Ravelry Knitters discussion

Alright people - fair warning - the books nominated here will probably have been on your school summer reading list at some point! This is the month for the classic you've never read or have been wanting to re-read. Dickens, Dostoyevsky, The Iliad - I even consider some books to be modern classics (the average American canon should include Heller, Orwell, Salinger, Fitzgerald.)

This could be embarrassing, so I'll go first.


I know, right? I went to prep school too - they had me read some great books. How did I never read this? I've been meaning to get to it for...oh, 25 years now.

I chose The Giver, but Great Gatsby definitely deserves another reading. My perspective has changed a lot since I last read it. Maybe I'll read both.

Christina, the giver is for the September poll, so you could wind up doing both!

First time making nominations, and as this is for October I thought I'd suggest some classic horror:

My first impulse was The Great Gatsby, but then I thought, why not something I haven't read already. LOVED Gatsby...

Instead, I'm going with Oscar Wilde. I read quotes by him and find him to be brilliant, so here it is:



Can't believe I've never read anything by him. This is a great thread for firsts!

This just came up in discussion with my girls over dinner: Doctor Zhivago.

In one of my high school lit classes...30 years ago, it made some sort of lasting impression...probably due to my brilliant Dead Poet's Society genre teacher...

He also introduced us to Joseph Conrad's "Billy Budd"

...To Kill a Mockingbird...A Tree Grows in Brooklyn...

Ooh, A tree grows in Brooklyn...I've always wanted to read that one. Shirley Jackson too, as the Lottery has been on my mind....

How about something by Willa Cather? My Antonia ... any, actually, would be cool. And I haven't read a Tree Grows in Brooklyn since I was a kid a zillion years ago, would love to read it again....

ooh yes, Willa Cather! And Edith Wharton! Anybody else thinking that a Classic-of-the-Month club is in order?

I recently fell into Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Agnes of Sorrento" (free on projectgutenberg) and it's amazingly good!

I guess I never realized Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote anything other than Uncle Toms cabin.....

Craftlit just did edithe Wharton, and I don't feel the need to do more, as so many of our members overlap. But Willa Cather is worth putting in the poll....might have a very overstuffed poll!

Anyone willing to bite off a whale of a tale? Moby dick tends to be one every classics list that people have never actually read. And I'd be willing to add Hemingway (some of his stuff is short!)

Hemingway's tidbit on Paris was a refreshing change from his usual testosterone-packed nuggets ›;0'
...Plus de change plus le même chose?

Seriously, these books that stand the test of time are worth another look! I wonder what our current reads will be worth another look 100yrs from now, don't you?

Yes, moby dick! But maybe over two months for length?

Death comes to the archbishop (Cather)
Invisible man (Ellison)
Pnin (Nabokov)
Their eyes were watching god (Hurston)

--gabrielle

I just read these posts and I am interested in reading a classic. How does the discussion group work? My suggestion Scarlet Letter by Hawthorne. A lot of good suggestions so far.

Deb, really, I just open a thread and people start commenting. Sometimes it's more in depth than other times....I must say, classics tend to beloved or hated, so I'm sure many will have something to say. That said, some just like the group read because they want someone else to choose what they read, and they never get on and chat about it. It's a free country here, all good!

I keep hoping and praying no one suggests War and Peace. We'd be reading it for the rest of the year! Just kidding, I love all the responses so far, so many I haven't even heard of (like, all of Gabrielle's choices!) Very cool idea, Zoe.

And I agree, Apryl. So many new books all the time, how many of them will stand the test of time?

For some of these, we could read the book, watch the movies, and knit along with a related project even. Scarlet Letter, we could knit something red :) and so forth. A book AND a knit along.

Oh we do know how to have fun, don't we?!

It is fun thinking about what to read. The ones I suggested are sometimes considered best but not most poPular. I have zero interest in Lolita, but pnin, sure :)

Gabrielle, for this time round, not sure I'll include Pnin in the poll...not considered a classic, as so few have heard of it. I'm looking for those huge gaping holes in people's reading history.

Makes me want to do a Russian literature month at some point though. Which gives me ideas for countries......

Yes, I know it's a stretch for "classic" :)
How about one day in the life of Ivan denisovich for short Russian classic (bending rules less dramatically)

Last year I challenged myself to read some of the classics that I had not read before/for a very long time. I loved My Antonia and would willingly read another Willa Cather. And, as pointed out, Craftlit does a great job of filling in some of our "neglected" authors---thank you, Heather.

Gabrielle wrote: "Yes, I know it's a stretch for "classic" :)
How about one day in the life of Ivan denisovich for short Russian classic (bending rules less dramatically)"

That's a great read, and not a long one, either.

Here are two books my children love and are always telling me I should read:


Swallows and Amazons

Treasure Island

I just finished a course called Close Reading and it was great fun. As far as classics,go I'd like to add mine to the list-Carmilla by Sheridan le Fanu. It goes along with October......

Oscar Wilde is fantastic! I thoroughly enjoyed his work in college. I just finished Heller's Catch-22 & loved it. I don't know how he kept his character's shenanigans straight. Invisible Man was much much better for me as a more mature adult.
I only went back a month on this thread. Did anyone mention Shakespeare? I could reread "A Midsummer's Night Dream". Also Toni Morrison's Bluest Eye & Beloved. Well, anything by her. Louise Erdrich's Tracks is awesome. She is awesome. (Sorry, I recently saw The Lego Movie).
Margaret Atwood is great. Pushkin is good. Has anyone ever read "Frankenstein"? I was surprised that it's considered to be romantic.

Oops, I meant this for the Classics thread.

Frankenstein's "Romantic" not "romantic." It's a product of the Romantic movement in literature, which was big in the first third of the 19th century.

That's a little snippy. I know it's the Romantic period, but studying it put a different spin on the word "romantic". Instead of supermarket novels

It became elevated to include meditations on nature.

Not sure I would consider Margaret Atwood a classic- yet. At this point, I'm thinking older.....starting with, say, George Orwell and Lord of the Flies and on back. But if you have a specific Atwood, by all means, please put her in the nominations thread for me to pop in a non classics month. For some reason the store I work at sells out of Oryx &Crake every year.....

As for Shakespeare', he might be a month unto himself. :)

Ad don't worry, Tiffany. I'm pretty sure Susanna meant that as instructive, not snippy. I didn't read it as such. Even if you take the literary analysis aside, Romantic means different things to different people. WAY different things. I, for one, don't find Nicholas Sparks books romantic, because someone always dies at the end, but some people think they're horribly romantic.
And obviously, we're not talking a period in literature there!

No, I didn't mean to be snippy.

Thank you Zoe & Susanna. I greatly apologize for misreading your words, Susanna. Sometimes discussions are better in person where you can see, hear, and feel their words.

Oh, that's very true. It can be hard to convey tone with just text.