Tuesday, November 13, 2007
20 most re-read books
The Costa Book Awards recently conducted a survey to learn which 20 books are the most re-read (h/t Missy):
1. The Harry Potter Series by J.K Rowling
2. Lord of the Rings Trilogy by JRR Tolkien
3. Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen
4. The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien
5. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
6. 1984 by George Orwell
7. Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
8. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis
9. Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
10. Catch 22 by Joseph Heller		11. Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson
12. To Kill a Mocking Bird by Harper Lee
13. Flowers in the Attic by Virginia Andrews
14. Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
15. Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
16. The Bible
17. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
18. Bridget Jones Diary by Helen Fielding
19. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
20. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
I've read 17 - all but #2, #4 and #15, only one time each, however. And I've heard of #15 - have you? I'm surprised that Bryson's book is so popular as to be 11th and in such exalted company. Most make various kinds of sense, especially Catch 22 which is really very funny and spot-on, as they say where this list originated.

Especially Jane Austen. She wrote her books almost 200 years ago! I wonder if she had any idea that her six small, wonderful stories would delight people for so long and so much. Or that the characters and personalities would be so germane all these many years after she drew them and brought them to life. It's times like these that I very much hope there is an afterlife, so that wonderful people like her can see what happens.

The 2007 Costa Book of the Year will be announced in January.

Labels: ,

Permalink | | posted by jau at 3:34 PM


4 more:
Blogger ligneus — at 6:10 PM, November 13, 2007:
You haven't read The Hobbitt and LOTR?!! You know Alan Sullivan is holds those in very high esteem, as do I. Somewhere I have kept a very interesting essay on Tolkien and his books and how his experience in the trenches in WW1 shaped his thinking and some of the scenes in the books.
Well I haven't read #'s 1,7,8,11,12,13,15,17,19 and 20! Of those the only ones I'd like to read are the CS Lewis and the Dickens. Most of the others but specially Harry Potter I have no interest in. Kind of depressing to find that one #1.
 

< home >

Blogger jau — at 2:42 AM, November 14, 2007:
I must admit that I'm surprised you haven't read Great Expectations. I think you'd like it, although there are a couple of other Dickens books that I like better. As for CS Lewis, perhaps this isn't the one I'd pick for you since it's apparently not your favorite genre (ooh, I got to use the word genre). Some of his more philosophical and personal books, perhaps?

Which leads to an inevitable question: what's on your own list for repeatable reading??
 

< home >

Blogger ligneus — at 8:26 PM, November 14, 2007:
I read a few of Dickens novels when I was young but none since I left England forty years ago! Oliver Twist is a twice read, also Pride and Prejudice, LOTR, East of Eden, Animal Farm, in non fiction, George Orwell's Journalism and Essays and above all Irving Babbitt's Democracy and Leadership. Covering the same ground as that, Thomas Sowell's A Conflict of Visions. Oh, mustn't forget Milan Kundera's The Art of the Novel. Fabulous book.
For lack of time I'm not really widely read and I have to be selective in what I do take on.
 

< home >

Blogger Webster Twelb — at 1:30 AM, November 15, 2007:
Oh..I do love Jane Austen very much. And oh..I haven't realized that it's been 200 years..time is really going fast.
 

< home >


Post a Comment

< home