My best friend loves to read even more than I do.
♥
She came over last week, and together she, Ryan, + I compiled a list of books that everyone should read at least once in their lifetime. I do often feel like I’m a bit behind when it comes to the classics, and before I get any further from my youth, I thought I’d just nip that one right in the bud.
So here’s what we came up with:
| I will read every single one of these classics |
- Catcher In The Rye - J. D. Salinger
- Wuthering Heights - Emily Brontë
- Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë
- Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
- Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
- 1984 - George Orwell
- Macbeth – Shakespeare
- Much Ado About Nothing – Shakespeare
- Civil Disobedience - Henry David Thoreau
- To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee
- Of Mice + Men - John Steinbeck
- Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
- The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne
- The Crucible - Arthur Miller
- Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
- Pride + Prejudice – Jane Austen
- The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
- Mrs. Dalloway - Virginia Woolf
- A Room Of One’s Own - Virginia Woolf
- Dubliners - James Joyce
- Madam Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
- War + Peace - Leo Tolstoy
- Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
- Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
- Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut
- The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde
- On The Road – Jack Kerouac
- Lord of the Flies - William Golding
- A Farewell To Arms - Ernest Hemingway
- The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
- Moby Dick - Herman Melville
- Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
- The Stranger - Albert Camus
- Paradise Lost - John Milton
- For Whom The Bell Tolls - Ernest Hemingway
- Light In August - William Faulkner
- The Sound + The Fury - William Faulkner
- 100 Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Márquez
- Walden - Henry David Thoreau
- Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
- Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
- The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath
- Into The Wild - Jon Krakauer
- A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
We tried to represent as many influential writers and eras as we could think of, but it’s pretty likely that we’re leaving someone out. You did so well at filling in the gaps when I asked for your help with summer movies, so I must ask again…
am I missing anything?
xx.
I don’t think you’re missing out by not having read A Christmas Carol. As far as Dickens is concerned, you go read yourself some Bleak House. Also, I couldn’t help but notice that Edith Wharton is missing from the list as well, and I LOVE HER. House of Mirth, all the way. My third recommendation is Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, which is by a more recent author, and is about communing with nature. My fourth would be The Professor’s House, by Willa Cather (I just might read this again, myself). And fifth, but not least, a hearty recommendation for anything and everything by P.G. Wodehouse.
Wow, so I’ve never even heard of P.G. Wodehouse! Sweet English degree, Julia? Thanks for the recommendations!
I definitely want to read a few Dickens pieces, so that’ll be added to the list. I still think I want to give A Christmas Carol a try, just so I know, you know? And good call on Edith Wharton. Also added directly to the list. Communing with nature is totally my thing, so that’ll be put on there, too, haha.
THANKS!
Also, Willa Cather? DUH, JULIA! This is why I asked for help.
jane eyre, Lolita, walden, civil disobedience, the stranger, the catcher in the rye, and to kill a mockingbird are a few of my very, very favorite books! I think they shaped who I am. awesome list. I have most of these if you want to borrow them <3
Thank you! I may take you up on that offer once I finish the one I’m on (and the ones I own that I just haven’t gotten around to reading yet)!
xx.
You should definitely read requiem for a dream by hurbert selby jr.! That book left me speechless..
Thanks for the suggestion! I love to hear about books that changed peoples’ perceptions and really made them think!
xx.