Underrated Work by a Great Author?

I was curious to hear your favorite underrated works by great authors. My example is Hemingway's The Short, Happy Life of Francis McComber. Most people read his more famous stories, such as A Farewell to Arms, The Old Man and the Sea, etc. The books don't have to be classics. Just pick any writer you love.
MM

 

*Warning, this is a typical Lemex post*

Virgil's Eclogues came instantly to mind. I'm not sure I properly understand The Georgics, but it's the work of his I have had less chance to really get to know. But most people (if they read Virgil at all) will only read The Aeneid, and that's just such a shame. The Eclogues are all extremely well-crafted, very human works.

The fact that La Vita Nouva is not considered the prelude to Dante's Divine Comedy is, I think, one of the greatest crimes against literature ever committed. You don't get the back story to the latter without the former.

 

Not quite the same caliber as Hemingway or Dante, but while CS Lewis is best known for Narnia, or even The Screwtape Letters, or his nonfiction, my favorite of his books is the lesser-known Till We Have Faces. (Interestingly, it was his own favorite of his books, too.)

 

Relevant:

Magnum Opus Dissonance

 

The Path of the King by John Buchan.

His other works (e.g. 39 Steps) seem to be thriller pot-boilers by comparison, yet a fan of his had never even read it.

 

I haven't heard of that one yet. Maybe I can find it. Thanks for sharing.

 

I also have C. S. Lewis in mind. His cosmic trilogy of "Out of the Silent Planet", "Perelandra" and "That Hideous Strength" are pretty amazing, and aren't known that widely. Does that count?

 

Herman Wouk's Inside, Outside. He displays a sense of humor I haven't seen in any of his other writings.

 

Kurt Vonnegut's Time quake, Bluebeard and Jailbird.

 

Love that book.

 

Mein Kampf sucks. Who saw that coming?

 

The Eyes of The Dragon by Stephen King. A great fantasy novel with an fairy tale-like atmosphere. The villain is fantastic and the hero is an incorruptible paragon, and the side characters were fun to read.

 

That book is worth it for fleshing out Flagg's character and back story alone.

 

Hermann Hesse's Narcissus and Goldmund. His popular novel is Siddhartha. N and G is quite different and deals with two men who've met in a cloister. One opts to leave the cloister to become an artist. We see his awakening to the outside world, and follow him as he experiences outside influences like the bubonic plague.