Top 100 Books Read meme

[cupidsbow]

Only 61/100. That's pretty lame for someone who makes a living at being well-read.

The Big Read reckons that the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books they've printed. Well, let's see

Comments

[angriest]

I counted as far as noticing both The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and The Chronicles of Narnia were on the list despite one being a subset of the other, and figured the list was too stupid to live.

Plus the complete works of Shakespeare contain many plays not worth being in the top 100 of anything. Trolius & Cressida, for example.

[cupidsbow]

Yep, it's a typical "commercial title" list, rather than a true "Best Of" (however you might actually qualify that).

It was still kind of fun to go through and remember all those years of reading. Ah, my well-spent youth. I miss that kind of leisure, you know.

[dfordoom]

I only scored 47. Oh well.

[lauredhel]

57 - better than I thought I'd do, and a few recs for my list. I'm not counting the Bible and the Works of Shakespeare, thought I've read a fair few of the greatest hits within.

[iphi1]

61 is not bad at all. In fact, I think it's the highest number I've seen so far. I only got 25 out of 98 (2 repeats). It's a very Anglosaxon list though, isn't it?

[cupidsbow]

It's a very Anglosaxon list though, isn't it?

Yeah, it really is. Although that's probably a big part of why I've read a fair number. At least half of them were on the syllabus at school. Admittedly, I read the other half for pleasure, and I've actually read most of them more than once (about 26 of them -- one of them being Hamlet, stupid list). As those are particular favourite and/or I teach them, I've usually re-read those ones several times. I wouldn't even know how many times I've re-read Pride and Prejudice, for instance.

Have you re-read many of your 25? And would your hit-rate change with a less English-focused list?

[iphi1]

Let's see, I've (re)-read some of the works of Shakespeare because I had to. Universities insist on teaching Shakespeare for some reason *grin*. Most of the other books on this list I read, I read for pleasure. I re-read The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Dune(all books - several times)and The Secret History.

If I understood correctly this list is the "UK's (BBC) 100 best-loved novels of all time" list. I suppose my hit-rate might increase significantly if you start from the Belgian's best-loved novel of all time list. Of course then the list would include dozens of Dutch books nobody outside Dutch-speaking territories has ever heard about, and perhaps also more of the European classics. (Voltaire, Camus, Ionesco, Goethe, Calvino).

Honestly though, my hit-rate might increase but not the amount of books I read for pleasure. I find most Belgian, Dutch and French "classics" extremely depressing and boring.

[stephen_dedman]

39, including repetitions, but not including anything I started but didn't finish (including series) or don't remember. I'm no longer absolutely sure which Dickens novels I completed, or whether I made it all the way through Tess of the d'Urbervilles (though I'm pretty sure I didn't even attempt any other Hardy novels, and bluffed my way through that part of my English course at uni).

And no, I'm not overly impressed with this as a list of 100 best books, but I am pleased to see that Shadow of the Wind and Cloud Atlas made the cut. Sorely tempted to start some sort of utterly unscientific poll to come up with my own list of must-reads.