Famous books you never cared for/understood the appeal of?

Demian by Hermann Hesse.

It was recommended to me by my high school literature teacher, who said it was a fascinating coming-of-age story. It does have those themes at the beginning, but then, cue half the book and it turns into a search for a God or some kind of 'spiritual enlightenment' with weirdass symbolism thrown in. I was royally pissed off. Of course now I know all Hermann Hesse works are like that, but imagine my frustration as a reader back then.

I don't understand the appeal of Hesse in general. I have friends who devour all his books, and from what they've told me it's literally the same guy everytime abandoning the material world for a soul search only to learn the same aesop: "The answer lies within you". Why does Hesse need so many pages to state something so obvious?

Sorry for the rant

 

@tumblingdice If you ever feel like revisiting Hesse, you might want to start with The Glass Bead Game. You're right that his books are often thematically similar but I feel like that one manages to avoid a lot of the esotericism and keeps things a bit more grounded, so to speak.

 

Thanks, I'll give it a shot sometime.

 

Moby Dick

Most the classics that I've read I've come to appreciate. Heck, I've even picked up a few on my own to read now that my literary tastes have matured a bit. But that book was the driest dullest most deplorable tomes that I have ever had the misfortune of being assigned to read. One of only a handful books in my whole life that I started but never actually finished.

 

Handmaid's Tale

I was meant to read it as part of my A-Level English Literature course (for the non-Brits here, that's one of the exams you take before you finish secondary school and the grade from your A-Level determines whether you get to go to a good university or not). Anyway, didn't read it 'cause I found it dull back when I was 17.

Then as an adult I was like, I really should read it. I was supposed to have read it already, after all, and maybe I just didn't appreciate it back then!

So, I finally did read it a couple of months ago. It started off pretty promising, and I can see Atwood did things very deliberately - I didn't enjoy most of her writing but I wouldn't say it was without skill.

However, my 17-year-old self was right. It was DULL AS ALL HECK!

Nothing much happens at all, coupled with very bland descriptions of bland happenings. And bland descriptions of very bland things, like the ceiling, or an egg. The whole thing was so detached from any kind of emotions that it was just un-engaging for the most part - and that the detachment was probably deliberate on Atwood's part doesn't make it any more enjoyable than it was! I don't honestly remember what I read except for the same key scenes that got me full marks at my A-Level exam. (oh how my Eng Lit class loathed me for that...)

 

Love that book It's one of the few I've gone back and re-read. Parts of it had me laughing. Didn't much care for the whaling chapters, but I liked the rest quite a lot.

 

I didn't like it either. From the implausible opening to the slowness of it...I like Atwood, just not that particular book.

 

It's one of the few Great Books that I actually think is a good one as well, but unlike you, the parts that truly fascinate me are the whaling bits. Totally contrary to all the rules of good writing, but I love all that unnecessary explanation.

 

I found them interesting upon first reading them. When I've gone back and re-read Moby Dick, I've found them less so, but mainly because I'm re-reading for the story the second and other times around.

 

I suppose Moby Dick has a special place in my heart due to the circumstances in which I first read it. When I first moved to Japan, I ended up (long story) dirt poor.

Tap water for dinner poor.

Took me six months or so to get clear of that, so when I went to the bookstore looking for something, anything, to read in English and discovered that all imported books were at least 15 dollars (we'll ignore the complexities of the exchange rates for the moment, I was paid in yen). From the thinnest little Stephen King novella to a doorstopper like Moby Dick, they were all fifteen bucks.

So I bought Moby Dick based primarily on weight. Turned out to be a good choice, but I also read it probably six times in my first year here.

 

I have to agree heartily with everything you said ...with the exception of Lord Foul's Bane, which I never attempted to read. I, too, give everything a pass that was written a long time ago, especially if the time set of the story was contiguous with the author's lifetime, as with Jane Austen. I loved Pride and Prejudice, and it got me reading all of Austen's books. However, it's a slice of history for me. Ditto Dickens and many other Victorian writers. I read them for their window on a period of history, rather than for their contemporary relevance.

Name of the Wind. Aargh. I plowed through that, and also the follow-up, hoping that at some point it would really grab me. But yes, Gary-Stu is a perfect way to describe the main character. Everything was just so EASY for him, wasn't it?

I read the first Harry Potter book, but gave up partway through the second. I think I would have loved these books as a child, but as an adult they became too cloying for me very early on.

Totally agree about George RR Martin, though. I made it midway through Book 4, before throwing in the towel. However, the first book, and to some extent the second were amazingly good. I was all fired up, and went around persuading other people to read them. But then when nothing was resolved in Book 3, I began to lose heart.

What I find unreal is the popularity of the Outlander series of books. I just don't get it. They are such a load of complete nonsense. And so far removed from what Scotland actually is, that it's pathetic. And I love a well-written, historically-set novel. But maybe that's the problem. It's not well written, and the history is laughable.

Mind you, the book that most disappointed me recently was Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall. I thought I would eat it up, because I do love history, but I simply couldn't read past the first couple of chapters. It's Marmite, for sure. (For you non-Brits out there, that means you either love it or you hate it.) Her style was overwhelming, and not in a good way.

 

The Catcher in the Rye is my all time favorite book. I read a couple of arguments about why it became a classic but I wasn't very convinced to be honest. I liked it simply because of how much the main character was candid and convincing. Few authors can create such an authentic character as Holden. I'm not American though, so there's a lot I don't understand about it. The fact that I first read it in the height of my teenage years was probably what made me like it so much. To a non-teenager American perhaps there's little to be gained or entertained with.

This is also one of my all-time favorites. What I liked about it is that the writing is pretty unique. It's not the easiest book to follow up, or one that catches your attention well. But even though I felt like giving it up sometimes, I'm glad I did not. In the end you are able to get the full picture of Wilde's message, and appreciate the characters and the plot.

 

I liked the Picture of Doriam Gray.
I liked Catcher in the Rye.
I liked Lord Foul's Bane.
I liked Pride and Prejudice.
I liked Moby Dick.
I liked Potter.
I liked GRRM.
I liked Name of the Wind.
AND I liked Outlander.

So, screw all y'all!

 

The dictionary. Honestly Mariam what the hell were you thinking? You were beyond tedious and your characters were scarce and that plot, WTF!? Woman needs to get some bloody damn guidance on how to write a thrilling tale.

Oh I am going to have to go with the 5th HP forward, cause whiny Harry can bite my hiney. Bet me by Jennifer Cruise, absolutely loath. I am sorry let me say that one more time: LOATH !!
It is the kind of thing that makes you question every fiber in your being as to what the hell you were thinking. Also I do not much care for your closet foot fetish Miss Cruise, so kindly remove you disgusting little toes from my ass. The series that shall not be dignified with a name nor its Keebler Elf stealing author, but you know the one with which I speak. The one with such awful composition that is holds water like a damn sieve, with its unbearably wooden one dimensional characters. The only thing the series is good for is fire tender (and that is only slightly better than using to wipe your ass when your out of TP).

 

Oh I know someone is going to be upset with me but I can't stand books by Chuck Palahniuk or Jodi Picoult or....Stephen King. I know I know...but I feel like they follow a pattern or a template and that they don't use any originality in their books. They try to be "shocking" but it just is unrealistic and annoying...

I freaking love Dorian Gray though...I have that book 3 times!

 

True story! Also not impressed with Tolkien. Sad considering his huge contribution to my favorite genre.

 

I like Stephen King, but I can see your point. The thing that makes it somewhat more excusable for me is that he more or less created the template that he writes from, so there's an element of originality buried deep in the work.

 

I tried reading Catcher in the Rye when I was 17 (so like, height of teenagerism, right?), but I couldn't stand it all the way to the end. I can appreciate Holden's candidness, but he came across as so bitchy and pretentious that I hated him. He was an ungrateful, privileged asshole with no redeeming qualities in my eyes. He was just too insufferable.

I had a particularly terrible English teacher when I was 15, so any book she made us read, I hated, because I hated her. That included To Kill A Mockingbird (I was especially furious that I was forced to read it for themes I could gather just from keeping up with the news). I also remember hating "A Hunger of Memory," but I never read the whole thing -- my (very good, that year) English teacher disliked it and she understood how much students hated it so she only made us read specific chapters.

 

I really didn't like Lord of the Flies at all. It was like you were being spoon-fed everything...except the spoon was a shovel. It almost seemed lazy to me, like another on of his books could be called The Lion and the Moral of the Story or something.

 

Harry Potter, I didn't read it when it first came out because at the time I was going through a deeply Christin phase, and that was about witchcraft. *sighs and rolls his eyes at past self* It became such a big thing and I'm a fantasy and magic buff, and people kept saying how it`d be right up my ally but I just couldn`t get into it. Like it wasn`t the worst thing I've ever read, it just didn`t really draw me in. If you want supernatural pre teens and teenagers, in a school-ish setting (well it`s a summer camp but murr) @Lea`Brooks would probably agree with me that Rick Roardin pulls it off better than Rowling.

 

I may have already posted this, but just because it came to mind when I saw the thread title...

The Goldfinch. It won the Pulitzer. For...what? What's so special about this book?!?

 

Moby Dick, for me was terrible, just awful. I still have it as I will use at as punishment for my children when they are old enough to read that type of thing.
There are a few posts in this thread slating some writers I really enjoy and admire, I really wish this forum had a dislike button for those responses

 

And a "philistine" button.

 

I agree. In fact I really liked Donna Tartt's 'middle book' The Little Friend, but I didn't like the one she started with (can't remember the name of it just now) about the students at the small college who kill one of themselves, and I started The Goldfinch and didn't bother finishing it. I probably won't bother trying to read any more that she writes. It's not that she's a bad writer, it's just that I find myself not engaged with her characters. It's as if she's writing at arm's length from her characters AND her readers. Don't get the appeal.

I wonder if it's the prizes. It seems as if when a book gets a lot of attention and wins prizes, they just keep rolling in. It's almost as if the academy that dishes out a prize feel they can't possibly vote against a particular author, once they have been 'winners.' How many times has Hilary Mantel won ...and she's another one whom I really can't read.

........

I thought of another book I had to read and found terribly unengaging. Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter. My overview of the book was 'who bloody cares?' All that wallowing in religious angst. Geez. For a person like me who isn't even remotely religious, I just could NOT get on board with that. (Ditto anything by John Milton.) But of course I had to write a good-tempered 'book report,' for it. I remember getting an A, and thinking ...what a load of shite.

 

most classic books (Jane Eyre, Frankenstein ETC) as well as 50 Shades of Grey and Twilit saga, i read the last one in this series and thought it was the worst thing i'd ever read... never understood the popularity...