If you’re on a book blog, chances are you read widely enough to have encountered at least some classic literature. Maybe high school English class scarred you and you find it snooty and inaccessible. Maybe it’s all you read. Maybe you can take it or leave it.
Even if you happen to love classic literature, and you’ve read a great deal of it, there will always be books that you miss out on. No one can read everything. If that’s you, then this list is five classic novels you may not have picked up yet, but definitely should. If you think you hate classic literature, may I suggest that you give one of these a try?
I first read North and South after a friend from England was shocked that I’d never read anything by Elizabeth Gaskell. I naively asked whether the style was similar to Jane Austen, and I think my friend almost choked on her tongue. No, I learned, Gaskell is not comparable to Austen. Not to knock Jane Austen; I love her novels, and so does my friend. But, as she put it, “Gaskell is grittier.” It’s true.
North and South is set in England during the Industrial Revolution. At it’s core, it’s a love story. However, the milieu of the Victorian factory town colors everything that happens. There are labor unions, strikes, and class distinctions to contend with. Plus a take-charge female protagonist! What’s not to like?
If you’re an audiobook lover, please listen to the Audible version narrated by Juliet Stevenson. She is the perfect narrator for this novel.
I sort of picked up How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn on a whim one day, but I absolutely fell in love with it. To this day it’s one of the most beautiful books I’ve ever read. The prose is breathtaking.
This novel is basically a love letter from the narrator to his youth in a coal mining village in Wales. He reminisces on his childhood while coal slurry (basically the waste left over from coal mining), which has been encroaching on his village for years, finally overtakes his home. It’s a book about loss, about longing for home, and about how the ones we love never really leave us. I’m telling you. Read. This. Book.
The character of Dorian Gray, the beautiful young man who never ages while a hidden portrait depicts the hideousness of his soul, is pretty well known. But if you’ve never read the book, you’re missing out.
Oscar Wilde was a prolific writer of plays and poetry, but he penned exactly one novel. The Picture of Dorian Gray is that novel, and it’s a gift to the world. It’s somehow simultaneously heartbreaking, horrific, and hilarious. I read this book in my early teens, and it was the first time I realized, at least consciously, that the people of the past were just that—people, with inner lives and senses of humor just as developed as those living now. It was also the first time I laughed out loud while reading a classic novel.
I didn’t read East of Eden by John Steinbeck until I was out of college. Somehow we didn’t do a lot of Steinbeck in high school, and I’d convinced myself that I wasn’t really interested in his work. Don’t be like me. Dive into this Steinbeck novel if you haven’t already.
East of Eden has one of the best villains I’ve encountered in literature. Seriously, she gave me chills. But the story itself is quite uplifting. One important message from this book is that a person is in charge of their own destiny and decisions. They can’t blame their actions on blood or heritage or circumstance, because in the end we can overcome anything.
Tolstoy has a bit of a reputation (some might say a deserved reputation) for being inaccessible. I read War and Peace last year and, let me tell you, there’s a reason few people read that book anymore. However, if you’re looking for an “easier” Tolstoy novel, Anna Karenina is your girl.
This is a family drama, as opposed to a war novel. It follows the consequences of Anna Karenina’s decision to leave her husband and take up with the dashing Count Vronsky. It’s a fascinating look at social mores and what happens when someone decides to flout them.
Happy Reading!
