was still smitten, so she included a 30+ plus summary of "and they lived happily ever after" and the latter was written after she'd gotten over him, so she kills the guy at the very very end in the span of two paragraphs (if you're going to swoop in and tell me I'm completely wrong about these summaries, feel free to do so, I am prone to misremembering book endings. I spent 10 years thinking Oliver Twist got run over and killed by a cow half-way through the book!)

I could totally publish and teach oodles on Chaucer! Just not the Canterbury Tales. Thankfully, however, my primary focus is on Italian and Mediterranean merchants and numeric paleography, so I probably won't be called on to publish on Chaucer.

Edited January 18, 2012 by Loimographia

[perrykm2]

That is the most interesting concentration I've heard so far. A medievalist with a focus in Italian and Mediterranean merchants and numeric paleography.

[Isidore]

As for myself, as a medievalist, I'm always I little saddened that I haven't gotten around to reading all the Canterbury Tales. I've read just about everything else by Chaucer (and took two courses on his work as an undergrad) but not his main opus. To anyone who doesn't really like Chaucer though, I offer them House of Fame.

I second that recommendation! House of Fame - good stuff. I like it even more than The Canterbury Tales.

As an aspiring medievalist, I'd also like to second the recommendation demand that you read Chaucer's magnum opus! Really, you must. It will be worth it. And read it in its original Middle English, not one of these flimsy modern "translations" (not that a fellow medievalist would ever so much as consider such profanity...) It's funny. And beautiful. And worthy of all the time and effort that so many (but not yet I!) have devoted to reading Ulysses.

[Loimographia]

It's on my list of things to do, I swear! And now that I'm done with applications (unless I decide to throw in some UK schools, though the thought makes me feel ill) it's probably my next goal. I really do like Chaucer (sadly, though I find the Divine Comedy a beautiful piece of writing, I find Dante rather unlikeable, mostly thanks to his La Vita Nuova. So whiny! And now let unleash the Danteists!). And, of course, I will read it in the original. But the beautiful cynicism about authorship, and the subsequent irony of Chaucer's literary canonization, makes House of Fame one of my favorite works. (Oh god, have I gone and misused irony in a lit forum? quick, someone tell me if this counts!)

I got about halfway through Ulysses, though my motivations for reading it were mostly egotistical. I gave up when I realized I was trying so hard to like it, just to say that I liked it.

I'm going to take the comment on my concentration as a compliment, I hope XD The numeric paleography is just a little pet interest of mine, so it's a little weird, I guess.

Edited January 20, 2012 by Loimographia

[marlowe]

I second that recommendation! House of Fame - good stuff. I like it even more than The Canterbury Tales.

As an aspiring medievalist, I'd also like to second the recommendation demand that you read Chaucer's magnum opus! Really, you must. It will be worth it. And read it in its original Middle English, not one of these flimsy modern "translations" (not that a fellow medievalist would ever so much as consider such profanity...) It's funny. And beautiful. And worthy of all the time and effort that so many (but not yet I!) have devoted to reading Ulysses.

And without Canterbury Tales, there would be no Ulysses! Chaucer did more for modern English than arguably any other author.

[lolopixie]

House of Fame is a goody. So applicable to what we are all going through right now. I was so scared before I took the Chaucer seminar because of the whole middle English thing, but I had an awesome professor teaching it. It is amazing to see how much we really have not changed in our perception of the world, chance, love, authority, experience in hundreds of years.

[Enzian]

I lived in a former Soviet Republic for the last few years and everyone there had read tons of Jack London and O. Henry. Me and my American English degree could cite The Call of the Wild and "The Gift of the Magi" and one random London short story ("South of the Slot," I think) and that's it.

And my local teacher counterparts kept going on and on about The Forsyte Saga, which I'd never heard of.

So that was a little embarrassing but, on the other hand, I'd read WAAAAYYY more Dostoyevksy than just about anyone I met (a whole two novels).

It's a strange world out there, folks.