Classics Club List #1 – Finished! ….. and not finished ….

Posted on November 20, 2018 by Cleo

November 18, 2018 has come and gone and I can’t believe that my five year anniversary date with the Classics Club has come around so quickly! It seems like only a year or so ago I was compiling my list and wondering how I was going to read so many books. So how did I do with it? Well, here’s what I accomplished ….

First of all, I went completely overboard and instead of choosing the recommended 50 books, I chose 170 books! Eh, not particularly my most wise decision, especially considering the content of some of them. Needless to say, I didn’t finish my list but, on a brighter note I did manage to read 66 of them, which is better than 50. I also had a few of them (The Histories, Paradise Lost, Metamorphoses, Hamlet and History of the Peloponnesian War come quickly to mind) where I posted by chapter/book/act, so that was a big task in itself and expanded my reading time. I’ve also started Bleak House, City of God, Crime and Punishment and Dead Souls from my original list, I just didn’t finish in time. 🙁

So here is my first Classics Club list, which I will call complete!

My list:Ancients (5000 B.C. – A.D. 400): (9 books read)

The Odyssey – Homer (end of the 8th century B.C.) March 23, 2014
The Histories (450 – 420 B.C.) – Herodotus (because I love my Greeks!) April 17, 2017
The History of the Pelopponesian War (431 B.C.) – Thucydides  (a very
interesting war. I can’t wait to get Thucydides viewpoint) June 15, 2017
Oedipus Rex (429 B.C.) – Sophocles  (Sophocles is one of my favourite
Greek playwrights) May 25, 2014
Oedipus at Colonus (406 B.C.) – Sophocles   June 24, 2014
Antigone (441 B.C.) – Sophocles  December 28, 2014
Apology (after 399 B.C.) – Plato   December 12, 2013
Defense Speeches (80 – 63 B.C.) – Marcus Tullius Cicero  (I’ve started this
and love it!) August 20, 2014
Metamorphoses (8) – Ovid (I will finish this!)  March 31, 2016

Medieval/Early Renaissance (400 – 1600 A.D.): (6 books read)

The Rule of Saint Benedict (529)? – Saint Benedict December 2, 2015

The Canterbury Tales (1390s??) – Geoffrey Chaucer (groan! It intimidates
me but I must overcome!)  November 15, 2015
The Book of Margery Kempe (1430) – Margery Kempe   August 1, 2014
Le Morte d’Arthur (1485) – Thomas Mallory  (this read is coming up soon!) December 6, 2014
Utopia (1516) – Thomas More (looking forward to reading a good Utopian
novel)  December 15, 2014
Selected Essays (1580) – Michel de Montaigne  November 30, 2015Late Renaissance/Early Modern (1600 – 1850 A.D.): (17 books read)

Romeo and Juliet (1591 – 1595) – William Shakespeare   October 13, 2014
Richard II (1595) – William Shakespeare   November 30, 2014
Henry IV Part I (1597) – William Shakespeare  December 21, 2014
Henry IV Part II (1596 – 1599) – William Shakespeare  December 24, 2014
Henry V (1599) – William Shakespeare  June 22, 2016
Othello (1603) – William Shakespeare   October 28, 2014
Hamlet (1603 – 1604) – William Shakespeare  January 27, 2015
King Lear (1603 – 1606) – William Shakespeare  December 3, 2014
Paradise Lost (1667) – John Milton (time to use my guide by C.S. Lewis) February 27, 2014
Gulliver’s Travels (1726) – Jonathan Swift  (I wonder if I’ll like it)   January 3, 2015
Candide (1759) – Voltaire   March 21, 2014
Sense and Sensibility (1811) – Jane Austen  January 25, 2015
Persuasion (1818) – Jane Austen (I have read every other Austen novel but
this one. For shame!)   February 21, 2015
Eugene Onegin (1825 – 1832) – Alexander Pushkin   December 1, 2013 & February 8, 2014
The Pickwick Papers (1836 – 1837) – Charles Dickens  (a fun read!) November 5, 2017
Wuthering Heights (1847) – Emily Brönte   February 1, 2014
David Copperfield (1850) – Charles Dickens   January 15, 2014

Modern (1850 – Present): (34 books read)

Villette (1853) – Charlotte Brönte  March 31, 2016
The Warden (1855) – Anthony Trollope (looking forward to starting The
Barchestershire Chronicles) April 8, 2014
Madam Bovary (1856) – Gustave Flaubert (just because)   April 4, 2014
Barchester Towers (1857) – Anthony Trollope   August 7, 2014

Doctor Thorne (1858) – Anthony Trollope September 25, 2014

Framely Parsonage (1860 – 1861) – Anthony Trollope December 8, 2016

Fathers and Sons (1862) – Ivan Turgenev September 19, 2014

The Small House at Allington (1864) – Anthony Trollope March 31, 2017

The Moonstone (1868) – Wilkie Collins (for a light read) January 1, 2016

War and Peace (1869) – Leo Tolstoy (going on and on and on ……) August 3, 2014
Erewhon (1872) – Samuel Butler May 16, 2015
La Curée (1871 – 1872) – Emile Zola (continuing the Rougon-Macquart
series) April 23, 2014

Far from the Madding Crowd (1874) – Thomas Hardy (I dislike Hardy’s
novels but should include one.) June 23, 2016

Daniel Deronda (1876) – George Eliot February 24, 2014

Son Excellence Eugène Rougon (1876) – Emile Zola January 31, 2014

A Doll’s House (1879) – Henrik Ibsen July 27, 2016

The Brothers Karamazov (1880) – Fyodor Dostoevsky (I can’t wait for this
one!)  November 10, 2016
The Black Arrow (1888) – Robert Louis Stevenson   November 20, 2013
L’Argent (1891) – Emile Zola  August 21, 2015

The Time Machine (1895) – H.G. Wells January 11, 2016

The Importance of Being Earnest (1895) – Oscar Wilde September 18, 2014

The Well at the World’s End (1896) – William Morris October 5, 2016

Dracula (1897) – Bram Stoker (scary ….. not my favourite genre) October 19, 2015
The Man Who Was Thursday (1908) – G.K. Chesterton (love Chesterton!) August 20, 2014

Count Magnus and Other Ghost Stories (1904 – 1911) – M.R. James
November 13, 2013

Ethan Fromme (1911) – Edith Wharton May 11, 2015

The Great Gatsby (1925) – F. Scott Fitzgerald (double groan. Since the

first time I read this was in high-school, I need to do a re-read to
confirm that I despise it)   January 2, 2014
Mrs. Dalloway (1925) – Virginia Woolf   January 13, 2014
The Pilgrim’s Regress (1933) – C.S. Lewis  (I think this is a more simpler
Lewis) {No – this was incredibly complex!} November 30, 2013
Out of the Silent Planet (1938) – C.S. Lewis (love his Space Trilogy – a re-

read) September 19, 2014
The Great Divorce (1945) – C.S. Lewis (fascinating plot) June 15, 2014

Seven Story Mountain (1948) – Thomas Merton (looking forward to it) March 15, 2014

East of Eden (1952) – John Steinbeck (I hated Mice & Men but I will attempt

to keep an open mind with this one) February 17, 2015

To Kill A Mockingbird (1960) – Harper Lee April 5, 2016

Where do I go from here …..?? I’m going to condense my original list to 66 and roll many of the ones I didn’t read into my second list. Which I’m going to keep to 50. See! I do learn by experience!! Stayed tuned for the second list which I’ll post soon!

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Posted on December 6, 2016 by cleopatra

“Alexey Fyodorovich Karamazov was the third son of Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov, a landowner of our district, who became notorious in his own day (and is still remembered among us) because of his tragic and mysterious death, which occurred exactly thirteen years ago and which I shall relate in its proper place.”

What a marvellously mysterious first sentence which brings all sorts of questions to mind. Why was the Karamazov father only remembered because of his horrific death? What else did he do in life? Why has the narrator waited thirteen years to tell the story? And why does it need to be told in its “proper place”?

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The Well at the World’s End by William Morris

Posted on October 18, 2016 by cleopatra

“Long ago there was a little land, over which ruled a regulus or kinglet, who was called King Peter, though his kingdom was but little.”

King Peter of Upmeads has four sons, Blaise, Hugh, Gregory and Ralph. All resolve to set out to seek great adventures but the youngest, Ralph, decides to do so against his father’s wishes. Encouraged by Dame Katherine, a newly married lady to the chapman, she gives him a beaded necklace of blue and green stones and inspires him to find the Well at the World’s End.

“Son, true it is that the water of that Well shall cause a man to thrive in all ways, and to live through many generations of men, maybe, in honour and good-liking; but it may not keep any man alive for ever; for so have the Gods given us the gift of death lest we weary of life ……

Of strife and of war also we know naught: nor do we desire aught which we may not easily attain to. Therefore we live long, and we fear the Gods if we should strive to live longer, lest they should bring upon us war and sickness, and over-weening desire, and weariness of life. …..

…. ye wear away your lives desiring that which ye may scarce get; and ye set your hearts on high things, desiring to be master of the very Gods. Therefore ye know sickness and sorrow, and oft ye die before your time, so that ye must depart and leave undone things which ye deem ye were born to do; which to all men is grievous. And because of all this ye desire healing and thriving, whether good come of it, or ill. Therefore ye do but right to seek to the Well at the World’s End, that ye may the better accomplish that which behoveth you, and that ye may serve your fellows and deliver them from the thralldom of those that be strong and unwise and unkind, of whom we have heard strange tales.”

Ralph’s youth and inexperience are apparent at the beginning of the story, as he travels first to Bourton Abbas and then through the Wood Perilous, meeting up with various adventures and challenges on his journey. He encounters two women, both of whom he loves, yet one whom he is not destined to keep. Finally, with Ursula, his love, and with the help of the Sage of Sweveham, they manage to attain their quest, finding the Well and drinking of its bounty. Their return home is also fraught with danger and intrigue, as Ralph learns the value of perseverance and the rewards of loyalty.

The Vision of the Holy Grail tapesty (1890)
Sir Edward Burne-Jones (design and figures)
William Morris (design and execution)
source Wikipedia

Born in Essex, William Morris had a number of accomplishments and careers during his life, including that of a textile designer, a poet, a novelist and a social activist. Though classically trained at Oxford, Morris became an architect, and with his friends, the well-known artists Edward Burne-Jones, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and archtitect Philip Webb, they formed a decorative arts firm that became the rage of the Victoria era. His renown as a poet followed, and he further exercised his literary talents as a novelist. His interest in Marxism and concern for social issues developed an appetite for activism which lasted throughout his life. He died in 1896 of tuberculosis at the age of 62.

The Merciful Knight (1863)
Edward Burne-Jones
source Wikiart

The Well at the World’s End is a very curious mix of fairy tale, adventure, and rather risque scenes and actions for the time period of Victorian England. While it reminded me very much of Le Morte d’Arthur, The Faerie Queene, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Morris was not reluctant to reveal the physical attraction between Ralph and the women he encountered, nor did he prevaricate about their physical relationship, however, he did so in rather a romantic knightly way. Morris was a muse for writers like C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien who admired his pioneering work in the genre of fantasy fiction, and the names “Gandolf” and “Silverfax” which appear in The Well at the World’s End, are echoed also in The Lord of the Rings.

Danaë (The Tower of Brass) 1887-88
Edward Burne-Jones
source ArtUK

This book was a wonderfully rich and exciting read, full of heroic exploits, peril and satisfying resolutions. Morris was indeed a talented writer and his love for the Medieval is apparent in every word of the story. I own his book, The News From Nowhere, which I hope to read soon as a follow-up. Being compared to Gulliver’s Travels and Erewhon, it’s a complete deviation from this story —an utopian novel of a libertarian socialist bent. In any case, his story telling abilities solidified themselves for me with this novel and I’m looking forward to exploring more works from Morris.

Lamia and the Soldier (1905)
John William Waterhouse
source Wikiart

Classics Club Spin # 14 ……………. and the Winner Is ……..

Posted on October 3, 2016 by cleopatra

Number 1

I must say that I’m rather excited to read We by Yevgeny Zamyatin. I’ve heard excellent feedback about it and I haven’t read a sci-fi book in awhile. I’ve also been enjoying a Russian-fest lately, finishing off The Death of Ivan Ilyich and am in the middle of The Brothers Karamazov. Both books have touched on issues that have lately been on my mind, and I wonder what insights I’ll gain from reading We.

Now I need to finish off some of my recent reads so I can get started. I hope everyone was as happy with their spin choice as I am with mine!

Classics Club Spin #14

Posted on September 30, 2016 by cleopatra

Sigh! I usually get excited about the Classics Club Spin but this time, between my failures to finish my last spins and the load of books I already have on my plate, my enthusiasm is severely compromised. I should pass …..

…….. however, if I can finish up some of my reads, I don’t have much planned after them, AND I’m always trying to concentrate on my Classics Club List. So with these excuses in mind, I’m going to give it a whirl …..

The Rules for the spin are:

Go to your blog.
Pick twenty books that you’ve got left to read from your Classics Club list.
Post that list, numbered 1 – 20, on your blog by next Monday.
Monday morning, we’ll announce a number from 1 – 20. Go to the list of twenty books you posted and select the book that corresponds to the number we announce.
The challenge is to read that book by December 1st.

I used the random list organizer here to choose the 20 books from my master list. Then I tweaked them, so my list ended up looking like this:

We (1921) – Yevgeny Zamyatin
Address to Young Men (363) – Saint Basil
The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (1860) – Jacob Burckhardt
The History of Napoleon Buonoparte (1829) – John Gibson Lockhart
The Well at the World’s End (1896) – William Morris
The City of God (426) – Augustine
Ivanhoe (1820) – Sir Walter Scott
Wives and Daughters (1864/66) – Elizabeth Gaskell
Dead Souls (1842) – Nikolai Gogol
If On A Winter’s Night A Traveller (1979) – Italo Calvino
A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland and a Journal of a Tour of the Hebrides (1775) – Johnson & Boswell
Tartuffe (1669) – Molière
Twenty Years After (1845) – Alexandre Dumas
Framley Parsonage (1860-61) – Anthony Trollope
On the Social Contract (1762) – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) – Ann Radcliffe
The Interpretation of Dreams (1899) – Sigmund Freud
The Merchant of Venice (1596 – 1598) – William Shakespeare
The Histories (450 – 420 B.C.) – Herodotus
Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864) – Jules Verne

Oh, Lord help me. I left some BIGGIES on the list without changing them out. I just hope the spin goes in my favour and misses them. I’m sure I’ll be tense until Monday. 🙂

Best of luck everyone with your spin!

The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy

Posted on September 20, 2016 by cleopatra

“Inside the great building of the Law Courts, during the interval in the hearing of the Melvinsky case, the members of the judicial council and the public prosecutor were gathered together in the private room of Ivan Yegorovitch Shebek, and the conversation turned upon the celebrated Krasovsky case.”

Wow! My last Tolstoy novel read was War and Peace over two years ago and I’d forgotten the depth that Tolstoy could create within his stories with a clear, straight-forward narrative. The Death of Ivan Ilyich appears to be merely a tale of the last days of a Russian court judge, yet Tolstoy brings the human condition into vivid and startling colours.

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Classics Club Spin #13

Posted on June 5, 2016 by cleopatra

I was going to resist the spin this time. I have too many books on the go and too many of them are atrociously difficult, or inordinately huge. But one of my goals for the year was to pare down my Classics Club list, so why on earth wouldn’t I participate in a spin?

With that said, I’m not shy to admit that I absolutely manipulated my list. Well, perhaps not completely, but I did change out about seven books for ones that I’m either currently reading, are shorter novels, or projects that I am struggling with (Shakespeare, that’s YOU!). Surprisingly, one of the manipulations was not The Faerie Queene.

The Rules for the spin are:

Go to your blog.
Pick twenty books that you’ve got left to read from your Classics Club list.
Post that list, numbered 1 – 20, on your blog by next Monday.
Monday morning, we’ll announce a number from 1 – 20. Go to the list of twenty books you posted and select the book that corresponds to the number we announce.
The challenge is to read that book by August 1st.

I used the random list organizer here to choose the 20 books from my master list. Then I tweaked them, so my list ended up looking like this:

Ivanhoe (1820) – Sir Walter Scott
Far From the Madding Crowd (1874) – Thomas Hardy
Framley Parsonage (1860-61) – Anthony Trollope
1984 (1949) – George Orwell
The Fairie Queene (1590 – 1596) – Edmund Spenser
Henry V (1599) – Wiliam Shakespeare
The Histories (450-20 BC) – Herodotus
Richard III (1592) – William Shakespeare
Le Rêve (1888) – Emile Zola
Tom Sawyer (1876) – Mark Twain
The Good Soldier Svejk (1923) – Jaroslav Hasek
The Silver Chalice (1952) – Thomas Costain
A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland and a Journal of a Tour
The Lord of the Flies (1954) – William Golding
The Red Bade of Courage (1895) – Steven Crane
The Robe (1942) – Lloyd C. Douglas
The Twelve Caesars (121) – Suetonius
The Stranger (1942) – Albert Camus
Tom Brown’s School Days (1857) – Thomas Hughes
The Merchant of Venice (1596 – 1598) – William Shakespeare

While my intentions are good, if I don’t finish by August 1st, I won’t be surprised. But nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? And if I get a book I’m already reading, it will be more of a guarantee for success.

So let the spin begin!

Metamorphoses by Ovid

Posted on April 20, 2016 by cleopatra

“My soul would sing of metamorphoses.

but since, o gods, you were the source of these

bodies becoming other bodies, breathe

your breath into my book of changes: may

the song I sing be seamless as its way

weaves from the world’s beginning to our day.”

Publius Ovidius Naso was born in Sulmo, east of Rome in the year 43 B.C. As a son of an upper middle class family, his father sent him to be educated in Rome to distinguish himself in a career in law or government. Ovid was known as an exemplary rhetorician and worked at minor magisterial posts before quitting his public career to pursue poetry. Immediate success followed his first published elegy and by 8 A.D., the year in which Metamorphoses was published, he was one of the foremost poets of Rome.

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Villette by Charlotte Brönte

Posted on April 3, 2016 by cleopatra

“My godmother lived in a handsome house in the clean and ancient town of Bretton.”

What on earth have I just read? This book simply cannot be written by the same author who wrote Jane Eyre! The mind rebels! The heart rebels! It cannot be! Am I sounding very dramatic and flourishing and vocal? That’s because I’ve spent 572 pages being lulled catatonic. What happened …..??

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Classics Club Spin # 12 ……….. And The Winner Is ……………

Posted on March 7, 2016 by cleopatra

Number 8

Well, this was a very good choice for me. I’ve been trying to read through Anthony Trollope’s The Barsetshire Chronicles for about two years, and am at the halfway point. Number 8 for me is Framley Parsonage, book number 4 in the series.

For some reason, I’ve had a Trollope-block in the last year, and I really needed a push, so perhaps this is it. Now I just need to buckle down and read!