Overrated Books

[Badger11]

I thought I would start a thread on this. I mean books that are well known to the public but for whatever reason you just don't get the hype.

My number 1 for this:

The Catcher In the Rye.
I read this when I was a teenager for those who haven't it's supposed to be the definitive book on teenage angst.

Why I hated it.
Whiny rich kid who keeps getting kicked out of private prep schools and moaning about how hard his life is. Oh boo hoo try being a poor inner city slum kid.

Number 2:
The Great Gatsby

Again a book about rich Americans and their awful lives, who bloody cares. Both of these books are regularly voted 1 and 2 on the best American novels of all time.

PS
I do read a lot probably 1 book a week so I like to think I have some judgement.

 

[Teddy Eagle]

I guess they were both of their time. The concept of the teenager didn't really exist before The Catcher in the Rye which predated James Dean, whether that's enough to make it a great book is debatable - like you I read it when I was young and it was one of those almost set books like On the Road and Steppenwolf.
My choice would be Finnegan's Wake which Anthony Burgess said was the greatest book ever written and I found to be unreadable gibberish. It always seemed like something people claimed to like to make them look clever.

Finnegans Wake - Chapter 1

Glosses of words in Finnegans Wake by James Joyce optimized for iPhone, Android, iOS

www.finwake.com

 

[beak]

I thought I would start a thread on this. I mean books that are well known to the public but for whatever reason you just don't get the hype.

My number 1 for this:

The Catcher In the Rye.
I read this when I was a teenager for those who haven't it's supposed to be the definitive book on teenage angst.

Why I hated it.
Whiny rich kid who keeps getting kicked out of private prep schools and moaning about how hard his life is. Oh boo hoo try being a poor inner city slum kid.

Number 2:
The Great Gatsby

Again a book about rich Americans and their awful lives, who bloody cares. Both of these books are regularly voted 1 and 2 on the best American novels of all time.

PS
I do read a lot probably 1 book a week so I like to think I have some judgement.

Most books by Grahan Greene ,a miserable ending is virtually guaranteed, except for the our Man in Havana.

 

[Eaglehamster]

I guess they were both of their time. The concept of the teenager didn't really exist before The Catcher in the Rye which predated James Dean, whether that's enough to make it a great book is debatable - like you I read it when I was young and it was one of those almost set books like On the Road and Steppenwolf.
My choice would be Finnegan's Wake which Anthony Burgess said was the greatest book ever written and I found to be unreadable gibberish. It always seemed like something people claimed to like to make them look clever.

Finnegans Wake - Chapter 1

Glosses of words in Finnegans Wake by James Joyce optimized for iPhone, Android, iOS

www.finwake.com

I vaguely recall an article, I'm going back to the 80's, written using such obtuse words and confusing style but with an air of confidence bordering certainty. It was a brilliant few paragraphs deliberately written to be totally meaningless. It was then passed to a number of academics for their thoughts and criticism. Several of them praised it highly as a polished piece of work. So yes, rather than admit to failing to understand an author, some @rseholes will pretend comprehension.

 

[Eaglehamster]

I have tried several times to read "An Honourable Schoolboy" John Le Carre. Just couldn't get past the first few pages. I'm not totally stupid so if an author confuses me to such an extent I don't care what happens next or bores my pants off at the start of a novel, I bin it.

 

[Badger11]

I have tried several times to read "An Honourable Schoolboy" John Le Carre. Just couldn't get past the first few pages. I'm not totally stupid so if an author confuses me to such an extent I don't care what happens next or bores my pants off at the start of a novel, I bin it.

I have read the Karla trilogy and the HS is very poor compared to Tinker Tailor and Smiley's people.

 

[Stirlingsays]

I never quite came to terms with the complicated nuanced themes of the hungry caterpillar.

 

[PalazioVecchio]

My choice would be Finnegan's Wake which Anthony Burgess said was the greatest book ever written and I found to be unreadable gibberish. It always seemed like something people claimed to like to make them look clever.

speaking as somebody very familiar with Joyce's background geography & culture.....i must agree with you. Long-winded overly decorous tripe. Trying too hard to be clever and looking ridiculous.

other Tripe :

Catch 22

zen and art of motorcycle maintenance

On the road......Jack Keroac

And i will add to having never gotten into the whole Tolkein worship saga on account of not being autistic.

Lets all be honest, Shakespeare can often be a bit of a d.ckhead. Nobody ever spoke like that. Even his servant characters talk like they read Classics at Oxford. Shakespeare's jokes are unfunny, his plays longwinded and overly wordy, his poetry is shyte, and it looks like he was just showing off.....trying to be clever, again. Compare and contrast to the tight writing style of Douglas Adams.
Who else, apart from Shakespeare, riddles their script with new invented words of a Graeco-Roman Biblical etymology ? Unfamiliar words that the listener must unpack with a dictionary. T0sser ( or should i say Ancilliary-Manual Onanist )

 

[PalazioVecchio]

i would include most ancient Holy texts in the thread. Especially the violent ones. It is ironic that you write an incitement to violence on Facebook and you go to jail. Write it in an ancient text and you get praised from a height.
Such books for sale in every Holy bookstore near you.

2 Tier.

 

[thechaddyboy]

Grabbed a copy of Catcher in the Rye a while back having seen it lauded on so many lists, only managed 20% of it & couldn't understand the hype. Guess it didn't help I'd only just finished reading 'Shuggie Bains' which is a quality read.

 

[PalazioVecchio]

Charles Dickens ........ Dick-end.

His attempts to reproduce the slang-accent of the working classes ? torture.

Urban Dictionary: Bellend

Tip of the p****. Can also be used as an insult. Only Britain has been blessed with this amazing word so far, but the Gods are trying to find a way to spread it around the entire world.

www.urbandictionary.com

 

[Badger11]

Charles Dickens ........ Dick-end.

His attempts to reproduce the slang-accent of the working classes ? torture.

Urban Dictionary: Bellend

Tip of the p****. Can also be used as an insult. Only Britain has been blessed with this amazing word so far, but the Gods are trying to find a way to spread it around the entire world.

www.urbandictionary.com

I have read a number of his books and have come to the conclusion they are padded out. Because Dickens was always trying to make money many of his books were first published as serials in magazines. So of course the longer the book the more he could cut it into instalments and get paid.

You can easily cut 100 pages from Great Expectations without even trying and it would not affect the book.

 

[Teddy Eagle]

speaking as somebody very familiar with Joyce's background geography & culture.....i must agree with you. Long-winded overly decorous tripe. Trying too hard to be clever and looking ridiculous.

other Tripe :

Catch 22

zen and art of motorcycle maintenance

On the road......Jack Keroac

And i will add to having never gotten into the whole Tolkein worship saga on account of not being autistic.

Lets all be honest, Shakespeare can often be a bit of a d.ckhead. Nobody ever spoke like that. Even his servant characters talk like they read Classics at Oxford. Shakespeare's jokes are unfunny, his plays longwinded and overly wordy, his poetry is shyte, and it looks like he was just showing off.....trying to be clever, again. Compare and contrast to the tight writing style of Douglas Adams.
Who else, apart from Shakespeare, riddles their script with new invented words of a Graeco-Roman Biblical etymology ? Unfamiliar words that the listener must unpack with a dictionary. T0sser ( or should i say Ancilliary-Manual Onanist )

Good nominations. Catch-22 and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance are better for their ideas (although I don't remember any from the latter) than to actually read.
Lord of the Rings is a bit of a slog; it may be heresy to its fans but the films are more accessible for anyone interested.
Truman Capote said of Kerouac, "That's not writing. That's typing". He said it because Kerouac never rewrote anything but the point stands.

 

[Stirlingsays]

i would include most ancient Holy texts in the thread. Especially the violent ones. It is ironic that you write an incitement to violence on Facebook and you go to jail. Write it in an ancient text and you get praised from a height.
Such books for sale in every Holy bookstore near you.

2 Tier.

But those are the exciting bits.

 

[Stirlingsays]

Good nominations. Catch-22 and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance are better for their ideas (although I don't remember any from the latter) than to actually read.
Lord of the Rings is a bit of a slog; it may be heresy to its fans but the films are more accessible for anyone interested.
Truman Capote said of Kerouac, "That's not writing. That's typing". He said it because Kerouac never rewrote anything but the point stands.

True, but they never publish Kerouac's reply to Truman of, 'yeah but you take it up the arse'.

 

[Teddy Eagle]

True, but they never publish Kerouac's reply to Truman of, 'yeah but you take it up the arse'.

Hardly libellous even back then.

 

[Hannes]

“The Da Vinci Code”. A completely nonsensical story and pretty boring. I bought it and read it because everyone was reading it on the beach at the time of publication.

 

[Badger11]

Good nominations. Catch-22 and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance are better for their ideas (although I don't remember any from the latter) than to actually read.
Lord of the Rings is a bit of a slog; it may be heresy to its fans but the films are more accessible for anyone interested.
Truman Capote said of Kerouac, "That's not writing. That's typing". He said it because Kerouac never rewrote anything but the point stands.

LOTR along with To Kill a Mockingbird are my favourite books. I take your point about LOTR, although I love the book (he wrote it as 1 book not 3) I could spend all day criticising it from a plot that is all other the place, characters that are not fully developed and too many endings. Still love it though, I guess I would say that the sum is better than the parts.

 

[Teddy Eagle]

LOTR along with To Kill a Mockingbird are my favourite books. I take your point about LOTR, although I love the book (he wrote it as 1 book not 3) I could spend all day criticising it from a plot that is all other the place, characters that are not fully developed and too many endings. Still love it though, I guess I would say that the sum is better than the parts.

To Kill a Mockingbird is my favourite too. Shame about the delayed "sequel".
Tolkien gets some leeway since he was virtually inventing the form but was still more interested in languages than story. Not surprising with his academic background.

 

[Stirlingsays]

To Kill a Mockingbird is my favourite too. Shame about the delayed "sequel".
Tolkien gets some leeway since he was virtually inventing the form but was still more interested in languages than story. Not surprising with his academic background.

What was that called? 'We lost the appeal'?