<p>I liked Tom Sawyer, but was indifferent to Huck Finn in high school. I won’t reread it, but it’s not the worst piece of literature I’ve been forced to read.</p>
<p>I LOVED Catcher and Candide (I even read the latter of my own volition). And Gatsby is one of my all-time favorites… I cried at the end. Speaking of emotional books, Where the Red Fern Grows is the first book I cried after–I’m not sure if this counts as a “classic” but it’s close enough.</p>
<p>I read Where the Red Fern Grows in 5th grade and it was also the first book I cried after. I wish I had waited to read that one when I was older, the scene where the kid fell on the axe really upset me for a while.</p>
<p>I hated, hated, HATED The Great Gatsby. And The Scarlet Letter remains the only book I ever gave up on completely, and just read the Sparknotes instead.</p>
<p>I loved Jane Eyre though, which seems to be near the top of the hate lists of everybody else I know.</p>
<p>I agree that The Scarlet Letter was painful to read. I did not like it. </p>
<p>I did enjoy The Great Gatsby, Huck Finn, Pride & Prejudice and Jane Eyre though, all of which seem to have gotten a lot of votes.</p>
<p>I have mixed feelings about Dickens. I didn’t like Great Expectations, but that could’ve been because I was forced to read it in eighth grade and didn’t really appreciate the classics. I did like A Tale of Two Cities, after reading it multiple times for different classes (sophomore English and Academic Decathlon). </p>
<p>I have yet to attempt to read/watch any of the LOTR books/movies, but they’re at the top of my list, so we’ll see how that goes.</p>
<p>Pride and Prejudice and The Scarlett Letter struck me as Victorian soap operas that were 200 pages too long. </p>
<p>Gatsby on the other hand is probably one of my favorite books of all time. I also loved A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, which all but one other person in my class hated.</p>
<p>Oh, and I detested reading any Greek mythology, specifically The Odyssey and The Sophoclean Trilogy.</p>
<p>Jane Eyre >>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Wuthering Heights</p>
<p>could someone explain how they all hear him whisper rosebud then? because from what I’ve seen that nurse walks in moments too late for it to make any sense, I get how rosebud is the sled and all that but that seemed missing to me</p>
<p>Agreed on Wuthering Heights, I DESPISED that book. Didn’t understand jack of what was going on.</p>
<p>Ah I liked Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights equally. The latter was a little drawn out/overembellished, but when she got to the meat of the story, I really did enjoy it.</p>
<p>Oh god, Pride and Prejudice was awful. It was the only book in high school that I did not finish. The entire thing was gossip, I swear. Huck Finn was terrible as well, it gave me a headache. I remember hating Animal Farm when I read it in 7th grade, but I’m thinking about giving it another go eventually. I didn’t like Fahrenheit 451 too much, but I might re-read that one as well. </p>
<p>I’m currently attempting to read Atlas Shrugged, and it’s proving to be quite difficult (not to mention the thing is huge!). I’m not sure if I will quit or not, but it isn’t as good as I imagined it would be. </p>
<p>Notes from the Underground and The Double made my head hurt, but I liked Memoirs from the House of the Dead, so it’s not Dostoevsky. I think it might have been the lack of dialogue and endless ranting and rambling…</p>
<p>Speaking of headachey books, did anybody ever read House of Leaves? My friends and I were obsessed with it in high school.</p>
<p>I hated Jane Eyre with a passion. I mean, I did read it in 8th grade, but my reactions to it were a lot more current, in retrospect, than many of my opinions on books. Notably, (spoilers) after he loses his sight and she lives with him and all is happy, I was like okay, I didn’t like this book particularly, and I still think that Jane herself is annoying, but I can live with this. I am satisfied. AND THEN HE GETS HIS SIGHT BACK AND NOTHING CAN BE NOT OKAY FOR THEM. NO, ONLY PERFECTION FOR THESE TWO. Dislike dislike dislike.</p>
<p>Although I suppose that’s a specific reason. But I didn’t like the rest of it, either.</p>
<p>Try Crime and Punishment or The Brothers Karamazov, nightpwnsj00</p>
<p>For me…I couldn’t get past the first few pages of A Tale of Two Cities and I gave up on Jude the Obscure.</p>
<p>Of Mice and Men</p>
<p>I fell asleep reading that book.</p>
<p>Best night of sleep I’ve ever had!</p>
<p>That book serves two good purposes for me: a scene from Lost in which Ben recites an awesome monologue from the book, and an episode of Psych where Shawn insists on using his “Lenny voice” when they’re trying to ask this farmer guy questions. 
Otherwise I just really couldn’t get into that book!</p>
<p>Oh, and I think I liked Huck Finn! The Odyssey is a classic too, but I’ve been forced to read it one too many times!</p>
<p>And I absolutely HATED The Call of the Wild. I had to read that in middle school. Why, why, why did they insist we read that book? I’m pretty sure I never finished it.</p>
<p>Then again, I hardly finished any of the books we had to read…</p>
<p>Oh, I also didn’t like Animal Farm. It probably didn’t help that I hated the teacher who made us read it.</p>
<p>I’ll finish Wuthering Heights one of these days. A friend did a monologue from the book once, and ever since then I’ve wanted to read it. I think it was just too complicated of a book for me to read when I was younger, but I’ll finish it someday!</p>
<p>LOL JUDE THE OBSCURE. I had to read it for AP Language over the summer. It is possibly the worst book to read over the summer (or any time, for the matter), as it is so depressing. And Hardy spends too much time describing architectural features (like the wall that Jude stares at). Jude annoyed me as well… he was too suicidal. I honestly wish he would have committed suicide so the book would end.</p>
<p>I was one of the few people who completed it that summer, btw. Worst week of my life, and I never knew a book of that length could take me so long.</p>
<p>Btw, Moby Dick is amazing. Yes, the scholarly chapters were boring, but I loved the rest of it. Also, the slash (yes, I realize this is totally immature, but I couldn’t resist.)</p>
<p>Aaand I just gave up on Atlas Shrugged. If anyone on here feels that that book was amazing, do tell, because I’m not seeing it, and would very much like to see it. Pnin seems promising, though.</p>
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<p>Yesss. I agree with everything you said. Of Mice and Men was not the best. I couldn’t really get into it. I used to live in the same sort of area in California as he described, and (also in Cannery Row) his descriptions were very vivid, but it just wasn’t the place I grew up. I mean, I know that my California is a whole heckuva lot more urban/suburban than his was, but hills should stay hills, right? And his hills were different! And the rest of the scenery. BUT anything that involves Ben/Sawyer awesomeness automatically makes a book worth having read. :D</p>
<p>Lol… The OP sounds like an essay prompt. I don’t like classics because I can’t relate to them and they are sometimes difficult to read. I don’t like contemporary books either, because I don’t often know very much about the author, and I refuse to give some random idiot the satisfaction of deriving meaning out of his or her garbage. Seriously, you guys know ANYONE can write and publish a book, right?</p>
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<p>looool, that’s exactly how I took it. I was like “what next? they both suddenly become beautiful also?”. But I remember writing that because she never had a resolution with her step mother (I mean the woman is dying and she’s still like “I hate you jane, I kept money from you because I hate you…and your mother was so ugly…so ugly that…<em>dies</em>”) it kept from traditional romantic story tales. I mean, considering how rosy romance was in that time of the books writing it was ground breaking (people were like “What? UGLY PEOPLE DO NOT FALL IN LOVE!”). Wuthering Heights was groundbreaking in that people were like “WHAT!? JERKS DO NOT FALL IN LOVE!”. </p>
<p>also I kinda hate romance novels in general and reading those two was like…ew.</p>
<p>gotakun, you are a book snob.</p>
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LOL so basically, you refuse to read anything on the basis that it could suck? Haha do you also refuse to watch a movie or show on that basis too? You’re missing out on a lot of good stuff. I don’t know anything about the authors of the books I read, who cares?</p>
<p>I agree with the several people who said Catcher in the Rye. Definitely didn’t hate it, but it sounded like some rich kid whining. And the part with his English teacher on the couch was so weird. Not a bad book, but I don’t know why every other person has it listed under the “books” section on facebook.</p>