Hardest books to read.

[QUOTE=bassplr19]Any poetry is hard to read, like Illiad and the Odessy, Cantebury Tales, Dante's Inferno[/QUOTE]
That isn't poetry, that's fucken literary diareah or however you spell that shit (literally).

The Divine Comedy...I should have studied it for 3 years but I've never managed almost to open it!

[QUOTE=Lazlosdead]I have trouble any book with a lot of characters. I'm attempting to read Gravity's Rainbow right now and I"m moving real slow.[/QUOTE]
Crying of Lot 49 is the only Pynchon I wouldn't put in the 'challenging read' column.

I say that with great affection for Mason & Dixon and for V. But I'm still procrastinating on GR and Vineland, in part because I spent two months on Mason & Dixon, and $60 on OED Online subscription fees to decipher the period dialogue--worth it, he's riotously funny when you can 'get' the jokes, but still a big committment.

naked lunch & soft machine- william s burroughs

so much jizz

great expectations & oliver twist-dickens
the witching hour-anne rice
any textbook-anybody

they're all so boring

I'd say Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, the old english version, untranslated and is thick like a motherfucker. I had to read that for a Chaucer class my junior year in college. On the plus side, it enlightened me to Sparknotes, which became a deadly habit that I had to stop cold turkey my senior year when none of the books I was reading was on the site.

I’d vote for Joyce’s _Finnegans Wake_ and _Ulysses_, very difficult reads and, well, I’m not sure if the reward outweighs the challenge. No knock toward JJ but I think experimenting can go a bit too far.

I also agree with the Pynchon citation and will mention a book I haven’t seen listed yet, a personal favourite: _The Sound and the Fury_ (1929) by William Faulkner.
At times a difficult read as, among some things, the first section is narrated by a retarded man who has no concept of time, so from sentence to sentence he may be shifting years.
[Faulkner once thought of printing an edition with different coloured inks to assist the reader but then he claimed he himself doesn’t know…]
The second part is told by his dead brother Quentin.
There are 2 characters named Maury, and two named Quentin, etc etc. These are most of the things that one needs to deal with.

One of my favourite books and I highly recommend it to everyone. Difficult but not overbearing.
j(ay)

[I]A Portrait of the Artist As A Young Man[/I] is the only book that ever gave me trouble. To think, people consider that one of Joyce's more ACCESSIBLE books....

*shudder*

Anything Anne Rice has written after The Vampire Lestat

I just finished The Hobbit and am on Fellowship now... friends that have read it and my hubby keep telling me if I stick with it it'll get better. Right now it's boring and complicated... too many characters and family lines, etcetc. Maybe they should have puta family tree and story for each family...

It's like the Bible, ya gotta scan past the genealogies.

Anything written by the goddamn Puritans about makes me gag.

The Bostonians by Henry James, I usually love his stuff but this one pissed me off.
Americana by Don DeLillo, ~I finished it so I'm allowed to have an opinion on it, PAH!
Walden by H D Thoreau, This guy's worse than Benjamin Franklin, but I have found myself thinking back on this one favourably, it was a toughie.

[QUOTE=Fake_Self]Anything written by the goddamn Puritans about makes me gag.[/QUOTE]

What about Anne Bradstreet? As long as you ignore the last bit of her poems which is usually the bit about God, they're quite pleasant, she was a master of poetry. Mistress? Whatev.

The Victorians and Romantics can be a pain in the ass. The preamble of Scarlet Letter is dreadful and almost as long as a novel itself. Worst establishment of Authority I've ever suffered through. Moby Dick with its chapters on whaling that don't advance plot. The Brontes, Thackeray, Jane Austen, etc., and later authors who emulate them like Tom Wolfe, Ayn Rand, etc., all make for rough going for ADHD cases like me.

They're probably not quite as difficult for me to hang with as the stream of consciousness writers.

I cannot make it through a Kafka book to save my life. I've gotten up to page 50 of [I]The Trial[/I] about 3 times and have never gotten beyond it because of how dry the writing is. Nothing in it can keep me interested enough to keep turning pages.

[I]A Clockwork Orange[/I] was great once I got used to the language. I even made a page of all the words and what they all mean and it's since became one of my favorite books.

[I]Bangkok 8[/I] also started out really boring and only got better towards the end. I'm not sure why; it had an interesting premise and the guy can write pretty decently but it was a slow read.

[QUOTE=dim71886]I cannot make it through a Kafka book to save my life. I've gotten up to page 50 of [I]The Trial[/I] about 3 times and have never gotten beyond it because of how dry the writing is. Nothing in it can keep me interested enough to keep turning pages.

[I]A Clockwork Orange[/I] was great once I got used to the language. I even made a page of all the words and what they all mean and it's since became one of my favorite books.

[I]Bangkok 8[/I] also started out really boring and only got better towards the end. I'm not sure why; it had an interesting premise and the guy can write pretty decently but it was a slow read.[/QUOTE]
Kafka was hard for me until I forced my way through "The Castle." Then "The Trial." Still haven't done "Metamorphosis" yet, but the key to digging him for me turned out to be a casting issue. I assigned the characters in "The Castle" actors from Monty Python. Once I did that, it was hilarious.

[QUOTE=Voodoo Dolphin]great expectations & oliver twist-dickens
the witching hour-anne rice
any textbook-anybody

they're all so boring[/QUOTE]
Totally agree with the Great Expectations book. It's just sitting in my room collecting dust.

[QUOTE=DrGonzoHST]Ok. I just started reading House of Leaves and apart from the psychological effects the books puts you thru the format is just a pain in the fucking ass. I didn't want to take this up in the House of Leaves threads cause no doubt there are a grip a spoilers in there.

What other books (nonfiction or fiction) have you had problems reading?
[/QUOTE]

Agreed. I loved the book, but it was a bit difficult to follow. especially having to turn it around and upside down.

I had trouble staying with The Count of Monte Cristo (unabridged version) I's sure the abridged is much better, but I'm stubborn and I keep coming back to it.

Also, Atlas Shrugged has been very enjoyable, but also very long and heavily descriptive which makes it sometimes hard to stay interested between events.

I haven't finished either of these books, but I keep coming back for more.

[QUOTE=Lazlosdead]I have trouble any book with a lot of characters. I'm attempting to read Gravity's Rainbow right now and I"m moving real slow.[/QUOTE]

I'm finally read this. Almost done. Excellent book but quite a skein of plot elements, characters and symbol systems to unravel. The companion by Weissman is helpful to some extent.

[QUOTE=RandomThought]I don't know if anyone has mentioned Naked Lunch yet, but...shit, yeah, that takes the cake for me.

It took me three various times to finish the novel. I can't even piece it all together logically, but I guess the story in itself is devoid of logic anyway. I wish I could see the movie. <3 for Burroughs.[/QUOTE]

I still say it isn't a novel.

Interesting and the language is "hep" as they used to say...

[QUOTE=paranoidandriod]ive tried to read the trial like 2 times and i just can't. so whoever said that is right. The first time i read the hobbit i found it hard but i was in 7th grade then and now that im older, it seems to be quite a easy read. i havent ever been able to read the lord of ther ings but im gonna try after i finish the hobbit.[/QUOTE]

How old were you when you tied to read Kafka? I tried as a teenager and couldn't hang with him. I've already mentioned mentally casting the members of the Monty Python troup as a way of making it more readable, and really if anyone was going to adapt Kafka for the screen, Gilliam would be the man for the job.

But until you've moved across state lines and had to visit a DMV that still uses IBM Selectrics to type out forms, lived in a city that sends out letters saying that the police won't come to your ADT call unless you pay a $25 subscription fee to the city for the police to do what they're supposed to do with your tax dollars--come when called, etc., I don't think Kafka makes sense. You have to be in those life situations of being a dog named 'Stay.'

Try running for public office, or spend some time working in journalism and it will seem like Kafka's been reading your mail.

[QUOTE=Chixulub]How old were you when you tied to read Kafka? I tried as a teenager and couldn't hang with him. I've already mentioned mentally casting the members of the Monty Python troup as a way of making it more readable, and really if anyone was going to adapt Kafka for the screen, Gilliam would be the man for the job.

But until you've moved across state lines and had to visit a DMV that still uses IBM Selectrics to type out forms, lived in a city that sends out letters saying that the police won't come to your ADT call unless you pay a $25 subscription fee to the city for the police to do what they're supposed to do with your tax dollars--come when called, etc., I don't think Kafka makes sense. You have to be in those life situations of being a dog named 'Stay.'

Try running for public office, or spend some time working in journalism and it will seem like Kafka's been reading your mail.[/QUOTE]

Kafka's really not about bureauracracy though. It's more metaphor for the undisclosed natures of God, being and mortality as evidenced by existence. the Trial for example can be taken as the plight of man, rather than simply a single man (Joseph K.) faced with a universe who condemns him and does not answer. Quite like Job whose legitimate queries to God fell upon an unreciprocal cosmos.

Much of Kafka's work is representative of far more than the machinations of the human systems he ostensibly addresses.

9/11 Commission Report was dull.

I found To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf to be a tad challenging. Not quite sure why, I guess reading her is kind of like watching someone paint a picture, maybe I stopped watching too soon. I got like halfway through and bailed. Does it come out pretty in the end?

Kingdom of the Wicked by Anthony Burgess... Only book I couldnt finish...

[QUOTE=AlkalineMidnight]Kingdom of the Wicked by Anthony Burgess... Only book I couldnt finish...[/QUOTE]

how 'bout almost anything by Anthony Burgess.. I never finished A Clockwork Orange either.

[QUOTE=Parkaboy]Kafka's really not about bureauracracy though. It's more metaphor for the undisclosed natures of God, being and mortality as evidenced by existence. the Trial for example can be taken as the plight of man, rather than simply a single man (Joseph K.) faced with a universe who condemns him and does not answer. Quite like Job whose legitimate queries to God fell upon an unreciprocal cosmos.

Much of Kafka's work is representative of far more than the machinations of the human systems he ostensibly addresses.[/QUOTE]

That's another way to look at it (glad to have you back, Parka!), but in either case, while some teens enjoy Kafka, probalby out of general alienation and the sense that they are powerless even in the world of their peers, I think it's hard to relate to him until you've been in a few of the ridiculous scrapes life puts you through.

You're right, the deeper metaphors apply, like K.'s inability to get to the castle, no matter what channels he does or doesn't follow, his romantic entrapment that he only finds out after the fact worsens his situation, etc. I can totally see the religious aspects of that, though that wouldn't have made Kafka more appealing as a teen, at least for me. Maybe I had too much of a bourgoise childhood.

But I spent five years writing for a local free tabloid that specialized in covering the corruption of Kansas City, MO's, city hall, which is still very much governed by Pendergast principals. And running for Jackson County Legistlature while I was there gave me an even better look at the realities of urban politics, which are not at all lacking in Kafkaesque pradoxes and dilemnas.

The other thing that probably makes Kafka a hard read for most is, in the first place, you're reading him in translation. That's probably a setback with any author. This isn't to say they aren't worth reading, but if you take Tom Wolfe, Dickens or Thomas Hardy and compare them to Tolstoy, Goethe or Cervantes, you can see that Tom Wolfe is writing not only in your language but your dialect; Dickens and Hardy you have to get used to the dialect, but you know the language, and the reactions of the characters tend to reveal the exact meanings of some of the usage.

Obviously Kafka wasn't writing as elaborate a social document as a Victorian novelist, but I'm sure there's plenty of things that are at the discretion of the translator.

The other thing that fights Kafka's readabiltiy, probably, is stuff like The Trial and The Castle were works in progress, supposedly ordered burned by the author on his deathbed. I can only assume that he wasn't yet happy with them. The debate about whether he 'meant' to have them burned is beside the point: either he didn't feel they were complete and wanted them burned, or he at least wanted the asterisk by it to say, 'I wasn't finished, caveat emptor!'

Im a big fan, but Irvine Welsh can be a pain in the ass. The slang of some of his characters like Begbie, plus there is a lot of characters.

They take me a while to finish.

Try reading Kafka's short stories and see if you can get into those, they're pretty reflectful of what he's about.

[QUOTE=JackRabbitSlim]Im a big fan, but Irvine Welsh can be a pain in the ass. The slang of some of his characters like Begbie, plus there is a lot of characters.

They take me a while to finish.[/QUOTE]

[I]Trainspotting[/I] was definitely heavy on dialect, and even the glossary was far from complete. I have it from reliable sources that he doesn't always write like the drunk at the end of a bar. My to-read list includes tyring one or two of his other books to see about that.

Tim Robbins...I thought I wold enjoy reading him because he is kind of different. For instance in one book some of his main characters include a spoon, a stick, and other inanimate objects. I saw 3 of his books on sale for cheap at a used book sale and bought em. I struggled to get through Even Cowgirls Got the Blues and stopped reading it half way through. I picked it up again a month later and finished it. He goes off on so many tangents and his style is so tiresome. I tried reading another one and finally I decided screw this and sold the three books back to a used book shop.

[URL=http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0618056645/qid=1103908798/sr=8-1/ref=pd_csp_1/103-7662977-1678258?v=glance&s=books&n=507846]Earth in the Balance[/URL]

I had to read this for a review when I worked for the yellow press. It's not only full of shit, it's impossibly bad writing. You'd think a ghost writer and editor would do better at making Gore at least appear to have a brain.

[QUOTE=Chixulub][I]Trainspotting[/I] was definitely heavy on dialect, and even the glossary was far from complete. I have it from reliable sources that he doesn't always write like the drunk at the end of a bar. My to-read list includes tyring one or two of his other books to see about that.[/QUOTE]
I've read most of is books and I can't remember one that didn't sound like a filthy Scot drunkard. Maybe Filth ironically, I have read the first few pages of that and as I recall it was sans the patois.

i know a lot of people who have trouble with A Clockwork Orange. i've let people borrow it and i always get it right back. a lot of people only make it through 2 or 3 chapters before giving it up.

Irvine Welsh's [u]Filth[/u]. I enjoyed the hell out of [u]Maribou Stork Nightmares[/u] and haven't got around to picking up anything else by him... but [u]Filth[/u]... it just seemed so pointless. And the tapeworm in his gut was the most interesting character.

Tim Robbins is alright, IMO.

I've got a ton of books that I've started and haven't finished. But it's easy for me to lose my attention span and grow disinterested very quickly. Sometimes I give books a second chance. Sometimes I give them a third. Usually by the third chance--and the books I give this many chances to seem to be the ones that are highly recommended to me--if the book is still boring, I say fook it and move on.

The Hobbit - I think I've gotten to the same point in that book all four times I tried. It sucks, that's all that I can say about it. And now that I look back on the people who have said that they love the book, and that it, along with LOTR are fantastic, every single one of those people have very dull personalities, and their taste in music also sucks. Coincidence? I don't think so.

Underworld/White Noise/Americana - I've tried all three, and a couple others of DeLillo's and I always give up after about fifty pages, if not sooner. I probably own mostly all of his books, but I haven't finished a one of them yet. And everytime I get myself ready to read them again, an hour later I just throw it back on the bookshelf.

The Gunslinger/Gerald's Game/The Dark Half - By Stephen King. All three have different reasons, but the one common theme seems to be that the language in all was very drab. Well maybe not GG, I think the storyline in that one just sucked, but for The Gunslinger and DH it was because they were dry.

Absalom, Absalom/Sound and the Fury - I hate Faulkner. Any man that could write two pages of one sentence, and still know what his point was when he began it, I don't see that as prophetic, I see it as he must have had a boring life. Not that I didn't like the content of these books: I always have found his ability to create an intriguing story as being top notch. But man, too, too long.

Heart of Darkness - If that book moved any slower it would have been dead.

[QUOTE=bushpig]i know a lot of people who have trouble with A Clockwork Orange. i've let people borrow it and i always get it right back. a lot of people only make it through 2 or 3 chapters before giving it up.[/QUOTE]
Oh, so many people give up on this book. Probably more have attempted to read it than actually did. I gave up after the first ten pages when I first bought it but vowed to read it one day. About 6 months later I finally read it by writing out the meaning of every term as I came to it. Like when I read Shakespeare I eventually fell into a groove where I could get everything through context. Now that I realize it, I read that like it was Shakespeare by filling stuff in on my own. Huh.

As for JustinHolt, The Gunslinger was very dry but if you can get through it and to the sequels it picks up a lot. If not, the plot in the first one is only introductory and you could probably read a synopsis and get through the sequels without missing a beat. As for Gerald's Game, I was a big King fan when I read that (not much of one anymore outside of the DT series). I considered that as more an exercise in what he could write as opposed to a real story. Just something to get his juices flowing.

[QUOTE=phlegmatics]am i a moron for not being able to translate irving welsh's dialouge and still keep my mind in the story?

or is this a common thing?[/QUOTE]

The first time I read Trainspottting, I was somewhat detached. But I now have read all his books, including a re-read of Trainspotting, and love the man's writing. Welsh is an excellent storyteller, and the dialect makes the books even better.

[QUOTE=JustinHolt]Absalom, Absalom/Sound and the Fury - I hate Faulkner.[/quote]

Kindly give _As I Lay Dying_ a read through before, um, nailing the coffin shut on your feelings (and into anyone’s face).
_Light in August_ and/or some short stories (maybe “A Rose for Emily”) also.
If you are adamant against buying anything of his, send me your address and I’ll send you something.
If you then still “hate” WF, then I owe you a book of _your_ choice.

[QUOTE=JustinHolt]Heart of Darkness - If that book moved any slower it would have been dead.[/QUOTE]

I’ve been reading Joe Queenan’s (so far) very funny _Queenan Country_ (2004) [an American’s POV of the UK] and last night was laughing a bit while he was ranting about books. This passage you may appreciate, not that I completely agree with it, but it’s still damn funny:
“Joseph Conrad has always occupied a special place in my rogues’ gallery of cultural villains. Born in Poland in 1857, Conrad wrote prose as if he’d never left home. Given to tortuous plot structures and a penchant for narrators who seemed to be missing a few screws. Conrad possessed an almost supernatural inability to come to the point. (p.76-7)

j(ay)

[QUOTE=jay]
Kindly give _As I Lay Dying_ a read through before, um, nailing the coffin shut on your feelings (and into anyone’s face).
_Light in August_ and/or some short stories (maybe “A Rose for Emily”) also.
If you are adamant against buying anything of his, send me your address and I’ll send you something.
If you then still “hate” WF, then I owe you a book of _your_ choice.

j(ay)[/QUOTE]

Like the rest of my bit on Faulker said, I love the "story" element of his work. I just had his long, meandering style of writing. I've read "As I Lay Dying" at least ten times for different classes. And I suffered through Absalom, Absalom, That Evening Sun, The Sound and the Fury at least a couple of times each and I've taken away, I think, all that I am ever going to get from them.

I definetely respect anyone who chooses the to read, and like, Faulkner. I just can't personally see "it." I much prefer Hemingway's style to Faulkner's if I have the choice.

ok. You're now officially free of having Faulkner forced down your throat...

j(ay)

[QUOTE=Spike]...Tim Robbins is alright, IMO.[/QUOTE]

TOM!! the writer is TOM ROBBINS!! tim robbins is the dumb fuck actor from shawshank redemption and bull durham, married to susan sarandon!! sorry to flip out, but TOM ROBBINS is one of my favorite authors and i just can't imagine tim robbins sitting down to write a novel.

[QUOTE=jay]Joseph Conrad has always occupied a special place in my rogues’ gallery of cultural villains. Born in Poland in 1857, Conrad wrote prose as if he’d never left home. Given to tortuous plot structures and a penchant for narrators who seemed to be missing a few screws. Conrad possessed an almost supernatural inability to come to the point. (p.76-7)

j(ay)[/QUOTE]

I have been meaning to give As I Lay Dying another try.
What Conrad books did you read? I only read The Secret Agent but thought it was fascinating. It did have a rough start but that was so IN when he was writing, that was the thing! The writer could no longer explain a disjointed and godless universe, it was modern. Anyway, I liked it - the anarchists, the betrayal, stevie the poor half-wit victim, the surprises at the end.. all good. It was one of those that was difficult, but worth the difficulty. Some books are hard to read but that doesn't make them unenjoyable. You sound like you didn't enjoy Conrad or Faulkner, even though you appreciated what they were saying on the whole.

[QUOTE=Maddetchke Malorkus]I have been meaning to give As I Lay Dying another try.
[/QUOTE]

I love Faulkner, but I would NOT start with 'As I Lay Dying' or 'Sound and the Fury.' The best place to start is where, in retrospect, he should have started, his fourth novel, 'Sartoris.' If you want the complete version, pick up 'Flags int he Dust,' which a Faulkner junkie like me will always prefer. It's the first Yoknapatawpha novel, and it's where he really found his voice.

Rather than read him in order, in retrospect, I'd say read 'Flags in the Dust,' follow it with 'Light in August.' Then do the Snopes trilogy: 'The Hamlet,' 'The Town' and 'The Mansion.' Then maybe try 'As I Lay Dying.' His dialect will be natural to you at that point, which will make the jarring shift of narrators much easier to deal with. It's done in tiny chapters, each told by a different person. These people include some characters who are not bright, some characters who are insane, and some characters who are unreliable because of drink. It's very much like 'Trainspotting' that way, and if it had been my starting point with Faulkner, it might have been the end as well.

The most difficult book I ever read was Ulysses by James Joyce. Other then that would have to be text books, especially film theory stuff. Interesting, but it takes some serious effort.

[QUOTE=sacredchao23]The most difficult book I ever read was Ulysses by James Joyce. Other then that would have to be text books, especially film theory stuff. Interesting, but it takes some serious effort.[/QUOTE]

Maybe I mentioned this, but that book was in the can at my Irish friend once and I had to re-read the first page like three times just to get what the fuck was going on.

Course, this was years ago.

[QUOTE=Mr. Brown]Maybe I mentioned this, but that book was in the can at my Irish friend once and I had to re-read the first page like three times just to get what the fuck was going on.
[/QUOTE]

Figured it out in only three readings?

[QUOTE=Maddetchke Malorkus]What Conrad books did you read?[/quote]

Hmmm, you’re quoting me, so I guess it’s me you’re addressing…

_The Secret Agent_
_Heart of Darkness_
_Lord Jim_

None of which I had/have a problem with.

[QUOTE=Maddetchke Malorkus]Some books are hard to read but that doesn't make them unenjoyable. You sound like you didn't enjoy Conrad or Faulkner, even though you appreciated what they were saying on the whole.[/QUOTE]

I agree 100%.
I have to think that you are mixing up some of the posts; Faulkner is one of my favourite writers.
And the Conrad quote was just that, a quote, not my words. I don’t agree with it per se, but I think it’s a funny if not fitting statement.

[QUOTE=Chixulub]I love Faulkner, but I would NOT start with 'As I Lay Dying' or 'Sound and the Fury.'[/quote]

I totally agree with the later (although I think it may be his greatest work), but very much disagree with the former.
Me thinks _As I Lay Dying_ is easily WF’s most accessible book (out of the ‘greatest hits’ titles). One might say it’s Faulkner ‘doing minimalism’.
_Sartoris/Flags in the Dust_ is/are great, but more of a gateway into ‘if you wanna get into _Absalom, Absalom_.

And there you have two very different recommendations from two big ‘Faulkner Fanatics’.

j(ay)

[QUOTE=jay]
Me thinks _As I Lay Dying_ is easily WF’s most accessible book (out of the ‘greatest hits’ titles). One might say it’s Faulkner ‘doing minimalism’.
_Sartoris/Flags in the Dust_ is/are great, but more of a gateway into ‘if you wanna get into _Absalom, Absalom_.

And there you have two very different recommendations from two big ‘Faulkner Fanatics’.

j(ay)[/QUOTE]

He only wrote, what 27 novels (if you don't count 'Sartoris' and 'Flags in the Dust' as the same book), plus a hefty stack of short stories. Just read it all...