Classics Challenge (pre-1900)

Classics Challenge (pre-1900)

I have been guilty of completely neglecting an entire sector of the books I profess to love so much, and this simply will not do! Yes, I had been dismissing the classics as dull and turgid tomes and concentrating on novels that were written, for the most part, within the last 50 years or so.

To combat this, I declared that I would tackle at least one classic novel each and every month this year and so, the Classics Challenge was born.

I’d like to invite everyone to join me on this voyage of discovery. Obviously, everyone can set their own goals – perhaps to read a certain number of books by one author, or to try classic novels from a specific period, or to try one a month like me. Whatever takes your fancy is fine, but I’d love to have a few others join in and chat about whatever we’re reading, as well as making some recommendations along the way. Hopefully we will all find ourselves loving a previously untried author or series…

Let the challenge begin!

2007

  1. The Picture of Dorian Gray – Oscar Wilde (1891) – 7/10
  2. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain (1885) – 6/10
  3. The Invisible Man – H. G. Wells (1897) – 5/10
  4. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer – Mark Twain (1876) – 6/10
  5. Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen (1817) – 8/10
  6. The Prisoner of Zenda – Anthony Hope (1894) – 6/10
  7. Black Beauty – Anna Sewell (Reading Circle) (1877) – 7/10
  8. King Solomon’s Mines – H. Rider Haggard (1885) – 6/10
  9. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen (1813) – 8/10
  10. The Three Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas (1844) – 9/10
  11. Fanny Hill: The Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure – John Cleland (1750) – 8/10
  12. Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte (1847) – 8/10
  13. The Hound of the Baskervilles – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1902) – 7/10
  14. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow – Washington Irving (1820) – 8/10
  15. Carmilla – J. Sheridan LeFanu (1872) – 7/10
  16. The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde – Robert Louis Stevenson – (1886) – 7/10
  17. The Sign of Four – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle – (1890) – 6/10
  18. Candide – Voltaire (1758 ) – UNFINISHED
  19. Dracula – Bram Stoker (1897) – 7/10
  20. A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court – Mark Twain (1889) – 7/10
  21. Mansfield Park – Jane Austen (1814) – 8/10
  22. Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte (1847) – 8/10
  23. Gulliver’s Travels – Jonathan Swift (1726) – 6/10
  24. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall – Anne Bronte (1848 ) – 8/10
  25. Charlotte Perkins Gilman – The Yellow Wallpaper (1892) -7/10
  26. Jane Austen – Lady Susan (1795) – 6/10
  27. Jane Austen – Love and Freindship (sic) (1790) – 5/10
  28. Wilkie Collins – Woman in White (1860) – 7/10
  29. Charles Dickens – A Christmas Carol (1843) – 6/10

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