Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry. Characters that stay with you in a landscape you can’t quite believe to be true. Morally complex, with interesting digressions, and a plot that makes you stay up late reading.
I read it this year for the first time and I would say that it is an American great. And the first paragraph, with the pigs eating the rattlesnake, deserves some kind of award in its own right.
That's been on my "must read" list for years. Time for me to get my mitts on a copy and dive in. I could download from the library, but it's too big and too epic to waste on an ebook..
Joel, you got me with this title! Feels strange diving back into Substack after such a long hiatus...
Books I have loved and get my vote: The Woman in White, Bleak House, David Copperfield (if you only read one Dickens, make it this one), Crime and Punishment, Count of Monte Cristo (the audiobook version of this is superb!), Les Miserables, East of Eden (a must!). Still finishing War and Peace, as it was way too fat to carry along on the Camino.
Would definitely join you on Daniel Deronda and Moby Dick.
Looking forward to your "Big-Ass Classic Novel" year:)
Nathaniel Philbrick's "Why Read Moby Dick?" helped me better understand and appreciate Melville's book. I absolutely loved some parts (his descriptions are brilliant in places) and slogged through others (hello, whale classifications). Can't say it was my favorite book ever, but I'm glad I read it. I also recommend Philbrick's "In the Heart of the Sea," which is the true story that inspired Melville to write Moby Dick. That was a gripping read!
I started on Moby Dick but stopped half-way. I recall that it felt like reading a very encyclopedic account of whale life...But I do know that it must be worth it and am determined to give it another try.
The encyclopedic passages remind me of Les Mis and War and Peace, but only Tolstoy makes them pleasurable. I tolerate them in the other two. What is the difference?
So you need to read Dickens. I love 'Bleak House' and you must read it to really appreciate his genius at sprawling plots. But 'David Copperfield' is Dickens defined, the cast of eccentric characters, the mingled humour and pathos, it's all here. It is a good introductory tale. But both are an absolute must for your reading list.
'Pickwick Papers' is really for the hardcore Dickens fan. Not everyone will appreciate its rambling, the interjected melodramatic stories, and the humour may sometimes seem a little forced to modern, more cynical readers - I mean, Sam Weller is in himself an absolute comic literary treasure, but he doesn't make his appearance until about a third of the way in.
Of the others that I've read:
'The Brothers Karamazov' is the only Dostoevsky I've mastered to date. It is well worth reading, but it is an intellectual handful to follow. I was determined to read it simply because I had read the excerpt on 'The Grand Inquisitor' in a literary anthology and it was so stunning that I had to read the book it came from - I was glad I read the setting for the the Grand Inquisitor, but it is an imperfect and incomplete setting - Dostoevsky intended to write a sequel and never did.
'The Woman in White' is a good Gothic mystery, and Collins' unique narrative style, in the form of multiple witnesses statements, is engaging. However, I think 'The Moonstone', told in the same style, is the better mystery. Collins was Dickens' contemporary, but is a lesser storyteller.
'The Count of Monte Cristo' is over-the-top. I read a a number of the works of Alexandre Dumas, Pere, when I was younger, and I would describe him as writing the masculine adventure equivalent of Harlequin Romances. Nothing is realistic, nothing is believable, but it is addictively entertaining.
'Les Miserables': I have read a good abridged English version of this, which was still quite long, and have gotten a over a third of the way through the French original - I am much slower at reading in French. It is a wonderful story, but it is looong. Dickens' wordy asides have got nothing on Victor Hugo's. Hugo cannot stop himself from giving entire backstories to relatively minor characters, which is why a story centred around a riot in 1830s Paris spends a long time on things like a conversation between the bishop and a dying former French revolutionary, or describing Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo. Napoleon and the French revolutionary have nothing to do with the central story, but they are in there anyway.
'Don Quixote' should be read in Edith Grossman's recent translation. It is a rambling tale, but it is worth the journey. So much of modern literature draws from Don Quixote, from Dickens' Pickwick Papers to Mazzoni's The Betrothed. The Don himself is a ludicrously serious figure, but he would be boring without Sanch Panza as his comedic foil. The most famously cited incidents are in the first part, but the pace picks up in the second part, as Cervantes gains deftness in his character portrayal. This is 'the' groundbreaking novel in the European genre.
I missed that War and Peace was on the list. It has been decades since I read it, but would describe it as the Russian version of 'Les Miserables'. So, wonderful story with interesting characters, but with looong interjections on topics like Freemasonry.
David Copperfield is very accessible if you're not used to Dickens. It has all the typical Dickens stuff in it. I read it as a kid and loved it. I read Hard Times on my lunch breaks at a summer job when I was in college. It seemed like a bit of a slog, but my job on an assembly line may have colored my perception of it.
War and Peace is such a beautiful and profound novel, but I felt free to skip over Tolstoy's musings on a Theory of History when I reread and again reread the book. That problem doesn't arise with Anna Karenina.
Because you recently stated that you were not a fan of Wendell Berry (reason possibly forthcoming in the future), I suggest the first volume of the LOA "Port William novels and stories" by W.B. It clocks in at 983 pages. When it came out, I had not read any Berry novels ( a few short stories). But having them linked together in a chronological narrative (mostly) made me a fan. I particularly liked how stories within the community are often told and interpreted over many years by different voices.
That’s a great idea. I can’t quite justify my irritation with Berry until I’ve read more—and maybe I’ll drop it! I love the LOA editions. That’s a great way to jump in.
Joel, Did your planned review of "A Lesson Before Dying" (E. Gaines) get lost in the mad rush of writing your book in December 2023? Or, did I miss it?
No! Not yet. I’m reading A Gathering of Old Men right now and thought I might re-read Lesson when I finished. I was thinking I might review them both in one piece.
I'll be interested in your assessment of them side by side. I was partial to "Lesson", I thought it was a bit more nuanced about class and race in Louisiana. But both are good works.
You might add Our Mutual Friend by Dickens - my favorite Dickens, not as "classic" as Bleak House, but not as, well, bleak.
Skip the Rand, King, and Steinbeck options, as they are unworthy of the company of the others on your list. They're not bad, just not up to any of the others.
Several friends who are serious readers all swear by those Rand, King, and Steinbeck titles! Alas! I’m definitely leaning toward Don Quixote and Brothers K.
Our Mutual Friend is probably my favourite Dickens, but in order for its greatness to be truly appreciated, several other key Dickens novels need to be read first, including Bleak House and David Copperfield - Great Expectations as well.
I would second the comment about Atlas Shrugged. “Big-ass” classic novels should be worthy of their heft to deserve the reader’s commitment. Atlas Shrugged was more of a one note polemic, with wooden characters to boot. I’ve ready many of the books on this list (and am now motivated to read more!) and that is truly the only one I regret spending the effort to read.
Anna Karenina (Tolstoy) is an add. I’ll just say that having read a few of them, the “post-modern” novels (Gaddis, DFW, Fuentes, Pynchon) are slow going and may be best read over a long period of time. Not just because they’re hard to read on occasion, but I think you’re meant to slow down to parse the ideas as you go. Moby-Dick is also like that. Tom Jones, on the other hand, is a romp, and Cryptonomicon is a can’t-put-down thriller. Just a great list!
Not sure I’d go that far, but my taste runs to more Moby Dick, Faulkner and Cormac McCarthy. You might also want to consider “Swann’s Way,” volume one of Proust’s In Search of Lost Time.
_The Magic Mountain_ was one of the Big Ones I did in 2024. I thought it was an amazing book, absolutely epic in scope, particularly in terms of the characters that fill its pages, since it is not the plot that makes the book: It is one of those stories in which "nothing happens". It is all about the characters and who and what they represent, and the whole thing as a kind of allegory of the state and fate of Europe leading up to WWI. Mann writes with a very subtle and dry humor, and his skill with language is absolutely amazing. As a result of enjoying TMM so much, Mann's _Faust_ and _Joseph and His Brothers_ sequence are both on my to read list.
_Cryptonomicon_ is great and a lot of fun.
_War and Peace_ is on my list to read soon. It probably needs to count for two selections given its length.
Another possibility that I would highly recommend is Balzac's _Lost Illusions_. Balzac is up there with Tolstoy as far as ability to reflect life as it is in all its complexity and detail and his profound understanding of human psychology.
I did something similar, where I read 25 or so of the Great Big Novels from Don Quixote to Infinite Jest ... it took me 6 years. Almost the exact same list. For me the true hidden gems (if you could call a classic that) were Tom Jones, Vanity Fair and East of Eden.
That is my favorite novel by Solzhenitsyn. Two sadly unknown great Twentieth-century Russian novels are Life and Fate by Vasily Grossman and Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky. The latter takes place in France and was written in French, but it is quintessentially Russian. Both novels draw on their authors' experience in World War II.
I love big-ass novels, and Anthony Trollope is one of the masters. I suggest either The Barchester Chronicles (actually three books, but so good), The Way We Live Now, or He Knew He Was Right.
I’m currently reading my 12th Trollope, The Last Chronicle of Barchester. (There are 6 Barchester books!) My first book of his was Can You Forgive Her (aka Can You Finish It).
I love Trollope’s subtle sense of humor, and the sympathy he has for his characters, and how *real* his people are.
That looks like a pretty solid list! Many books that I haven’t read, but from authors who other works I have. Nany of which have wanted to read myself.
The one that I have read (mostly) is Moby Dick. In middle school, I was determined to read the whole thing (footnotes and all) and lost steam about 2/3.
(In high school, we read excerpts which focused primarily on the back half of the book so I was able to get closure to the story.)
One of the best stories of all time! However, it is possibly among the worst books (as far as a moving the narrative along standpoint). Be prepared for the fact that he spends just as much time talking about sailing, whales, wailing culture, and how to cook a whale steak as he does narrative. In reality, it’s two separate books intertwined - one fiction the other nonfiction.
That being said, as an adult, I might be more interested in learning of the history and philosophy of a dead industry.
I do enjoy the ins and outs of weird subcultures: Charles Willeford’s Cockfighter was excellent. And I’m reading Kathryn Scanlan’s Kick the Latch right now. Of course, both of those are short!
I agree with others on The Magic Mountain and Cryptonomicon. Moby-Dick is really amazing- a fever dream of a novel. Finished it in early July. For French literature I can recommend Emile Zola‘s Germinal, about a coal mining strike in Northern France. And if you’re really courageous, one of the big Chinese classics would also make sense on your list. I can recommend The Dream of the Red Chamber (or The Story of the Stone in another translation) as well as the Romance of the Three Kingdoms (which exists in a nice abridgement- I read the abridged version of this one), a tale of battles and strategy and court intrigue that’s the basis for tons of video games.
I almost put Dream of the Red Chamber on my list! I read bits and pieces in college for a Chinese lit course, but it didn’t resonate at the time. I spent far more time with Journey to the West. But I’ve never forgotten it!
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry. Characters that stay with you in a landscape you can’t quite believe to be true. Morally complex, with interesting digressions, and a plot that makes you stay up late reading.
That’s what I was going to comment!
Ditto!
I almost added it to my starter list! I’ll take that as reason to do so now.
I read it this year for the first time and I would say that it is an American great. And the first paragraph, with the pigs eating the rattlesnake, deserves some kind of award in its own right.
Pigs eating a rattlesnake! I’m sold!
And the pigs and the rattlesnake, metaphorical? Allegorical? Or, just two blue pigs eating a rattlesnake?
That's been on my "must read" list for years. Time for me to get my mitts on a copy and dive in. I could download from the library, but it's too big and too epic to waste on an ebook..
I'm reading Lonesome Dove currently.
Joel, you got me with this title! Feels strange diving back into Substack after such a long hiatus...
Books I have loved and get my vote: The Woman in White, Bleak House, David Copperfield (if you only read one Dickens, make it this one), Crime and Punishment, Count of Monte Cristo (the audiobook version of this is superb!), Les Miserables, East of Eden (a must!). Still finishing War and Peace, as it was way too fat to carry along on the Camino.
Would definitely join you on Daniel Deronda and Moby Dick.
Looking forward to your "Big-Ass Classic Novel" year:)
You’re back! I’m glad for the pointer on Dickens; there are so many to choose from. I’m still vacillating on Moby Dick; can’t decide.
The key that unlocks Moby-Dick is that it can be very, very *funny.* Knowing this going in helped me understand and love the book.
Great to know!
This really comes out in the audio book I listened to.
Agreed. Dry and wickedly sharp.
Nathaniel Philbrick's "Why Read Moby Dick?" helped me better understand and appreciate Melville's book. I absolutely loved some parts (his descriptions are brilliant in places) and slogged through others (hello, whale classifications). Can't say it was my favorite book ever, but I'm glad I read it. I also recommend Philbrick's "In the Heart of the Sea," which is the true story that inspired Melville to write Moby Dick. That was a gripping read!
And yes, I realize that in addition to a Big-Ass book, I've assigned you another 450 pages to read 😂
Gracias!
You absolutely must read Moby Dick. There are tedious moments, but by the end you are overwhelmed.
I started on Moby Dick but stopped half-way. I recall that it felt like reading a very encyclopedic account of whale life...But I do know that it must be worth it and am determined to give it another try.
That’s why I keep coming back to Dostoevsky. He fascinates me. I figure the problem is mostly me :)
The encyclopedic passages remind me of Les Mis and War and Peace, but only Tolstoy makes them pleasurable. I tolerate them in the other two. What is the difference?
So you need to read Dickens. I love 'Bleak House' and you must read it to really appreciate his genius at sprawling plots. But 'David Copperfield' is Dickens defined, the cast of eccentric characters, the mingled humour and pathos, it's all here. It is a good introductory tale. But both are an absolute must for your reading list.
'Pickwick Papers' is really for the hardcore Dickens fan. Not everyone will appreciate its rambling, the interjected melodramatic stories, and the humour may sometimes seem a little forced to modern, more cynical readers - I mean, Sam Weller is in himself an absolute comic literary treasure, but he doesn't make his appearance until about a third of the way in.
Of the others that I've read:
'The Brothers Karamazov' is the only Dostoevsky I've mastered to date. It is well worth reading, but it is an intellectual handful to follow. I was determined to read it simply because I had read the excerpt on 'The Grand Inquisitor' in a literary anthology and it was so stunning that I had to read the book it came from - I was glad I read the setting for the the Grand Inquisitor, but it is an imperfect and incomplete setting - Dostoevsky intended to write a sequel and never did.
'The Woman in White' is a good Gothic mystery, and Collins' unique narrative style, in the form of multiple witnesses statements, is engaging. However, I think 'The Moonstone', told in the same style, is the better mystery. Collins was Dickens' contemporary, but is a lesser storyteller.
'The Count of Monte Cristo' is over-the-top. I read a a number of the works of Alexandre Dumas, Pere, when I was younger, and I would describe him as writing the masculine adventure equivalent of Harlequin Romances. Nothing is realistic, nothing is believable, but it is addictively entertaining.
'Les Miserables': I have read a good abridged English version of this, which was still quite long, and have gotten a over a third of the way through the French original - I am much slower at reading in French. It is a wonderful story, but it is looong. Dickens' wordy asides have got nothing on Victor Hugo's. Hugo cannot stop himself from giving entire backstories to relatively minor characters, which is why a story centred around a riot in 1830s Paris spends a long time on things like a conversation between the bishop and a dying former French revolutionary, or describing Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo. Napoleon and the French revolutionary have nothing to do with the central story, but they are in there anyway.
'Don Quixote' should be read in Edith Grossman's recent translation. It is a rambling tale, but it is worth the journey. So much of modern literature draws from Don Quixote, from Dickens' Pickwick Papers to Mazzoni's The Betrothed. The Don himself is a ludicrously serious figure, but he would be boring without Sanch Panza as his comedic foil. The most famously cited incidents are in the first part, but the pace picks up in the second part, as Cervantes gains deftness in his character portrayal. This is 'the' groundbreaking novel in the European genre.
I missed that War and Peace was on the list. It has been decades since I read it, but would describe it as the Russian version of 'Les Miserables'. So, wonderful story with interesting characters, but with looong interjections on topics like Freemasonry.
Thanks for the feedback! I am leaning toward David Copperfield for my Dickens. I’m actually reading Hard Times this year; it’s considerably shorter.
Bleak House is funnier and just more awesome imho. DC is core Dickens, and can't go wrong.
David Copperfield is very accessible if you're not used to Dickens. It has all the typical Dickens stuff in it. I read it as a kid and loved it. I read Hard Times on my lunch breaks at a summer job when I was in college. It seemed like a bit of a slog, but my job on an assembly line may have colored my perception of it.
Ah but Hard Times is not a typical Dickens - the narrative style is completely different, almost an abstract of his usual style.
War and Peace is such a beautiful and profound novel, but I felt free to skip over Tolstoy's musings on a Theory of History when I reread and again reread the book. That problem doesn't arise with Anna Karenina.
Because you recently stated that you were not a fan of Wendell Berry (reason possibly forthcoming in the future), I suggest the first volume of the LOA "Port William novels and stories" by W.B. It clocks in at 983 pages. When it came out, I had not read any Berry novels ( a few short stories). But having them linked together in a chronological narrative (mostly) made me a fan. I particularly liked how stories within the community are often told and interpreted over many years by different voices.
That’s a great idea. I can’t quite justify my irritation with Berry until I’ve read more—and maybe I’ll drop it! I love the LOA editions. That’s a great way to jump in.
Joel, Did your planned review of "A Lesson Before Dying" (E. Gaines) get lost in the mad rush of writing your book in December 2023? Or, did I miss it?
No! Not yet. I’m reading A Gathering of Old Men right now and thought I might re-read Lesson when I finished. I was thinking I might review them both in one piece.
I'll be interested in your assessment of them side by side. I was partial to "Lesson", I thought it was a bit more nuanced about class and race in Louisiana. But both are good works.
I love Infinite Jest so, so, so much. I’ve read it four times. Ask me anything.
You might add Our Mutual Friend by Dickens - my favorite Dickens, not as "classic" as Bleak House, but not as, well, bleak.
Skip the Rand, King, and Steinbeck options, as they are unworthy of the company of the others on your list. They're not bad, just not up to any of the others.
Read Quixote. And do read both the Dostoevskys!
Several friends who are serious readers all swear by those Rand, King, and Steinbeck titles! Alas! I’m definitely leaning toward Don Quixote and Brothers K.
Our Mutual Friend is probably my favourite Dickens, but in order for its greatness to be truly appreciated, several other key Dickens novels need to be read first, including Bleak House and David Copperfield - Great Expectations as well.
I would second the comment about Atlas Shrugged. “Big-ass” classic novels should be worthy of their heft to deserve the reader’s commitment. Atlas Shrugged was more of a one note polemic, with wooden characters to boot. I’ve ready many of the books on this list (and am now motivated to read more!) and that is truly the only one I regret spending the effort to read.
Anna Karenina (Tolstoy) is an add. I’ll just say that having read a few of them, the “post-modern” novels (Gaddis, DFW, Fuentes, Pynchon) are slow going and may be best read over a long period of time. Not just because they’re hard to read on occasion, but I think you’re meant to slow down to parse the ideas as you go. Moby-Dick is also like that. Tom Jones, on the other hand, is a romp, and Cryptonomicon is a can’t-put-down thriller. Just a great list!
I’ve ALWAYS heard great things about Tom Jones. HL Mencken said it was the greatest English language novel.
Not sure I’d go that far, but my taste runs to more Moby Dick, Faulkner and Cormac McCarthy. You might also want to consider “Swann’s Way,” volume one of Proust’s In Search of Lost Time.
David Roberts suggested Swann’s Way too!
_The Magic Mountain_ was one of the Big Ones I did in 2024. I thought it was an amazing book, absolutely epic in scope, particularly in terms of the characters that fill its pages, since it is not the plot that makes the book: It is one of those stories in which "nothing happens". It is all about the characters and who and what they represent, and the whole thing as a kind of allegory of the state and fate of Europe leading up to WWI. Mann writes with a very subtle and dry humor, and his skill with language is absolutely amazing. As a result of enjoying TMM so much, Mann's _Faust_ and _Joseph and His Brothers_ sequence are both on my to read list.
_Cryptonomicon_ is great and a lot of fun.
_War and Peace_ is on my list to read soon. It probably needs to count for two selections given its length.
Another possibility that I would highly recommend is Balzac's _Lost Illusions_. Balzac is up there with Tolstoy as far as ability to reflect life as it is in all its complexity and detail and his profound understanding of human psychology.
Love it! Thanks for the guidance!
East of Eden was excellent and so American
Absolutely love this -- great title too. I'm downvoting Underworld into the underworld and casting 1000 votes for 1Q84 and Infinite Jest.
Good to hear about 1Q84!
I did something similar, where I read 25 or so of the Great Big Novels from Don Quixote to Infinite Jest ... it took me 6 years. Almost the exact same list. For me the true hidden gems (if you could call a classic that) were Tom Jones, Vanity Fair and East of Eden.
Vanity Fair! Yes!
That’s another plug for Tom Jones and East of Eden!
Cancer Ward by Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
I’ve heard that’s great.
Terrific novel. Completely changed the way I see news and politics.
That is my favorite novel by Solzhenitsyn. Two sadly unknown great Twentieth-century Russian novels are Life and Fate by Vasily Grossman and Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky. The latter takes place in France and was written in French, but it is quintessentially Russian. Both novels draw on their authors' experience in World War II.
I love big-ass novels, and Anthony Trollope is one of the masters. I suggest either The Barchester Chronicles (actually three books, but so good), The Way We Live Now, or He Knew He Was Right.
I’m currently reading my 12th Trollope, The Last Chronicle of Barchester. (There are 6 Barchester books!) My first book of his was Can You Forgive Her (aka Can You Finish It).
I love Trollope’s subtle sense of humor, and the sympathy he has for his characters, and how *real* his people are.
Excellent! Thanks for the nudge!
That looks like a pretty solid list! Many books that I haven’t read, but from authors who other works I have. Nany of which have wanted to read myself.
The one that I have read (mostly) is Moby Dick. In middle school, I was determined to read the whole thing (footnotes and all) and lost steam about 2/3.
(In high school, we read excerpts which focused primarily on the back half of the book so I was able to get closure to the story.)
One of the best stories of all time! However, it is possibly among the worst books (as far as a moving the narrative along standpoint). Be prepared for the fact that he spends just as much time talking about sailing, whales, wailing culture, and how to cook a whale steak as he does narrative. In reality, it’s two separate books intertwined - one fiction the other nonfiction.
That being said, as an adult, I might be more interested in learning of the history and philosophy of a dead industry.
I do enjoy the ins and outs of weird subcultures: Charles Willeford’s Cockfighter was excellent. And I’m reading Kathryn Scanlan’s Kick the Latch right now. Of course, both of those are short!
Glad to see lots of Dickens! 😃
I’ve never read any! I’m reading Hard Times this year, and I’m leaning towards David Copperfield for next.
I'm fond of Hard Times. I think it's very underrated. You don't often see it near the top of the Best Dickens lists, but it's in my top 5.
I agree with others on The Magic Mountain and Cryptonomicon. Moby-Dick is really amazing- a fever dream of a novel. Finished it in early July. For French literature I can recommend Emile Zola‘s Germinal, about a coal mining strike in Northern France. And if you’re really courageous, one of the big Chinese classics would also make sense on your list. I can recommend The Dream of the Red Chamber (or The Story of the Stone in another translation) as well as the Romance of the Three Kingdoms (which exists in a nice abridgement- I read the abridged version of this one), a tale of battles and strategy and court intrigue that’s the basis for tons of video games.
I almost put Dream of the Red Chamber on my list! I read bits and pieces in college for a Chinese lit course, but it didn’t resonate at the time. I spent far more time with Journey to the West. But I’ve never forgotten it!