To me no other book ever raises so many twisted and complicated moral questions as Brave New World. The way it tackles happiness in society is really deep and it kind of made me rethink and revalue the functioning and structure of our society.
This is a top 5 book for me. As soon as I finished reading it the first time, I immediately reread it. Other books in top tier category for me are 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Jungle, and The Count Of Monte Cristo (which I placed there 20 years ago and should reassess). I also love Jane Eyre, lol. Named my daughter, Jane, in fact. This was a fun list. I've seen A Room With A View and Howard's End and loved them both, I should attempt the novels.
Brave New World is a great book, but the first ?50 pages is exposition setting up the story and it was written awhile ago so can be hard to get through. 90% as good and similar but an easier read is “This Perfect Day” by Ira Levin.
So glad you put 'Wuthering Heights' at God tier. I completely agree and with 'Frankenstein' being there as well. I recommend checking out George Eliot, especially Middlemarch. BTW, did you know that Charlotte is believed to have based the main character in 'Shirley' on her sister Emily? I agreed with (or at least I could understand) a lot of your views except about Jane Eyre
I did! You should check out my ranking of Brontë novels, you might get a kick out of it 😂 ooh yes finally reading Daniel deronda has been on my mind for a while!
just watched this and i have loved Jane Eyre actually, so it's really interesting to see how you felt about it haha. however, i have had Emma (paperback) for a while so i want to get into it soon :)
I have diametrically opposite preferences on the Brontes' novels, i.e. Jane Eyre is my favourite and Wuthering Heights my least preferred. I'm thus very interested to hear how your reread of JE goes. On translated classics...phew, so much choice! I'll restrain myself to just a few suggestions: Dostoyevsky's "Crime and Punishment" (well...duh) Stendhal's "The Charterhouse of Parma" Giuseppe Di Lampedusa's "The Leopard" Not in the classic/literary sphere, but Boris Akunin's Fandorin series (late 19th century Russia mystery/thrillers, but Akunin plays with a lot of genres) is great fun, commencing with "The Winter Queen".
The Tenant of Wildfell hall is my number 1 and I am it’s number 1 pusher online apparently so I highly recommend it 🙌🏽 Damn I just realised I didn’t say that the books weren’t in a particular order within the Tiers 🫢 Ooh yes I have a copy of the idiot but I might start with Crime and Punishment! Thanks for these I remember The Leopard vaguely from when I was working at Waterstones but it’s good to know from someone who has read it that it’s recommended! 😂Honestly late 19th century Russian thrillers sound right up my street!
Entirely my fault for assuming too much, and doubly embarrassing after seeing that you’d dedicated whole videos to the subject! Oddly enough The Idiot is actually my favourite of FMD’s novels, but it’s not his best and I gather he was rather frustrated with it. It probably is much better to start with the Big Guns of C&P or The Brothers Karamazov. Hope you feel better soon.
@@fyodor371 😂 don’t worry about it, everyone consumes TH-cam content differently! Ooh interesting that’s definitely cemented me reading C&P first. Thanks! I’m actually fine now just waiting to test negative 🤦🏽♀️ today will be day 10 so fingers crossed today is the day🤞🏽🫣
You are the first reviewer that I’ve seen mention The Machine Stops by E M Forster. Besides the Internet. this novella was published in 1909 (six years after the first flight) and contemplates air travel as obsolete. Just imagining yourself at a time when cars were scarce and electricity was new, reading this would seem way too fantastic. Thanks!
I think he was such a great writer and really ahead of his time! I’m working on a series of video essays about the Bloomsbury group and he’s definitely in there so keep a look out for that 👀💖💪🏽
Excellent presentation!!! I enjoyed both your commentary as well as the categorization of the books into tiers. I feel entirely justified and happy to give this video a "thumbs up".
I thought the Great Gatsby was dreadful, I’ll have to try it again sometime. I heard Hunter S Thompson loved it so much he would type it out over and over and that he used his writing style for Hell’s Angels, a book I absolutely love. Dorian Grey is most definitely God Tier, just recently read it and was blown away at how incredible it is. 1984 sears in your mind, that book fucked me up, truly did. War and Peace is a work of art like the Mona Lisa, and a very approachable book. Tolstoy is a genius, a once in a lifetime author. Might I add a book to the God Tier? Crime and Punishment. I’ve only read one other Dostoyevsky book, but C&P delivers a boom with the message he communicates through it.
I found I have very similar opinions! I'm British and never truly loved Great Gatsby, but War and Peace, Frankenstein, Animal Farm and To Kill a Mockingbird would all make my God Tier Just need to read some more to have read as many classics as you! xx
I highly recommend E. M. Forster novels if you haven’t read them! Maurice and A passage to India are high on my TBR because I loved A room with a view and Howard’s End so much!
Loved this list - quite possibly because a number of my favourite classics were also on your "a good time" and "god tier" 😄 I suppose it's slightly embarrassing that I yet to read any Bronte or Austen novel, but they're on my reading list for 2023. 🙂 I can never decide on just the one novel that would be my all-time favourite, but I think it's fair to say "Swann's way" and "Anna Karenina" are among the contenders every time...which is mightily impressive considering I can't read them in their original French and Russian - god knows how much nuance is lost in that respect alone...
@@LibertyIndiaRose No kidding, I read The Hitchhiker's Guide (which I love) in both English and Norwegian. Believe me, the latter did not even come close. 😄
I got too intimidated by Les Miserables I’m afraid 😂 I’m currently reading crime and punishment and am very keen to read more Dostoyevsky so if I ever redo this video with a new batch they will definitely be there!
I ran across your You Tube tonight and I just so happen to be half way through “The Picture of Dorian Gray” and I’m in total agreement! I got through half of “Jane Eyre” and that’s all I could stand. “Ulysses” should be included with the dry paint thing or ‘I’d rather be stuck in a traffic jam’ than subjected to this totally confusing dribble.
Agree with most of the god tier novels, I find war parts in War and peace a little too detailed though (sadly my attention span is not what it once was)
It's a shame the poetic tradition no longer gets a mention when discussing "classics." Byron and Milton, for example, stand as the basis for some of the books mentioned here.
I haven’t read much unfortunately! I was only talking about books I’ve read so if the time comes that I’ve read enough it made sense to me to do a whole video on it 💖
Nice to see you mention Agatha Christie. She was often too formulaic (she joked that she was "a sausage factory"!!), and sometimes wrote too fast, but she had some great strengths, such as her dialogue, her character insights, her moral decency. I think "Five Little Pigs", "Sad Cypress" and "Crooked House" are marvellous. But I would hesitate to put her up there amongst great classics. I love your honesty and forthrightness by the way. So refreshing to see you say some books are over rated amongst the classics, and some are under rated. You're incredibly well read for a young woman!! Nice to hear Le Carre get a mention.
Thank you for your kind words! I think reading the tenant of wildfell hall honestly changed my life because it was the first time I realised that the mythologising of an author doesn’t always reflect their skills, and I’ve always tried to be open to authors who fall under the radar 💪🏽
H. E. Bate's novel "Love for Lydia" set in the 1920s is in my God tier!!! It's the best love story I've ever read; better than even Austen's "Emma" or "Jane Eyre", which I do like. He was an absolute master of the short story and I am in awe of his art. His descriptions of nature, of flowers is outstanding, better than great poets like Pushkin or Wordsworth. Up there with Shakespeare and Milton. Can't believe he never gets mentioned.
Yes Liberty, you simply must read some Bates!!! "The Kimono" and "The Station" are two outstanding short stories (but he wrote so many; he published more than 25 collections of short stories!!). His dialogue, his descriptions of the beauty of nature, of the seasons, of people's non verbal behaviour, his objectivity in observing human foibles without being cynical, are incredible. He evokes human suffering and pain in quite a unique way. I want to read his World War Two novel, "Fair Stood the Wind for France" next as they say that it is up there with "Love for Lydia". He wrote and published this during the war; he saw action as a member of the RAF. Henry Miller was a great admirer of him. "I won't hear of any Lord of the Rings slander!!" I love your honesty and forthrightness! It is good to see you defending your choices, and not being afraid to say if you think a book is under rated or over rated, even if it is getting lots of plaudits from critics and reviewers. That's refreshing. Lord of the Rings is a stupendous book, and if the University literary snobs don't like it, so much the worse for them!! It has such profound wisdom and beautiful descriptions of nature, and great characters in it that it will always live on as one of the best books ever written. It's in my God tier for sure. You make me want to read Wharton and E M Forster now. I will give them a try.
I will check out Bates’ work thank you for the recommendation! Absolutely anyone who has read Lord of the Rings knows how vivid the descriptions are and how gorgeous the prose is 😍
I simply adored it. I only wish they had assigned it in school instead of Great Expectations. I might have developed a love of Dickens instead. Nancy was probably the only interesting female character of the few novels of his I read.
I agree with Jane Eyre. I had to read it for school. Her skill for allusion, subtext, themes etc is extremely high but that doesn't matter if her writing is boring. Also screw Rochester. All my homies hate Rochester
It's so interesting how other people think about books, I agree on the most bronte novels but would switch wuthering heights with jane eyre 😅 I adore the tenant of wildfell hall...missed Thomas Hardy on that list though....
I've read many of the books you've listed, and I agree with most of what you've said about them. I did like Jane Eyre more than you seemed to, though. : ) There is one I would add to "I'd rather watch paint dry" and that would be David Copperfield by Dickens. I forced myself to finish it, and honestly I don't know why I did that. I've found that a lot of people loved it but I just couldn't get into it. In "God Tier" I would put The Iliad by Homer and The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas. Both of those books are fabulous. The Iliad is my personal favourite piece of literature. If you like Sci-Fi you may want to try Robert Heinlein's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. I'm reading it now and I've been having a great time with it.
@@LibertyIndiaRose I haven't seen it.. in fact I didn't know that there was a film. I'm not much for movies or television, personally. I may have to check it out though. Thanks for the heads up!
I enjoyed watching your video 😉 Not sure all your selections are classics though but that is the thing with the classic tag. There is no definitive definition
" A book by Leo Tolstoy: one of the greatest in all the languages of the world, War and Peace. Not only the greatest but also the most voluminous...thousands of pages. I don’t know that anybody reads such books except myself. They are so big, so vast, they make you afraid. But Tolstoy’s book has to be vast, it is not his fault. War and Peace is the whole history of human consciousness - the whole history; it cannot be written on a few pages. Yes, it is difficult to read thousands of pages, but if one can one will be transported to another world. One will know the taste of something classic. Yes, it is a classic. Nobody is more worthy of a Nobel Prize than Leo Tolstoy. His creativity is immense, he was unsurpassed by anyone. He was nominated, but refused by the committee because of his unorthodox stories on Christianity. The Prize committee opens its records every fifty years. When records were opened in 1950, researchers rushed to see whose names were nominated and cancelled and for what reason. Leo Tolstoy was nominated, but never given the prize as he is not an orthodox Christian. Leo Tolstoy is one of Russia’s wisest men of the 20th century and his ideas on non-violence deeply influenced Mahatma Gandhi’s ideology. Mahatma Gandhi declared three persons his master. The first was Leo Tolstoy, the second was Henry Thoreau, and the third was Emerson. Once Leo Tolstoy was asked - How many experiences did you have of divine ecstasy in your life? Tolstoy started crying. He replied - Not more than 7 in my life of 70 years, but I am grateful for those 7 moments and miserable too. In those moments it was evident that is could have been the flavor of my whole life but that didn’t happen. Those moments came and went on their own. But I am still grateful to God that even without any conscious effort on my part, once in a while He has been knocking at my doors.
Anna Karenina is one of my most loved books. How many times I have read it I can’t remember. I mean the number of times - I remember the book perfectly well, I can relate the entire book. If I was drowning in the ocean and had to choose just one novel out of all the millions of novels in the world, I would choose Anna Karenina. It would be beautiful to be with that beautiful book. It has to be read and read again; only then you can feel it, smell it, and taste the flavor. It is no ordinary book. Leo Tolstoy failed as a saint, just as Mahatma Gandhi failed as a saint, but Leo Tolstoy was a great novelist. Mahatma Gandhi succeeded as - and will remain forever - a pinnacle of sincerity. I don’t know of any other man in this century who was so sincere. When he wrote to people ‘sincerely yours’ he was really sincere. When you write ‘sincerely yours’, you know, and everybody else knows, and the person to whom you are writing also knows, that it is all bullshit. It is very difficult, almost impossible, to really be ‘sincerely yours’. That’s what makes a person religious - sincerity .Leo Tolstoy wanted to be religious but could not be. He tried hard. I feel great sympathy with his effort, but he was not a religious person. He has to wait at least a few more lives. In a way it is good that he was not a religious man, otherwise we would have missed Resurrection, War and Peace, Anna Karenina, and dozens more beautiful, immensely beautiful books. "
"The While History of Human Consciousness" ? Huh? @ Thinking And Destiny by Harold Percival @ The Naked Bible by Mauro Biglino @ Author Marcel Grauile The Pale Fox @ Author Paul Wallis The Conspiracy of Eden.@ Anatoli Fomenko.@ George Pollock The Fourth Phase of Water.
Interesting. I had assumed that Tolstoy just wasn't around when the Nobel Prize for literature was being awarded. Galsworthy and Kipling got Nobel prizes for Literature, and who talks much about Galsworthy these days? I assume the rules about being Christian changed later on, because Doris Lessing also received a Nobel Prize in 2007, and as a former Communist I'm pretty sure she was no "orthodox Christian".
If you want to go with a classic I would recommend A Room with a View by E.M. Forster, if you want something contemporary then maybe Circe by Madeline Miller, or if she would like some magical realism then potentially The Binding by Bridget Collins 🤩
And then there were none is great... until the ending. The ending ruins the book for me. Jane Eyre sucks from beginning to end. The negative events that happen to the character are just SO over the top.
We are the polar opposites regarding Lord of the Rings and The Great Gatsby. I'm neither British nor American just for the record and love love love Fantasy. I've red both in my teens for the first time. And while I appreciate the love of detail and care (inventing a language) of Tolkien I tended and still tend to skipp to the good parts. Did I miss Douglas Adams, Victor Hugo, Daphne du Maurier and Arthur Conan Doyle? I'd add the Neverending Story by Michael Ende which reads and hits as Adult just diffrent.
There will 100% be a part 2 to this at some point there’s so many books that I couldn’t include for time, or that I’ve read since that I want to talk about! 💖
Fun video! Thank you. For translated fiction try Jon Fosse, who won the Nobel Prize this year. I discovered him through the Booker International Prize (his plays are unknown here in the US). It took me a while to learn how to read him, but now I love his style and his characters. For starters, begin with Alisa at the Fire, which comes in at 125 pages. Septology, him magnum opus, at 850 pages, has to be one of the greatest, the God tier, or our time.
I literally was thinking Brave New World as you described the Overhyped category. It isn't bad or anything. If my friend wrote, I would think it is great. It's just, is it a classic? Top 100 best fiction novels of all time, Really?
Why do women always prefer novels about women shunning traditional marital roles, but at the same time taking wild men and tamping them into traditional marital roles?
@@LibertyIndiaRose The way you speak of the Brontë Sisters books, specifically Wuthering Heights. You seem to love the female characters, as most modern women tend, that want to “throw off the shackles of the patriarchy”. However, most women I’ve spoken with tend to love a wild male character that gets tamed into the traditional male roles of a civil husband. It would seem that men get tamer as they age and women tend to get restless as they age. Not saying a positive or negative towards those ideas, but just an observation. Enjoyed the video BTW
@@dead2me82 lol that’s hilarious you should really check out my ranking Brontë novels video 🤣 The “wild male character that gets tamed” trope is the reason I hate Jane Eyre 🤣 I believe the wild male character should stay the hell away from the sweet girl and let her be happy with someone who deserves her 😂 Mr Rochester is a red flag and sweet Jane has no business getting herself involved in that shit show of a domestic situation like I cannot deny Charlotte is a great writer, but I never get on board with the actual content of what she writes (apart from the first like 80% of Shirley and it’s forever a source of annoyance to me she didn’t follow through with what she was trying to do with that character and story but I get it half her family died when she was writing it). I love wuthering heights because it is written impeccably. No one who reads that book thinks it’s a love story to emulate and I literally say in the video all these relationships are toxic and no one should take advice from any of these characters. I’m a little perplexed actually about how your take applies to my opinion on the Brontë’s given what I said about those books 😂 Also if anyone is the victim in wuthering heights it’s poor Isabella 🫣 she thinks she’s marrying for love but is actually being used as a pawn of revenge against her brother 😭 But yea, my opinion on Charlotte’s books and WH is why I love the Tennant of Wildfell hall so much. Because the quality of the writing is there AND it’s a message I can get behind and thats a marriage made in literary heaven 😂💖 The message of the book is literally you cannot change or reform men, alcoholic womanisers are not sexy they’re scary, and if you find yourself in an abusive marriage get the hell out and take your children with you. It’s considered to be a response to Jane Eyre and how the public responded to Heathcliff and Mr Rochester. And it’s a reminder of how few rights women had, and even fewer if you were married, you could not earn your own money, your children were not legally yours you had no rights with regards to them, you were your husbands property, so yea naturally I enjoy reading about women who try and like get basic human rights for themselves 😂 and I think that’s why I like the 1800s so much because so much change happens in that century in terms of politics, social issues, women’s rights, science etc so much to get your teeth into! I’m glad you enjoyed the video! Slightly questioning why I have to answer for “most women” 😂 but I hope you read the Tenant of Wildfell hall, it feels like my mission on the internet is to get as many people to read it as possible 😂 if I was to answer your question based on like my extensive book reading and film and tv watching, it’s less the “taming” that’s appealing ( that’s far too much work and no woman wants to drag a man kicking and screaming despite what some men think 😂) it’s more the fact that out of all the women in the world he chooses to change himself for the main character, I think it’s why villains are so popular it’s the whole “the hero would let his love burn to save the world but the villain would burn the world to save the person he loves” Basically it boils down to wanting to be loved, as most things in life do in some way or another. I personally don’t get it, seems very risky 😂 but I guess everyone has their preferences 😂 As you can tell, I love a discussion, sorry if that’s not what you were looking for 😂
@@LibertyIndiaRose that’s quite a response 😳😉. The Tenants of WH is certainly a book I have not read. However, let’s exclude what you would love to see from your characters (as it pertains to what you wish from/for yourself or society as a whole). It appears that women want a man who is, for lack of a better way of saying it, a wild animal that they can tame…and rich. A man who has proven that he is dangerous…just not with them. Unfortunately, it is difficult to find such men in real life who can remain faithful, or sober, or non-violent, or whatever. Examples from some favorite books among females (both classic and modern): - Edward (wealthy) and Jake in the Twilight series (both vicious in their abilities but they would use it honestly) - Christian Grey (wealthy) from 50 Shades. Rich, dangerous, mysterious man is what the female protagonist is after, she just wants him safe enough for her benefit - Jay Gatsby (wealthy) is a mysterious millionaire who was a bootlegger and swindler that he used his cunning and power to try regain the heart of his past love, Daisy, who is married. - Mr. Darcy (wealthy), from Pride and Prejudice, is fairly selfish, vain and conceited, with anger issues, and it’s at the hand of Elizabeth that he reforms his ways. - Mr. Rochester (wealthy) is a passionate man, which includes his anger and pride), but Jane will be the one to soften him…sort of. - Four from Divergent series is a strong, mysterious, powerful, yet tormented character who seemingly can only be tamed by Tris. - The Beast from Beauty and the Beast (also wealthy) is the epitome of my argument 🤷🏻♂️ - Gus McCrea from Lonesome Dove. If you haven’t read this should be American Classic, then you’ve GOT to add this to your list! He is a former Texas Ranger, a scoundrel, wealthy, dangerous and a louse. Yet he’s the only man that Lorena can feel comfortable with and wants him to marry her. - Nearly every harlequin romance novel - Han Solo…just for some pop culture. Bounty hunter, black market dealer and all-around selfish scoundrel gets tamed by Princess Leia. Whether the men turn out to be the type of man you would actually want to be with, women wan the guy who is wild by nature, wealthy, and dangerous…and they want to believe that they can be the one to harness his volatility for their benefit. There aren’t any real love stories about the lowly poor guy who is a servant that women go for…unless he somehow ends up as a powerful rich man in the end and only then gets the girl (Gatsby being a great example…sort of, but you see the connection). After being married now for 19yrs, now, more than ever, I see that my wife wants me to be a “dangerous man”. A man who has the capability to cause real violence or exert real power, but only in defense of her and our family. Women want a man who can that raw, untamed animal buried down inside that can really get things done (work, sex, and even exemplified in play with children). A man incapable of this is simply not of interest to really any woman. I’m not saying that you, or any woman, necessarily likes the male protagonist’s of some of the books mentioned, but that’s what women want to read…they see these wild, capable of abusive type of men and they want to see if the woman is able to subdue and harness that wild, raw energy. But you don’t know unless you finish the book 😉. There’s a reason Jane Eyre is beloved, and primarily by women…it’s not the outcome, but the pursuit of changing that type of man. But alas, most men cannot be changed. As my mother, wisely, once told me: “Women marry men hoping that they’ll change and they don’t. Men marry women hoping that they won’t ever change and they do.”
To me no other book ever raises so many twisted and complicated moral questions as Brave New World. The way it tackles happiness in society is really deep and it kind of made me rethink and revalue the functioning and structure of our society.
This is a top 5 book for me. As soon as I finished reading it the first time, I immediately reread it. Other books in top tier category for me are 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Jungle, and The Count Of Monte Cristo (which I placed there 20 years ago and should reassess). I also love Jane Eyre, lol. Named my daughter, Jane, in fact. This was a fun list. I've seen A Room With A View and Howard's End and loved them both, I should attempt the novels.
Brave New World is a great book, but the first ?50 pages is exposition setting up the story and it was written awhile ago so can be hard to get through. 90% as good and similar but an easier read is “This Perfect Day” by Ira Levin.
So glad you put 'Wuthering Heights' at God tier. I completely agree and with 'Frankenstein' being there as well. I recommend checking out George Eliot, especially Middlemarch. BTW, did you know that Charlotte is believed to have based the main character in 'Shirley' on her sister Emily? I agreed with (or at least I could understand) a lot of your views except about Jane Eyre
I did! You should check out my ranking of Brontë novels, you might get a kick out of it 😂 ooh yes finally reading Daniel deronda has been on my mind for a while!
just watched this and i have loved Jane Eyre actually, so it's really interesting to see how you felt about it haha. however, i have had Emma (paperback) for a while so i want to get into it soon :)
Omg yes!! Emma is queen 👸
I have diametrically opposite preferences on the Brontes' novels, i.e. Jane Eyre is my favourite and Wuthering Heights my least preferred. I'm thus very interested to hear how your reread of JE goes.
On translated classics...phew, so much choice! I'll restrain myself to just a few suggestions:
Dostoyevsky's "Crime and Punishment" (well...duh)
Stendhal's "The Charterhouse of Parma"
Giuseppe Di Lampedusa's "The Leopard"
Not in the classic/literary sphere, but Boris Akunin's Fandorin series (late 19th century Russia mystery/thrillers, but Akunin plays with a lot of genres) is great fun, commencing with "The Winter Queen".
The Tenant of Wildfell hall is my number 1 and I am it’s number 1 pusher online apparently so I highly recommend it 🙌🏽 Damn I just realised I didn’t say that the books weren’t in a particular order within the Tiers 🫢
Ooh yes I have a copy of the idiot but I might start with Crime and Punishment! Thanks for these I remember The Leopard vaguely from when I was working at Waterstones but it’s good to know from someone who has read it that it’s recommended! 😂Honestly late 19th century Russian thrillers sound right up my street!
Entirely my fault for assuming too much, and doubly embarrassing after seeing that you’d dedicated whole videos to the subject!
Oddly enough The Idiot is actually my favourite of FMD’s novels, but it’s not his best and I gather he was rather frustrated with it. It probably is much better to start with the Big Guns of C&P or The Brothers Karamazov.
Hope you feel better soon.
@@fyodor371 😂 don’t worry about it, everyone consumes TH-cam content differently! Ooh interesting that’s definitely cemented me reading C&P first. Thanks! I’m actually fine now just waiting to test negative 🤦🏽♀️ today will be day 10 so fingers crossed today is the day🤞🏽🫣
You are the first reviewer that I’ve seen mention The Machine Stops by E M Forster. Besides the Internet. this novella was published in 1909 (six years after the first flight) and contemplates air travel as obsolete. Just imagining yourself at a time when cars were scarce and electricity was new, reading this would seem way too fantastic. Thanks!
I think he was such a great writer and really ahead of his time! I’m working on a series of video essays about the Bloomsbury group and he’s definitely in there so keep a look out for that 👀💖💪🏽
Excellent presentation!!! I enjoyed both your commentary as well as the categorization of the books into tiers. I feel entirely justified and happy to give this video a "thumbs up".
Thank you! I’m glad you enjoyed it!
I thought the Great Gatsby was dreadful, I’ll have to try it again sometime. I heard Hunter S Thompson loved it so much he would type it out over and over and that he used his writing style for Hell’s Angels, a book I absolutely love. Dorian Grey is most definitely God Tier, just recently read it and was blown away at how incredible it is. 1984 sears in your mind, that book fucked me up, truly did. War and Peace is a work of art like the Mona Lisa, and a very approachable book. Tolstoy is a genius, a once in a lifetime author. Might I add a book to the God Tier? Crime and Punishment. I’ve only read one other Dostoyevsky book, but C&P delivers a boom with the message he communicates through it.
Gatsby is so lyrical. It’s beautiful to read out loud. Not a single extraneous word.
I have tried Crime and Punishment and couldn’t make it to the punishment part 😭 but I fell in love with White Nights ❤️
@@LibertyIndiaRose hmm. C&P is so gripping!
@@Tolstoy111 yea I probably need to give at another try sometime
I found I have very similar opinions! I'm British and never truly loved Great Gatsby, but War and Peace, Frankenstein, Animal Farm and To Kill a Mockingbird would all make my God Tier
Just need to read some more to have read as many classics as you! xx
I highly recommend E. M. Forster novels if you haven’t read them! Maurice and A passage to India are high on my TBR because I loved A room with a view and Howard’s End so much!
Loved this list - quite possibly because a number of my favourite classics were also on your "a good time" and "god tier" 😄
I suppose it's slightly embarrassing that I yet to read any Bronte or Austen novel, but they're on my reading list for 2023. 🙂
I can never decide on just the one novel that would be my all-time favourite, but I think it's fair to say "Swann's way" and "Anna Karenina" are among the contenders every time...which is mightily impressive considering I can't read them in their original French and Russian - god knows how much nuance is lost in that respect alone...
You’ve read Swann’s way?? That’s impressive 😂 yea I do wonder sometimes how much we miss in the translation 😬
@@LibertyIndiaRose No kidding, I read The Hitchhiker's Guide (which I love) in both English and Norwegian. Believe me, the latter did not even come close. 😄
Yes the great Gatsby is totally over hyped! Lol I reread this this year from school and was like....that was it???
The lyricism in TGG is what gets me. It’s so beautiful.
Villette is a favorite. I've read it several times. Also loved Agnes Grey and Tenant of Wildfell Hall. Disliked Wuthering Heights.
Ooh that’s interesting! Have you read Shirley?
@@LibertyIndiaRose Yes. Long ago. Liked it, too. :)
Great but ,... nothing of Victor Hugo, not even Les Miserables, Blalzac, Zola , Flaubert? Dostoevski?
I got too intimidated by Les Miserables I’m afraid 😂 I’m currently reading crime and punishment and am very keen to read more Dostoyevsky so if I ever redo this video with a new batch they will definitely be there!
I ran across your You Tube tonight and I just so happen to be half way through “The Picture of Dorian Gray” and I’m in total agreement! I got through half of “Jane Eyre” and that’s all I could stand. “Ulysses” should be included with the dry paint thing or ‘I’d rather be stuck in a traffic jam’ than subjected to this totally confusing dribble.
I’m currently rereading Jane eyre to see if 14 year old me was right and It’s taking me such a long time 😂😭 I think she might have been 😂
Agree with most of the god tier novels, I find war parts in War and peace a little too detailed though (sadly my attention span is not what it once was)
I fully get that, the peace parts are definitely the most engrossing 👀💖
It's a shame the poetic tradition no longer gets a mention when discussing "classics." Byron and Milton, for example, stand as the basis for some of the books mentioned here.
I haven’t read much unfortunately! I was only talking about books I’ve read so if the time comes that I’ve read enough it made sense to me to do a whole video on it 💖
As a french hearing "la crème de la crème" like that is so funny.
Good ranking btw
Nice to see you mention Agatha Christie. She was often too formulaic (she joked that she was "a sausage factory"!!), and sometimes wrote too fast, but she had some great strengths, such as her dialogue, her character insights, her moral decency. I think "Five Little Pigs", "Sad Cypress" and "Crooked House" are marvellous. But I would hesitate to put her up there amongst great classics.
I love your honesty and forthrightness by the way. So refreshing to see you say some books are over rated amongst the classics, and some are under rated. You're incredibly well read for a young woman!!
Nice to hear Le Carre get a mention.
Thank you for your kind words! I think reading the tenant of wildfell hall honestly changed my life because it was the first time I realised that the mythologising of an author doesn’t always reflect their skills, and I’ve always tried to be open to authors who fall under the radar 💪🏽
I agree with you 💯% I feel like I have found my person. I subbed.
Omg that means so much thank you 💖
My God Tier would have to include Larry McMurty's "Lonesome Dove." I would put "The Catcher In the Rye" at the top of the Overhyped tier.
H. E. Bate's novel "Love for Lydia" set in the 1920s is in my God tier!!! It's the best love story I've ever read; better than even Austen's "Emma" or "Jane Eyre", which I do like. He was an absolute master of the short story and I am in awe of his art. His descriptions of nature, of flowers is outstanding, better than great poets like Pushkin or Wordsworth. Up there with Shakespeare and Milton. Can't believe he never gets mentioned.
Yes Liberty, you simply must read some Bates!!! "The Kimono" and "The Station" are two outstanding short stories (but he wrote so many; he published more than 25 collections of short stories!!). His dialogue, his descriptions of the beauty of nature, of the seasons, of people's non verbal behaviour, his objectivity in observing human foibles without being cynical, are incredible. He evokes human suffering and pain in quite a unique way.
I want to read his World War Two novel, "Fair Stood the Wind for France" next as they say that it is up there with "Love for Lydia". He wrote and published this during the war; he saw action as a member of the RAF.
Henry Miller was a great admirer of him.
"I won't hear of any Lord of the Rings slander!!" I love your honesty and forthrightness! It is good to see you defending your choices, and not being afraid to say if you think a book is under rated or over rated, even if it is getting lots of plaudits from critics and reviewers. That's refreshing. Lord of the Rings is a stupendous book, and if the University literary snobs don't like it, so much the worse for them!! It has such profound wisdom and beautiful descriptions of nature, and great characters in it that it will always live on as one of the best books ever written. It's in my God tier for sure.
You make me want to read Wharton and E M Forster now. I will give them a try.
I will check out Bates’ work thank you for the recommendation! Absolutely anyone who has read Lord of the Rings knows how vivid the descriptions are and how gorgeous the prose is 😍
Oliver Twist is taught because it’s relatively short. It’s not first rate Dickens.
I simply adored it. I only wish they had assigned it in school instead of Great Expectations. I might have developed a love of Dickens instead. Nancy was probably the only interesting female character of the few novels of his I read.
@@barbaras2669 GE is a lot more complex. Thematically, psychologically.
I agree with Jane Eyre. I had to read it for school. Her skill for allusion, subtext, themes etc is extremely high but that doesn't matter if her writing is boring. Also screw Rochester. All my homies hate Rochester
It's so interesting how other people think about books, I agree on the most bronte novels but would switch wuthering heights with jane eyre 😅 I adore the tenant of wildfell hall...missed Thomas Hardy on that list though....
When I get round to doing a part 2 there will 100% be some hardy on there, he’s on my TBR! 💖
Mrs. Dalloway - not sure how overhyped it is when I've never heard of it.
I don’t know how you’re in a bookish online space and haven’t heard of it! Everything is relative 💖
I've read many of the books you've listed, and I agree with most of what you've said about them. I did like Jane Eyre more than you seemed to, though. : ) There is one I would add to "I'd rather watch paint dry" and that would be David Copperfield by Dickens. I forced myself to finish it, and honestly I don't know why I did that. I've found that a lot of people loved it but I just couldn't get into it. In "God Tier" I would put The Iliad by Homer and The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas. Both of those books are fabulous. The Iliad is my personal favourite piece of literature. If you like Sci-Fi you may want to try Robert Heinlein's The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. I'm reading it now and I've been having a great time with it.
Oh really?? That’s interesting David Copperfield is on my TBR having seen the Dev Patel film and loved it 😂 did you manage to see it?
@@LibertyIndiaRose I haven't seen it.. in fact I didn't know that there was a film. I'm not much for movies or television, personally. I may have to check it out though. Thanks for the heads up!
Have you read 100 years of solitude?
No but I want to!
Just come across this video. Nicely done, and interesting…….have subscribed 😊
Thank you! I know there’s some hot takes in there 😂
I enjoyed watching your video 😉
Not sure all your selections are classics though but that is the thing with the classic tag. There is no definitive definition
"A Classic is a novel or book that has never finished what it has to say"- I forget who said that now???
Garbage List:
1. The Great Gatsby
2. To Kill A Mockingbird
3. Anything by Toni Morrison -- except Beloved
4. Anything by James Joyce
You deserve jail time
@@ExpiditionWild Ha ha...as long as I don't have to read anyone on my list.
Constantine Levin 100%
Eccentric collection, but fun to watch.
I like to think that sums me up 😂
@@LibertyIndiaRose I agree with most of your choices, but some I find incomprehensible (e.g. Frankenstein).
" A book by Leo Tolstoy: one of the greatest in all the languages of the world, War and Peace. Not only the greatest but also the most voluminous...thousands of pages. I don’t know that anybody reads such books except myself. They are so big, so vast, they make you afraid.
But Tolstoy’s book has to be vast, it is not his fault. War and Peace is the whole history of human consciousness - the whole history; it cannot be written on a few pages. Yes, it is difficult to read thousands of pages, but if one can one will be transported to another world. One will know the taste of something classic. Yes, it is a classic.
Nobody is more worthy of a Nobel Prize than Leo Tolstoy. His creativity is immense, he was unsurpassed by anyone. He was nominated, but refused by the committee because of his unorthodox stories on Christianity. The Prize committee opens its records every fifty years. When records were opened in 1950, researchers rushed to see whose names were nominated and cancelled and for what reason. Leo Tolstoy was nominated, but never given the prize as he is not an orthodox Christian. Leo Tolstoy is one of Russia’s wisest men of the 20th century and his ideas on non-violence deeply influenced Mahatma Gandhi’s ideology. Mahatma Gandhi declared three persons his master. The first was Leo Tolstoy, the second was Henry Thoreau, and the third was Emerson.
Once Leo Tolstoy was asked - How many experiences did you have of divine ecstasy in your life? Tolstoy started crying. He replied - Not more than 7 in my life of 70 years, but I am grateful for those 7 moments and miserable too. In those moments it was evident that is could have been the flavor of my whole life but that didn’t happen. Those moments came and went on their own. But I am still grateful to God that even without any conscious effort on my part, once in a while He has been knocking at my doors.
Anna Karenina is one of my most loved books. How many times I have read it I can’t remember. I mean the number of times - I remember the book perfectly well, I can relate the entire book.
If I was drowning in the ocean and had to choose just one novel out of all the millions of novels in the world, I would choose Anna Karenina. It would be beautiful to be with that beautiful book. It has to be read and read again; only then you can feel it, smell it, and taste the flavor. It is no ordinary book.
Leo Tolstoy failed as a saint, just as Mahatma Gandhi failed as a saint, but Leo Tolstoy was a great novelist. Mahatma Gandhi succeeded as - and will remain forever - a pinnacle of sincerity. I don’t know of any other man in this century who was so sincere. When he wrote to people ‘sincerely yours’ he was really sincere. When you write ‘sincerely yours’, you know, and everybody else knows, and the person to whom you are writing also knows, that it is all bullshit. It is very difficult, almost impossible, to really be ‘sincerely yours’. That’s what makes a person religious - sincerity
.Leo Tolstoy wanted to be religious but could not be. He tried hard. I feel great sympathy with his effort, but he was not a religious person. He has to wait at least a few more lives. In a way it is good that he was not a religious man, otherwise we would have missed Resurrection, War and Peace, Anna Karenina, and dozens more beautiful, immensely beautiful books. "
"The While History of Human Consciousness" ? Huh? @ Thinking And Destiny by Harold Percival @ The Naked Bible by Mauro Biglino @ Author Marcel Grauile The Pale Fox @ Author Paul Wallis The Conspiracy of Eden.@ Anatoli Fomenko.@ George Pollock The Fourth Phase of Water.
@Henry Thoreau -Walden @ Leaves of Grass- Walt Whitman @Who Has Seen the Wind-Farley Mowat.
Interesting. I had assumed that Tolstoy just wasn't around when the Nobel Prize for literature was being awarded. Galsworthy and Kipling got Nobel prizes for Literature, and who talks much about Galsworthy these days? I assume the rules about being Christian changed later on, because Doris Lessing also received a Nobel Prize in 2007, and as a former Communist I'm pretty sure she was no "orthodox Christian".
Can u suggest me some books to gift my female team leader ?
If you want to go with a classic I would recommend A Room with a View by E.M. Forster, if you want something contemporary then maybe Circe by Madeline Miller, or if she would like some magical realism then potentially The Binding by Bridget Collins 🤩
And then there were none is great... until the ending. The ending ruins the book for me.
Jane Eyre sucks from beginning to end. The negative events that happen to the character are just SO over the top.
i can joke about it now but the ending literally made me have a seizure😂
We are the polar opposites regarding Lord of the Rings and The Great Gatsby. I'm neither British nor American just for the record and love love love Fantasy. I've red both in my teens for the first time. And while I appreciate the love of detail and care (inventing a language) of Tolkien I tended and still tend to skipp to the good parts.
Did I miss Douglas Adams, Victor Hugo, Daphne du Maurier and Arthur Conan Doyle? I'd add the Neverending Story by Michael Ende which reads and hits as Adult just diffrent.
There will 100% be a part 2 to this at some point there’s so many books that I couldn’t include for time, or that I’ve read since that I want to talk about! 💖
I prefer “We” by Zamyatin over Brave New World.
Fun video! Thank you. For translated fiction try Jon Fosse, who won the Nobel Prize this year. I discovered him through the Booker International Prize (his plays are unknown here in the US). It took me a while to learn how to read him, but now I love his style and his characters. For starters, begin with Alisa at the Fire, which comes in at 125 pages. Septology, him magnum opus, at 850 pages, has to be one of the greatest, the God tier, or our time.
Thanks for the recommendation! 💖
I literally was thinking Brave New World as you described the Overhyped category. It isn't bad or anything. If my friend wrote, I would think it is great. It's just, is it a classic? Top 100 best fiction novels of all time, Really?
@@dellh86 exactly! I’m sure for the time it was amazing, but there’s a reason that these kind of best classics lists get updated over the years!
I do so agree with you about The Great Gatsby. I just don’t see it. Yuk.
Why do women always prefer novels about women shunning traditional marital roles, but at the same time taking wild men and tamping them into traditional marital roles?
@@dead2me82 what book is that exactly?
@@LibertyIndiaRose The way you speak of the Brontë Sisters books, specifically Wuthering Heights. You seem to love the female characters, as most modern women tend, that want to “throw off the shackles of the patriarchy”.
However, most women I’ve spoken with tend to love a wild male character that gets tamed into the traditional male roles of a civil husband.
It would seem that men get tamer as they age and women tend to get restless as they age. Not saying a positive or negative towards those ideas, but just an observation.
Enjoyed the video BTW
@@dead2me82 lol that’s hilarious you should really check out my ranking Brontë novels video 🤣 The “wild male character that gets tamed” trope is the reason I hate Jane Eyre 🤣 I believe the wild male character should stay the hell away from the sweet girl and let her be happy with someone who deserves her 😂 Mr Rochester is a red flag and sweet Jane has no business getting herself involved in that shit show of a domestic situation like I cannot deny Charlotte is a great writer, but I never get on board with the actual content of what she writes (apart from the first like 80% of Shirley and it’s forever a source of annoyance to me she didn’t follow through with what she was trying to do with that character and story but I get it half her family died when she was writing it).
I love wuthering heights because it is written impeccably. No one who reads that book thinks it’s a love story to emulate and I literally say in the video all these relationships are toxic and no one should take advice from any of these characters. I’m a little perplexed actually about how your take applies to my opinion on the Brontë’s given what I said about those books 😂 Also if anyone is the victim in wuthering heights it’s poor Isabella 🫣 she thinks she’s marrying for love but is actually being used as a pawn of revenge against her brother 😭
But yea, my opinion on Charlotte’s books and WH is why I love the Tennant of Wildfell hall so much. Because the quality of the writing is there AND it’s a message I can get behind and thats a marriage made in literary heaven 😂💖
The message of the book is literally you cannot change or reform men, alcoholic womanisers are not sexy they’re scary, and if you find yourself in an abusive marriage get the hell out and take your children with you. It’s considered to be a response to Jane Eyre and how the public responded to Heathcliff and Mr Rochester. And it’s a reminder of how few rights women had, and even fewer if you were married, you could not earn your own money, your children were not legally yours you had no rights with regards to them, you were your husbands property, so yea naturally I enjoy reading about women who try and like get basic human rights for themselves 😂 and I think that’s why I like the 1800s so much because so much change happens in that century in terms of politics, social issues, women’s rights, science etc so much to get your teeth into!
I’m glad you enjoyed the video! Slightly questioning why I have to answer for “most women” 😂 but I hope you read the Tenant of Wildfell hall, it feels like my mission on the internet is to get as many people to read it as possible 😂
if I was to answer your question based on like my extensive book reading and film and tv watching, it’s less the “taming” that’s appealing ( that’s far too much work and no woman wants to drag a man kicking and screaming despite what some men think 😂) it’s more the fact that out of all the women in the world he chooses to change himself for the main character, I think it’s why villains are so popular it’s the whole “the hero would let his love burn to save the world but the villain would burn the world to save the person he loves” Basically it boils down to wanting to be loved, as most things in life do in some way or another. I personally don’t get it, seems very risky 😂 but I guess everyone has their preferences 😂
As you can tell, I love a discussion, sorry if that’s not what you were looking for 😂
@@LibertyIndiaRose that’s quite a response 😳😉. The Tenants of WH is certainly a book I have not read. However, let’s exclude what you would love to see from your characters (as it pertains to what you wish from/for yourself or society as a whole).
It appears that women want a man who is, for lack of a better way of saying it, a wild animal that they can tame…and rich. A man who has proven that he is dangerous…just not with them. Unfortunately, it is difficult to find such men in real life who can remain faithful, or sober, or non-violent, or whatever. Examples from some favorite books among females (both classic and modern):
- Edward (wealthy) and Jake in the Twilight series (both vicious in their abilities but they would use it honestly)
- Christian Grey (wealthy) from 50 Shades. Rich, dangerous, mysterious man is what the female protagonist is after, she just wants him safe enough for her benefit
- Jay Gatsby (wealthy) is a mysterious millionaire who was a bootlegger and swindler that he used his cunning and power to try regain the heart of his past love, Daisy, who is married.
- Mr. Darcy (wealthy), from Pride and Prejudice, is fairly selfish, vain and conceited, with anger issues, and it’s at the hand of Elizabeth that he reforms his ways.
- Mr. Rochester (wealthy) is a passionate man, which includes his anger and pride), but Jane will be the one to soften him…sort of.
- Four from Divergent series is a strong, mysterious, powerful, yet tormented character who seemingly can only be tamed by Tris.
- The Beast from Beauty and the Beast (also wealthy) is the epitome of my argument 🤷🏻♂️
- Gus McCrea from Lonesome Dove. If you haven’t read this should be American Classic, then you’ve GOT to add this to your list! He is a former Texas Ranger, a scoundrel, wealthy, dangerous and a louse. Yet he’s the only man that Lorena can feel comfortable with and wants him to marry her.
- Nearly every harlequin romance novel
- Han Solo…just for some pop culture. Bounty hunter, black market dealer and all-around selfish scoundrel gets tamed by Princess Leia.
Whether the men turn out to be the type of man you would actually want to be with, women wan the guy who is wild by nature, wealthy, and dangerous…and they want to believe that they can be the one to harness his volatility for their benefit.
There aren’t any real love stories about the lowly poor guy who is a servant that women go for…unless he somehow ends up as a powerful rich man in the end and only then gets the girl (Gatsby being a great example…sort of, but you see the connection).
After being married now for 19yrs, now, more than ever, I see that my wife wants me to be a “dangerous man”. A man who has the capability to cause real violence or exert real power, but only in defense of her and our family. Women want a man who can that raw, untamed animal buried down inside that can really get things done (work, sex, and even exemplified in play with children). A man incapable of this is simply not of interest to really any woman.
I’m not saying that you, or any woman, necessarily likes the male protagonist’s of some of the books mentioned, but that’s what women want to read…they see these wild, capable of abusive type of men and they want to see if the woman is able to subdue and harness that wild, raw energy. But you don’t know unless you finish the book 😉. There’s a reason Jane Eyre is beloved, and primarily by women…it’s not the outcome, but the pursuit of changing that type of man. But alas, most men cannot be changed. As my mother, wisely, once told me:
“Women marry men hoping that they’ll change and they don’t. Men marry women hoping that they won’t ever change and they do.”
@@LibertyIndiaRose I also want to be clear that my original question wasn’t a denigration of women, but more of an rhetorical observation.
i saw miniature of this video and I thought "if 1984 isn't in god tire there is no hope for the humanity"
but it is, great taste