zaichikarky | That book meme from several years back

kehlen_crow posted this again recently. Supposedly the BBC said that the average adult only read 6 of these, although that isn't true. I did a quick meme of this on failbook, but this version is more opinionated, I suppose. I would also like to know what kind of book list is this? How has it been deemed the "Top 100"? Strange.

The Big Read reckons that the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books they've printed."
1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Italicize those you intend to read.
3) Underline the books you really love (and strike through the ones you hate!).
4) Put an asterisk (*) before the books you wasn't able to finish.
5) Reprint this list in your own LJ so we can try and track down these people who've read 6 and force books upon them ;-)

01 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
02 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien The movies were way better. In fact I kept falling asleep through the last book and didn't get through it.
03 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte My mom is a big fan of Jane Eyre and urged me to read it. I think it may have actually gotten me to appreciate classic books because before I read it, I didn't enjoy anything printed before the turn of the century and now I like a lot of classics.
04 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling It took me a long time to start reading the books, but once I did, I couldn't put them down.
05 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee Every American kid has read this in HS...
06 * The Bible
07 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte This is my favorite book of all time. I just can't say enough about it. It has my favorite quotes, it has the best anti-hero ever written. It is dramatic and bold, and super intense. I just can't believe this work of literary talent came out of a young, sheltered woman who never experienced love and died as young as her protagonist.

“Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living. You said I killed you--haunt me then. The murdered do haunt their murderers. I believe--I know that ghosts have wandered the earth. Be with me always--take any form--drive me mad. Only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! It is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!”

I just ordered an illustrated copy of the book published in 1943. I have another illustrated copy sitting here from the library from the 20s, but it doesn't capture the dark mood and passion as well as these engravings do...

08 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell Oh why isn't Animal Farm on here? I read that one. I've been meaning to read this book for the last 15 years. I think actually what's holding me back is that I thought I'd enjoy another old sci fi novel, Brave New World, but found it to be such garbage that I worry I'll be sorely disappointed with 1984 too.
09 His Dark Materials- Phillip Pullman This is an excellent series. I just wish I remember what happened after the first book. The plot just got very complicating with a bunch of different narratives going on. I wish the movie did better because I'd have loved to see the rest of the films completed.
10 Great Expectations
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott Somewhat cheesy at times. I identified a lot with the protagonist.
12 * Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy This book left me very disappointed. A lot of drama going on, but so boring. I don't like his writing style at all.
13 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca
16 The Hobbit
17 Birdsong
18 The Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger I read this in high school, and not even for a class! THEY'RE ALL PHONIES! That's all I remember from it. The kid thought everyone was phony.
19 The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell I think the book may be too much for me, but I want to try it. The movie is probably better.
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald Probably the greatest work of American Literature.
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll It's the 150th anniversary! We've got an exhibit in the Special Collections. I don't know how this man wasn't on drugs when he wrote this book. He probably was doing some heavy opiates.
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy My dad spoiled the ending. I don't know if I want to try reading it again :/
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen This is Austen's longest, and possibly dullest novel.
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell Oh my bad Animal Farm is on here. What was the quote? "All animals are equal, but some are MORE equal than others." I also read this in High School.
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery I need to read the rest of the Anne books. They are just so rich and happy!
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood I love Margaret Atwood. I liked her Oryx and Crake series better, but Handmaid's Tale is the one that always shows up as one of the best books ever written. It certainly leaves you thinking .
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding I read this when I was 14. I think it was intended to be a kid's novel... maybe, but a lot of the themes and symbols was lost on me at the time.
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan The movie was excellent.
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert - Ugh I just don't know about this one. I feel like this book is just so high-concept and pretentious. Something that sci-fi already innately has is just expounded in this series. I think I need to at least finish the first novel.
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 ~~Brave New World - Aldous Huxley~~ I'm glad this novel was only 300 pages. I hated every fucking page of it. I have never been more disappointed by a novel. It also doesn't help that Huxley was a LEGITIMATE eugenicist and believed in all the drivel from his book.
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck Again required reading for every 8th/9th grader....
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov I've heard a lot about this book. It disturbs yet intrigues me...
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt - Why is the only Donna Tartt novel I HAVEN'T read on here?
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo Maybe one day... The book intimidates me, although I think I'd like it better than 3 Musketeers
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville- I need to watch the miniseries with Patrick Stewart. For everything that's going on in the novel, it's so incredibly slow and dull. Does Melville really need to explain in excruciating detail seafaring in the 18th century?
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker Also disappointed by this one.
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 *The Color Purple - Alice Walker - The book is hard to read because it lacks basic punctuation. The movie is better.
84 * The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro - I find it strange that he wrote this and it's been so highly acclaimed when Never Let Me Go is one of the most amazing books I've ever read. I didn't like Remains at all. Didn't hold my interest whatsoever.
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert I have this sitting on my shelf at home, eager to be read. I think it will disappoint me like Tess of the D'Urbervilles did. What's interesting is that Lady Chatterly's Lover is a similar book that I enjoyed a lot.
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 ~~Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad~~ I read this in high school and hated it. I don't remember a damn thing about it. Wasn't someone floating down a raft in Africa?
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery Such a charming book.
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare Oh cool my favorite Shakespeare play. I just love Hamlet so much. I've seen it performed several times. It has the best quotes, the most drama, and I even performed a rap to it as part of a college project about modernizing a Shakespearean play XD. I still remember some of my verses.

My name's Larteezee so believe me when I say I got rhymes off the heezy. Never ever call my sister a breeze and your rhymes are whack, they don't appease me!
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl The novel was certainly more dark and even brutal in some ways!
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

That book meme from several years back

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