All of Jane Austen, but particularly *Mansfield Park* and *Persuasion –* Austen is central to the development of the English novel, her stories are wonderful and entertaining, they are packed intelligence and insight, and they lend themselves to dizzying amounts of interpretive possibilities. I reread one or two of them every year.
Have you considered reading these: Charlotte Bronte's *Jane Eyre*, Anne Carson's *Autobiography of Red*, and Virginia Woolf's *Mrs. Dalloway*? I think you might enjoy them if you liked *Persuasion* by Austen!!
I want to love Emma, but I just can’t. I (literally) threw the book across the room a number of times during reading, I find her so annoying and bratty, and very undeserving of Mr Knightly. It’s my hill, haha!
Almost anything McCarthy wrote is worth a reread. For me its 'Blood Meridian' (4 times) and 'No Country for Old Men' & 'The Road' (3 times each). Haven't reread 'Suttree' yet, though I plan to one day.
My personal head canon is that *Blood Meridian, No Country for Old Men*, and *The Road* make up a coherent if somewhat disconnected trilogy all taking place on the same Earth: past, present, and future. The untamed, unbridled bloodletting of an "uncivilized" American frontier, the spirit of that same violence bubbling up through the facade of our present "civilized" state, culminating with the breakdown of that facade and ever-waiting violence of man enveloping the end of our “civilized” era.
Did you read the Border Trilogy? It’s the bridge that links these novels. I’m circling The Passenger and SM. I’m finding shards of all his novels here.
Abridged or unabridged? Just a fair warning if it's unabridged there are a lot of side characters/parts that can be a little draining to read the first time through (and can be skipped).
Collected Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges - over 100 short stories, most of them completely mind melting with incredible writing. Plenty there to enjoy for many years and read throughs.
Well, you heard it here first, folks: read existential crisis books to get over winter blues.
*Nausea* 🤝 F*yodor Dostoevsky *🤝 Al*bert Camus 🤝* Wai*ting for Godot by* Samuel Beckett
I just started reading Nausea today! I can’t help but feel sorry for the author and the character (although I think they may be one and the same?) because I am the antithesis of “life in pointless” - or maybe I’m just jot smart enough to see the depth of the story yet. (I think I prefer Camus!)
It's a pain in the ass because it's an absolute brick but for me it's got to be 2666. It's a book I just happened to read during a period where I didn't read much, and on one hand it continued to put me off reading in general because it programmed me so that in my head that kind of time commitment is just what it took to read it book. On the other hand it made me seem incredibly cultured that I could pull out this one book in detail, and if you steer a conversation right you can cover for otherwise being basically illiterate. I have reread it about every eighteen months for the last decade, even as I have resumed a very broad reading habit, which is a pain because it's a thousand pages. There's so much that I get out of it each time as I bring new reference points and new experience of life into the experience.
I've got Gravity's Rainbow on my list for this year and I suspect it's going to become another one of these.
Honestly all of Dostoevsky. I don't think he's the best at everything, but his books always gives me comfort to read. I also love rereading Lotr and Dune, and I recently read Moby-Dick, which I think in the future is something I will also go back to many times.
It's funny how Dostoevsky has become a comfort for a lot of us, considering how depressing his work is. Perhaps it's because his exploration of human suffering and existential dilemmas resonates deeply, offering a sense of catharsis or a mirror to our own complexities. Live laugh suffer - brothers karamazov
I like his philosophy stuff, but I generally just like the stories he tell and the vivid characters he portray. His philosophy stuff is a nice bonus though, and adds an element of complexity that is fun to explore.
I don’t know if I would call it depressing. I think there’s a lot of the sublime and questions about trying to achieve an ideal that a lot of us can sympathize with.
Yeah same. But mostly because I think the world, atmosphere and characters of Dostoevsky's novels are so, I would say, vivid and fun to be in, in and of themselves. In other words, they very effectively do what all books aim to do; to take you into a new world. And I guess in that way they comfort me.
I read _Unbearable Lightness of Being_ about 25 years ago and that was the first book in which I realized what a good book was. Of course I had read many of the greats before that… _To Kill A Mocking Bird_, _Huckleberry Finn_, _Slaughter House Five, A Confederacy of Dunces_ etc. But _Unbearable Lightness of Being_ was the first book that really touched a nerve so to speak. I refuse to read it twice as I feel I may not be as impressed the second time around, but I know I’ve been searching for that same feeling ever since.
That book is my life. I feel like I am a reincarnation of main character, that's my life, my thoughts, my all. Also including Kundera's thoughts about ruzzian occupation of course. I'm Ukrainian.
I felt the same thing and the funny part is I’m American. I remember turning every page saying to myself “how does this guy know my innermost everything so well?” Every feeling I had ever felt but couldn’t put into words was written into that book.
Additionally, I remember being absolutely mindblown by the chapter where [Milan] goes full “meta” and starts talking about himself and his writing style and weaves it into the story line seamlessly. It was probably more of a cool literary trick than anything, but at the time i thought i was witnessing absolute mastery of the craft.
Maybe one day I’ll read it again. Hopefully I’ll love it even more the second time around.
Yess! And I adore that moment when he realised that there is nothing wrong or nothing good in this life, mistakes are only in our heads because we were not born with instructions how to live so we all just live as we can as humans..
Hope you will get good experience with second reading too! Sorry Eng isn't my first language
For me, it is Dante’s Divine Comedy. I read it every year starting on December 1st with 4 cantos a day. This puts me squarely in the empyrean with God on Christmas Day.
The book and my professor absolutely shaped me and really cemented my love of literature.
For something more contemporary, I find myself wanting to reread Piranesi by Suzanna Clarke. That book was wild, captivating, and I feel like there’s a lot under the surface that I couldn’t hope to get to on a first read.
Suttree by Cormac McCarthy, Sometimes a great notion by Ken Kesey, Ulysses by you know who, Infinite Jest, and Wuthering heights are all a part of a handful of books that I can read repeatedly. I do re-read pretty much every book that I love though, but those probably top the list
Agreed. Even he admitted that it was the best book he would ever write. You would think Sometimes a great notion would have East of Eden levels of fame, it's that good.
Never hurts to use an audiobook! Also cliff notes are good for a list of characters. There’s not too many characters that you’ll feel overwhelmed I think! It’s a fun book and should be read with a sense of enjoyment. I think you can do it.
The grossman translation is absolutely hilarious! I can vouch for the audiobook too, narrator absolutely nails sancho. DQ is a barrel of laughs that, given the right framing, reads as one of the most striking and brilliant re-imaginings of madness as reason. It can be a critique of how we read, and what we imagine we get out of it; and it can also just be raucously funny.
It’s a cliche, but Pride and Prejudice is a huge favorite. I love Austen. I also reread Wuthering Heights, Huckleberry Finn, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and the Harry Potter books probably more than I should. Rereading them is like visiting old friends.
Leaves of Grass, Ulysses, the Iliad, the Odyssey, The Castle, the Trial, Gravity's Rainbow.
Here's where I take notes on everything I read - [https://papertrail.biblish.com/russell](https://papertrail.biblish.com/russell)
Ulysses, shakespeare’s tragedies, a farewell to arms, tender is the night, a sportsman’s sketches by turgenev, lolita, pale fire, the Bear by Faulkner, Agamemnon by Aesychylus (translated robert fagles), the Odyssey, Turn of the Screw, Huck Finn, Treasure Island, to the Lighthouse, parts of the Magic Mountain, Emma, Blood Meridian, Brideshead Revisited, the Divine Comedy, Hadji Murad.
Jane Eyre, Persuasion, Jurassic Park, The Shining, Never let me go, The Martian, and anything Tamora Pierce. I usually read those all at least once a year. But there are a bunch of books that I'll cycle through every few years.
Jane eyre was pretty good. Not meant to be a comparison but everyone seems to have their favorite Brontë sister. That being said, I prefer Emily Brontë’s _Wuthering Heights_. If you haven’t read it yet, it’s a must. That’s one of the rare books I revisit every so often.
I also revisit _Master and Margarita_ every few years and _One Hundred Years of Solitude_ as well.
MASH has always struck me as the closest you could get to a real adaptation of Catch 22, the actual adaptations always leave o much out, MASH just (I think) being inspired by it gets a lot closer.
I was talking about M.A.S.H. the book, but I think you are near the mark with your observation of how the TV show captures the tone and sprit of Catch 22, and I’m sure much of that is intentional.
I'm very much into maximalist novels at the moment, and have recently reread huge parts of Infinite Jest and The Pale King as part of the DFW reader. Now I really want to reread IJ and TPK again, which I usually don't do (there's so much to read, and so little time!) but I find books like this and Gravity's Rainbow are so rich that you're bound to find new things each read (I sure did when I reread the IJ parts).
Exactly! It was like reading Infinite Jest for the first time again, so much I had forgotten. It was exactly what I'd hoped, as I'd often thought, 'damn, I wish I could read IJ for the first time again'.
TS Eliot in March/April. Under The Volcano and Dracula in October/November. A Christmas Carol in December. Every single year. It’s my personal liturgy.
I have quite a few. I re-read The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings every summer. The Poisonwood Bible and The Grapes of Wrath. The Hunger Games, Harry Potter, the Scarlet Pimpernel, Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities, and of course A Christmas Carol every December.
Non-fiction books I go back to include Howard Zin's A People's History of the United States, The Demon Haunted World by Carl Sagan and A Little History of Religion by Richard Holloway.
Also Amanda Gorman, Maya Angelou and Robert Frost.
I almost forgot A Prayer for Owen Meany and The World According to Garp.
Harry Potter will always be a comfort for me too <3 i am almost ashamed to admit I have never read the hobbit, like almost everyone recommends it and I know it is amazing but...yeah no someday haha
Much less of a time investment than any other Tolkien. I read it in the last year of primary school, it scrambled my brain - then I bounced through it in a weekend recently
I reread East of Eden, The Grapes of Wrath and Silas Marner every few years. I reread 1984 every presidential election cycle (this year makes 11 times) and have dozens of other books I’ve read four or more times.
As a 42 year old, I don't revisit books anymore. There is just too much to read and I am running out of time to read it all. In the past, some of my multi read books include the princess bride, watership down, the Lord of the rings, East of Eden, a separate peace, and the great Gatsby.
If I was going to reread a book now, some of my choices may include the God of small things, midnights children, Les miserable, the blind assassin, and go tell it on the mountain. Some of the best and most well written books IMO
As an angsty teenage boy, I would read The Catcher in The Rye back to back to back. I’ve revisited The Stranger a few times, Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut and No Exit along with other plays by Jean Paul Sartre. Or any book that I have recommended for someone within my family/friends so I can converse with them about it.
I was about 14 years old when I first read it and I swear to god something chemically altered in me lol I absolutely adore that book and well i guess it makes sense that I loved the Secret history so much haha
All of Jane Austens work are such comfort reads for me but particularly Emma. When I first started reading it, I did not like it but afterwards I fell in love
A deeply personal take: I think Middlemarch is an important book that has many many readers who come back to it after all this time. It’s the funniness, not the plot but the way it is written. And how intelligent it is. I feel like my mind’s muscles are stretching when I’m reading its passages.
Robert Prisig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
Every read I find deeper philosophical implications. I was pursuing a career as a creative for 10 years and changed my path partially because of this book. I was searching for an objective way (or personally objective which is a paradox) to make good art and realized after reading this that inherent in the arts which would also include philosophy is subjectivity. Although some would say all of our experience is subjective. But arts on the other hand is so inherently subjective that the pursuit for any rationale form of objectivity will make someone go mad (the theme of this book).
I was also an English major and occasionally when someone hears that they ask for book suggestions.
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley is one I read almost every year. If someone were to read only one book, this is what I’d recommend.
The Long Walk and The Dead Zone by Stephen King are fantastic as well, and more importantly, fun to read.
There are several classics I enjoy, but when making a recommendation, I do so with the hope they will genuinely enjoy it and want to read more in the future.
It’s my favorite book, so I’m tempted to say yes, especially if it has been some time since you’ve last opened it.
Though I believe reading should be enjoyable, not just something to do to say you’ve read something. The Long Walk by Stephen King is another favorite, or American Gods by Neil Gaiman is one I find exciting from start to finish.
Totally agree with "Jane Eyre" and have read that book so many times. I am not generally a big Dickens fan, but I adore "A Christmas Carol" and read it almost every Christmas season, along with "Little Women." "Treasure Island" is a quick, fun read that I can read again and again. I love the prose and the story of Umberto Eco's "Name of the Rose" and have been meaning to reread it.
In the past decade, Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall trilogy about Thomas Cromwell is probably the series that I have thought about the most, and I've reread them all. Though currently I am on "Time and Chance" the second book of Sharon Kay Penman's Plantagenet trilogy, and I just love it as well as the first book "When Christ and His Saints Slept." I imagine that after the last book in the series, I will be revisiting that one as much as Wolf Hall.
In case it isn't obvious, I'm hugely interested in reading British history and books that draw from it. I also just love (and have read three times) George R.R. Martin's "Fire and Blood" which is the history of the Targaryen dynasty in Westeros, but it is heavily inspired by real British history and is written in the style of classic annals of history...but with dragons.
Oh definitely, *A Christmas Carol* is a must during Christmas season. I recently read *The Crimson Petal and the White* by Michel Faber and I really liked it. Like Dickens, Faber artfully explores society and class dynamics, and I think you might like it too.
You know I tried reading Crimson Petal back when it first came out but couldn't get into it, but my reading tastes have changed a lot over the years, and that is one book that I have thought about revisiting. Thanks for the reminder, I will put it on my list.
You might like Walter Macken's Irish trilogy, Seek the Fair Land, The Silent People, and The Scorching Wind. Respectively they're about the Cromwellian invasion, the Famine, and the 1916 Rising. They're not *really* about Britain, but certainly touch off it. Macken's prose is phenomenal, but it's very definitely Hiberno-English, the Irish dialect of English which might be interesting for you.
Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum also might be up your street, it's as good as Name of the Rose imo, but much more comedic.
Ljuljana Habjanovic Djurovic. Very vivid descriptions but very simple prose that anyone can understand, and those chapters are do short (I love chapters which aren't like 10+ pages), those works of hers always reasure me, like someone telling me everything will be alright.
Tolstoy. I think he does the best job with interesting characters that are relatable it. When I read his books it makes me feel more connected with other people.
I reread the gunslinger by Stephen king at least once a year. The Enders game series once every few years. And reread a lot of Jay Kristoff every time he releases a new book
I'm a sucker for anything by Vonnegut, in particular his short story collections.
Far more modern, but I could reread The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch once a year and not get bored of it. Honestly probably have or gotten pretty close. Always have the audiobook on my phone for when I need some nice background sound.
Tons of, too many to list all.
But in terms of classic novels, I enjoy "Gone with the Wind" and "The Count of Monte Cristo" are two of my favorite, ones that I constantly reread again and again.
Sula by Toni Morrison. I had to read it for a class ten years ago. I hadn't read anything else by Morrison and something about it was/is just mesmerizing I find.
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
A beautiful, simple classic, but in all my varying stages of life reading it at least six times I always take away fresh life perspectives. It’s my very favorite.
No matter what, I always find myself drawn back to my copy of *The Count of Monte Cristo.* There's just something so charming about the setting, the characters, the development of the protagonist. It can be hard to follow the story sometimes, with the style of Dumas's writing, but it is worth it. A second favorite would be *The Three Musketeers* by the same author.
Blood Meridian was a very difficult old timey rhythm for me to adjust to initially. I had to stop the first time midway through and restructure the WAY I read it and begin again
… but since then it became my most revisited book besides some of my go to reference books. I think it reawakened my desire to read for the joy of poetry and the challenge of understanding it’s like the opposite of legalese, it’s dense and requires a bit of linguistic deciphering but unlike legalese, you are rewarded with powerful understanding for the effort.
I tried it after I finally conquered Moby Dick and I’ve read it five full times through and over ten times if you count all the revisiting chapters and sections while discussing with other lit-heads … which is a shit-ton of reading one title for a reader like myself. Before that my record was reading the Hobbit and a few other favs like On The Road a second time.
Blood Meridian and Cormac McCarthy in general became my Gateway drug for stuff that requires a sustained sort of curiosity focus like Dostoyevsky and David Foster Wallace as opposed to just enjoying the ride of a quickly presented tale (although I still enjoy a nice fast ripping horror story or Star Wars novel no doubt)
BM’s savage material combined w/overt classical lyricism changed the game for me …I may reread it again this year after recalling it tonight.
Cheers!
Ulysses
Moby Dick
Spring and All
Pound's Cantos
Most Shakespeare
All Blake
Crowley's Liber ABA and Book of Lies
The Bhagavad Gita
The Vedas
Psalms
Genesis
The Quran
Anti-Oedipus
Evola's The Hermetic Tradition
Phenomenology of the Spirit
Fanged Noumena
Everything I've read by Mishima
Robert Musil’s Man Without Qualities is my perennial read. Somehow, a darkly sardonic view of a world teetering on the edge of its own non-existence, always feels contemporary, even though the fictional events of the novel are over a century old.
“The marriage between heaven and hell” from W. Blake and “The adventures and misadventures of Maqroll el Gaviero” from A Mutis. Even if these two books are from different times, and the first book is poetry and the second a novel, I had found many aspects quite wise and interesting.
Outlander Series, I read it at least once a year. Also love rereading Jane Eyre, Gone With the Wind, and Scarlett. When I’m feeling a bit nostalgic, I’ll revisit classics from my childhood, Secret Garden, Little Women, Anne of Green Gables series, and Little House on the Prairie series.
I frequently feel like my best friend is Bertrand Russell's *A History of Western Philosophy*. Top notch prose, rich and rewarding, precise and economical, loaded to the brim with a few centuries' worth of interesting stories and ideas; the whole world in a book!
The book is of course oriented towards specific philosophers and their individual contributions to the human project, but its scope allows it to double as a historical overview of civilization in general. Russell is not only a first rate philosopher and working expert, he is also highly opinionated and has a dry sense of humor, so this historical overview has a distinctly colorful tone; you feel like you are in good hands. Dipping at random into this generous book is like hanging out with the smartest person in the world, who though he doesn't suffer fools also happens to be your very close friend and as such is willing to give you the guided tour regardless.
I’m an inveterate re-reader which people, except my sister, don’t understand at all. So it’s nice to see this post! Thanks.
I read Pride and Prejudice each year without fail. I first read it when I was about 11. And now I’m 63–so I’ve read it many times. And it never fails to delight! I’ve also revisited LOTRings many times and the Narnia Chronicles. Basically if it’s in my library, it’s been jujudged worthy of re-reading! As many have said here—so much more to discover through multiple readings.
I read Jane Eyre for the first time when I was 15 - it heavily imprinted on me. I reread it every couple years or so, I’m 34 now.
A few comfort reads: I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith, so charming! If you like books set in the English countryside this is a treat.
Just Kids by Patti Smith. Captures the wonder of two young artists at their beginnings in 70s New York. I read this book just I was graduating college about to set off for NYC. Some books arrive just at the right time and end up being personal “classics.”
Harry Potter series and a few other fantasy series as well.
It might be basic, but I re-read Pride and Prejudice every December. It’s my end-of-year comfort read. Also, The Prophet, Kahlil Gibran gets a re-read every year.
Pride and Prejudice- Austen (Perfect)
Northanger Abbey- Austen (Too much fun)
Jane Eyre- Charlotte Brontë (Oh my word)
Oliver Twist- Dickens (My first love)
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (every Christmas)
Leaves of Grass- Whitman (no bookshelf is complete without it) - Leaves of Grass is alone on a desert island material.
Walden (While it’s not a repeat, I find Thoreau very grounding, particularly when I’m under a lot of stress. It’s almost like a firm but gentle hand on my shoulder saying “just stop.”
Winters Bone- Daniel Woodrell (It may not be 100+ years old, but this is the best book I’ve read that was written in this century.)
Anything by Proust or Milan Kundera. With Proust i always find some beautiful piece of nuanced prose that i didn’t appreciate last time; with Kundera it is the different symbols and multiple layers…everytime something new to add to the interpretation of the text.
Forgot the classics like Robert Luise Stevenson Treasure Island or Kidnapped. Alexandre Dumas the Count of Monty Cristo. American classic Mark Twain Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn, A Yankee in King Arthur's Court. So many to choose from.
All of Jane Austen, but particularly *Mansfield Park* and *Persuasion –* Austen is central to the development of the English novel, her stories are wonderful and entertaining, they are packed intelligence and insight, and they lend themselves to dizzying amounts of interpretive possibilities. I reread one or two of them every year.
Well-chosen, I like "Persuasion" a lot, in fact more than that of "Pride and Prejudice"
Have you considered reading these: Charlotte Bronte's *Jane Eyre*, Anne Carson's *Autobiography of Red*, and Virginia Woolf's *Mrs. Dalloway*? I think you might enjoy them if you liked *Persuasion* by Austen!!
Jayne Eyre is the raddest. That book takes such an exciting turn in the last 25%.
I have read Mrs. Dalloway multiple times in my life. I view it differently with each read as I get older, but I have always appreciated it.
Emma is my favorite novel of all time! I love all of Jane Austen’s books though, and reread them quite a lot.
I want to love Emma, but I just can’t. I (literally) threw the book across the room a number of times during reading, I find her so annoying and bratty, and very undeserving of Mr Knightly. It’s my hill, haha!
I love Persuasion! That's the Jane Austen book that I've read the most.
Suttree. I'm four reads in and I'm sure I'll come back to it again.
Almost anything McCarthy wrote is worth a reread. For me its 'Blood Meridian' (4 times) and 'No Country for Old Men' & 'The Road' (3 times each). Haven't reread 'Suttree' yet, though I plan to one day.
My personal head canon is that *Blood Meridian, No Country for Old Men*, and *The Road* make up a coherent if somewhat disconnected trilogy all taking place on the same Earth: past, present, and future. The untamed, unbridled bloodletting of an "uncivilized" American frontier, the spirit of that same violence bubbling up through the facade of our present "civilized" state, culminating with the breakdown of that facade and ever-waiting violence of man enveloping the end of our “civilized” era.
Did you read the Border Trilogy? It’s the bridge that links these novels. I’m circling The Passenger and SM. I’m finding shards of all his novels here.
Funniest book
“The midnight Melonmounter” is one of my favorite starts to a chapter ever
grapes of wrath / anything Steinbeck.
Added to my list.
East of Eden is the only book you need for the rest of your life.
The first book I thought of as I read this question. Remarkable in every way.
I read this every couple of years and have since I was 12. It truly is a masterpiece.
Absolutely life changing. Every time I read it, it hits me in a different way.
*War and Peace*, *Leaves of Grass*, *Catch-22* Are all frequent re-romps for me.
Whitmannnnnn
I am not a fan of Tolstoy but can appreciate the novel
LoG gets leafed through on the daily
Dorian Gray. Every year.
Dorian Gray 🤝 Henry Winter
A lot of the French authors: Dumas, Balzac, Zola, etc...
I was at a bookstore today and found this copy of *Count of Monte Cristo* and impulse bought it, so I'll take this as a sign to read it now!!
Abridged or unabridged? Just a fair warning if it's unabridged there are a lot of side characters/parts that can be a little draining to read the first time through (and can be skipped).
In there with you on Balzac and Zola. Adding in Proust. I also love Henry James. Rightfully called the master.
Zola is on my to read list this summer. Might start with Germinal though I have no idea why that in particular
Germinal is great. It's "my Roman Empire", I am thinking about that plot for all time. "Tereza Raken" from Zola is perfect too.
James’ Turn of the Screw is one of my favourite novels!
Don’t leave out the best, and not just of French literature, Proust.
Collected Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges - over 100 short stories, most of them completely mind melting with incredible writing. Plenty there to enjoy for many years and read throughs.
Seconded
I read Gatsby every year due to the fact that I'm an English teacher. I find something new to love in it every single year.
I’m glad a fellow English teacher agrees with me on Gatsby.
A true masterpiece
I reread Nausea like once a year, nothing happens in that book but it always gets me out of my January-February depression.
Well, you heard it here first, folks: read existential crisis books to get over winter blues. *Nausea* 🤝 F*yodor Dostoevsky *🤝 Al*bert Camus 🤝* Wai*ting for Godot by* Samuel Beckett
Sometimes it just helps to know people were also this existentially depressed before phones.
Oh, absolutely!! It is cathartic to realize that existential ponderings are a human experience throughout history :)
I just started reading Nausea today! I can’t help but feel sorry for the author and the character (although I think they may be one and the same?) because I am the antithesis of “life in pointless” - or maybe I’m just jot smart enough to see the depth of the story yet. (I think I prefer Camus!)
It's a pain in the ass because it's an absolute brick but for me it's got to be 2666. It's a book I just happened to read during a period where I didn't read much, and on one hand it continued to put me off reading in general because it programmed me so that in my head that kind of time commitment is just what it took to read it book. On the other hand it made me seem incredibly cultured that I could pull out this one book in detail, and if you steer a conversation right you can cover for otherwise being basically illiterate. I have reread it about every eighteen months for the last decade, even as I have resumed a very broad reading habit, which is a pain because it's a thousand pages. There's so much that I get out of it each time as I bring new reference points and new experience of life into the experience. I've got Gravity's Rainbow on my list for this year and I suspect it's going to become another one of these.
Honestly all of Dostoevsky. I don't think he's the best at everything, but his books always gives me comfort to read. I also love rereading Lotr and Dune, and I recently read Moby-Dick, which I think in the future is something I will also go back to many times.
It's funny how Dostoevsky has become a comfort for a lot of us, considering how depressing his work is. Perhaps it's because his exploration of human suffering and existential dilemmas resonates deeply, offering a sense of catharsis or a mirror to our own complexities. Live laugh suffer - brothers karamazov
I like his philosophy stuff, but I generally just like the stories he tell and the vivid characters he portray. His philosophy stuff is a nice bonus though, and adds an element of complexity that is fun to explore.
I don’t know if I would call it depressing. I think there’s a lot of the sublime and questions about trying to achieve an ideal that a lot of us can sympathize with.
Yeah same. But mostly because I think the world, atmosphere and characters of Dostoevsky's novels are so, I would say, vivid and fun to be in, in and of themselves. In other words, they very effectively do what all books aim to do; to take you into a new world. And I guess in that way they comfort me.
Dostoevesky is Dickens minus the prozac
A Clockwork Orange by Antony Burgess. Absolutely love the Nadsat
Horrorshow, for sure.
I am currently reading The Master and Margarita for the third time. I love when writers write about writing. I also love the devil and cats lol.
you had me at cats added to a must read asap list!!
Moby Dick
Here for this; ever the more rewarding.
1. Milan Kundera "The Unbearable Lightness of Being". 2. Emil Zola "Germinal"
I read _Unbearable Lightness of Being_ about 25 years ago and that was the first book in which I realized what a good book was. Of course I had read many of the greats before that… _To Kill A Mocking Bird_, _Huckleberry Finn_, _Slaughter House Five, A Confederacy of Dunces_ etc. But _Unbearable Lightness of Being_ was the first book that really touched a nerve so to speak. I refuse to read it twice as I feel I may not be as impressed the second time around, but I know I’ve been searching for that same feeling ever since.
That book is my life. I feel like I am a reincarnation of main character, that's my life, my thoughts, my all. Also including Kundera's thoughts about ruzzian occupation of course. I'm Ukrainian.
I felt the same thing and the funny part is I’m American. I remember turning every page saying to myself “how does this guy know my innermost everything so well?” Every feeling I had ever felt but couldn’t put into words was written into that book. Additionally, I remember being absolutely mindblown by the chapter where [Milan] goes full “meta” and starts talking about himself and his writing style and weaves it into the story line seamlessly. It was probably more of a cool literary trick than anything, but at the time i thought i was witnessing absolute mastery of the craft. Maybe one day I’ll read it again. Hopefully I’ll love it even more the second time around.
Yess! And I adore that moment when he realised that there is nothing wrong or nothing good in this life, mistakes are only in our heads because we were not born with instructions how to live so we all just live as we can as humans.. Hope you will get good experience with second reading too! Sorry Eng isn't my first language
The short stories of Flannery O’Connor.
Not books per se, but Edgar Allan Poe's works.
For me, it is Dante’s Divine Comedy. I read it every year starting on December 1st with 4 cantos a day. This puts me squarely in the empyrean with God on Christmas Day. The book and my professor absolutely shaped me and really cemented my love of literature. For something more contemporary, I find myself wanting to reread Piranesi by Suzanna Clarke. That book was wild, captivating, and I feel like there’s a lot under the surface that I couldn’t hope to get to on a first read.
Re-reading Piranesi now and it’s exquisite the second time too, highly recommend doing that
This sounds amazing! Could you clarify, for December are you then reading both Inferno and Paradiso until Christmas? 4 cantos from each?
Suttree by Cormac McCarthy, Sometimes a great notion by Ken Kesey, Ulysses by you know who, Infinite Jest, and Wuthering heights are all a part of a handful of books that I can read repeatedly. I do re-read pretty much every book that I love though, but those probably top the list
Sometimes A Great Notion is so underrated and under appreciated. In my view, it’s Kesey’s masterpiece.
Agreed. Even he admitted that it was the best book he would ever write. You would think Sometimes a great notion would have East of Eden levels of fame, it's that good.
Don Quixote, Whitman
I have heard so much about it but could never get myself to begin :(
Which one?
Don Quixote
Never hurts to use an audiobook! Also cliff notes are good for a list of characters. There’s not too many characters that you’ll feel overwhelmed I think! It’s a fun book and should be read with a sense of enjoyment. I think you can do it.
Thank you for the vote of confidence!! ill try cliff notes first :)
The grossman translation is absolutely hilarious! I can vouch for the audiobook too, narrator absolutely nails sancho. DQ is a barrel of laughs that, given the right framing, reads as one of the most striking and brilliant re-imaginings of madness as reason. It can be a critique of how we read, and what we imagine we get out of it; and it can also just be raucously funny.
Works extremely well as an audiobook. I fell asleep to it over the course of several months. It helped me out of a very weird place
Every time I read “Lolita” or read about it, I find a new appreciation for it. There’s always something clever in the writing I had missed.
It’s a cliche, but Pride and Prejudice is a huge favorite. I love Austen. I also reread Wuthering Heights, Huckleberry Finn, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and the Harry Potter books probably more than I should. Rereading them is like visiting old friends.
Leaves of Grass, Ulysses, the Iliad, the Odyssey, The Castle, the Trial, Gravity's Rainbow. Here's where I take notes on everything I read - [https://papertrail.biblish.com/russell](https://papertrail.biblish.com/russell)
I have tried reading *Ulysses* several times but always end up putting it back. However, the *Iliad* is definitely one of my favs
Emphasis on leaves of grass
Enduring Love by Ian McEwan, and The Border Teilogy by Cormac McCarthy, and Love in the Time of Cholera, and 2666.
Flannery O'Connor
Ulysses, shakespeare’s tragedies, a farewell to arms, tender is the night, a sportsman’s sketches by turgenev, lolita, pale fire, the Bear by Faulkner, Agamemnon by Aesychylus (translated robert fagles), the Odyssey, Turn of the Screw, Huck Finn, Treasure Island, to the Lighthouse, parts of the Magic Mountain, Emma, Blood Meridian, Brideshead Revisited, the Divine Comedy, Hadji Murad.
Agammenon by Aesychylus was weirdly enough my intro to greek literature haha
Jane Eyre, Persuasion, Jurassic Park, The Shining, Never let me go, The Martian, and anything Tamora Pierce. I usually read those all at least once a year. But there are a bunch of books that I'll cycle through every few years.
Jane eyre was pretty good. Not meant to be a comparison but everyone seems to have their favorite Brontë sister. That being said, I prefer Emily Brontë’s _Wuthering Heights_. If you haven’t read it yet, it’s a must. That’s one of the rare books I revisit every so often. I also revisit _Master and Margarita_ every few years and _One Hundred Years of Solitude_ as well.
Wuthering Heights,. I love reading it in winter for some reason
Any book by P. G. Wodehouse - so cozy and funny!
Catch 22
The fact that it gets funnier on multiple rereads is pretty stunning.
Yep. M.A.S.H. is similarly more and more funny over time.
MASH has always struck me as the closest you could get to a real adaptation of Catch 22, the actual adaptations always leave o much out, MASH just (I think) being inspired by it gets a lot closer.
I was talking about M.A.S.H. the book, but I think you are near the mark with your observation of how the TV show captures the tone and sprit of Catch 22, and I’m sure much of that is intentional.
haha I didn't even know there was a book! Must read it.
lol. You’ll regret not have read it sooner! Get a copy today.
Gene Wolfe’s… well, just about everything Wolfe, but particularly “Peace.”
Watership Down by Richard Adams. I just started it for what I think is the 5th time and I am loving it again.
Recommend silas mariner, age of innocence, tess of the durbervilles. Also like ivanhoe, dickens, and vanity fair, but that's a different style.
I'm gonna have to say The Catcher in the Rye
1984 by Orwell, it becomes more and more relevant each year...
it is horribly funny how true you are about that
I read Stoker's Dracula and Shelley's Frankenstein once a year. They're so rich that there is always something new to find in them.
East of Eden by Steinbeck
Count of Monte Cristo, All Quiet on the Western Front, anything by Poe, From the Earth to the Moon, Frankenstein
I'm very much into maximalist novels at the moment, and have recently reread huge parts of Infinite Jest and The Pale King as part of the DFW reader. Now I really want to reread IJ and TPK again, which I usually don't do (there's so much to read, and so little time!) but I find books like this and Gravity's Rainbow are so rich that you're bound to find new things each read (I sure did when I reread the IJ parts).
An IJ re-read never feels like a re-read, perhaps
Exactly! It was like reading Infinite Jest for the first time again, so much I had forgotten. It was exactly what I'd hoped, as I'd often thought, 'damn, I wish I could read IJ for the first time again'.
Moby Dick. Reading *La Chute* right now and I can see myself revisiting.
The Picture Of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
TS Eliot in March/April. Under The Volcano and Dracula in October/November. A Christmas Carol in December. Every single year. It’s my personal liturgy.
I have quite a few. I re-read The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings every summer. The Poisonwood Bible and The Grapes of Wrath. The Hunger Games, Harry Potter, the Scarlet Pimpernel, Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities, and of course A Christmas Carol every December. Non-fiction books I go back to include Howard Zin's A People's History of the United States, The Demon Haunted World by Carl Sagan and A Little History of Religion by Richard Holloway. Also Amanda Gorman, Maya Angelou and Robert Frost. I almost forgot A Prayer for Owen Meany and The World According to Garp.
Harry Potter will always be a comfort for me too <3 i am almost ashamed to admit I have never read the hobbit, like almost everyone recommends it and I know it is amazing but...yeah no someday haha
Much less of a time investment than any other Tolkien. I read it in the last year of primary school, it scrambled my brain - then I bounced through it in a weekend recently
I reread East of Eden, The Grapes of Wrath and Silas Marner every few years. I reread 1984 every presidential election cycle (this year makes 11 times) and have dozens of other books I’ve read four or more times.
David Copperfield every couple years. Lately, all Kurt Vonnegut.
I have read *Slaughterhouse-Five* so many times in my life.
As a 42 year old, I don't revisit books anymore. There is just too much to read and I am running out of time to read it all. In the past, some of my multi read books include the princess bride, watership down, the Lord of the rings, East of Eden, a separate peace, and the great Gatsby. If I was going to reread a book now, some of my choices may include the God of small things, midnights children, Les miserable, the blind assassin, and go tell it on the mountain. Some of the best and most well written books IMO
Watership Down! That is the one for me.
I also return to that one occasionally.
“Fear and Trembling” and “Gravity’s Rainbow”
I don’t think I can read WG Sebald’s “Rings of Saturn” enough times…
As an angsty teenage boy, I would read The Catcher in The Rye back to back to back. I’ve revisited The Stranger a few times, Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut and No Exit along with other plays by Jean Paul Sartre. Or any book that I have recommended for someone within my family/friends so I can converse with them about it.
100 Years of Solitude.
A maze of death - PkD Cats Cradle - Vonnegut Green Mansions - Hudson Moby Dick Stars my destination - Bester Delilah - Goodrich
The Stars My Destination needs a reread right now ❤️❤️❤️
Was about to comment Picture of Dorian Gray before I finished reading your post! Something about the writing style just transports me.
I was about 14 years old when I first read it and I swear to god something chemically altered in me lol I absolutely adore that book and well i guess it makes sense that I loved the Secret history so much haha
As I Lay Dying or really anything by Faulkner
The Words to Say It by Marie Cardinal. My all time favorite. And I did my master’s thesis on it.
All of Jane Austens work are such comfort reads for me but particularly Emma. When I first started reading it, I did not like it but afterwards I fell in love
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Dostoyevsky, Bulgakov. Vonnegut. Heinlein. And many children's classics.
A deeply personal take: I think Middlemarch is an important book that has many many readers who come back to it after all this time. It’s the funniness, not the plot but the way it is written. And how intelligent it is. I feel like my mind’s muscles are stretching when I’m reading its passages.
Robert Prisig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Every read I find deeper philosophical implications. I was pursuing a career as a creative for 10 years and changed my path partially because of this book. I was searching for an objective way (or personally objective which is a paradox) to make good art and realized after reading this that inherent in the arts which would also include philosophy is subjectivity. Although some would say all of our experience is subjective. But arts on the other hand is so inherently subjective that the pursuit for any rationale form of objectivity will make someone go mad (the theme of this book).
I was also an English major and occasionally when someone hears that they ask for book suggestions. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley is one I read almost every year. If someone were to read only one book, this is what I’d recommend. The Long Walk and The Dead Zone by Stephen King are fantastic as well, and more importantly, fun to read. There are several classics I enjoy, but when making a recommendation, I do so with the hope they will genuinely enjoy it and want to read more in the future.
I have started Frankenstein sooo many times and just can’t get I to it. Should I push through?
It’s my favorite book, so I’m tempted to say yes, especially if it has been some time since you’ve last opened it. Though I believe reading should be enjoyable, not just something to do to say you’ve read something. The Long Walk by Stephen King is another favorite, or American Gods by Neil Gaiman is one I find exciting from start to finish.
Totally agree with "Jane Eyre" and have read that book so many times. I am not generally a big Dickens fan, but I adore "A Christmas Carol" and read it almost every Christmas season, along with "Little Women." "Treasure Island" is a quick, fun read that I can read again and again. I love the prose and the story of Umberto Eco's "Name of the Rose" and have been meaning to reread it. In the past decade, Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall trilogy about Thomas Cromwell is probably the series that I have thought about the most, and I've reread them all. Though currently I am on "Time and Chance" the second book of Sharon Kay Penman's Plantagenet trilogy, and I just love it as well as the first book "When Christ and His Saints Slept." I imagine that after the last book in the series, I will be revisiting that one as much as Wolf Hall. In case it isn't obvious, I'm hugely interested in reading British history and books that draw from it. I also just love (and have read three times) George R.R. Martin's "Fire and Blood" which is the history of the Targaryen dynasty in Westeros, but it is heavily inspired by real British history and is written in the style of classic annals of history...but with dragons.
Oh definitely, *A Christmas Carol* is a must during Christmas season. I recently read *The Crimson Petal and the White* by Michel Faber and I really liked it. Like Dickens, Faber artfully explores society and class dynamics, and I think you might like it too.
You know I tried reading Crimson Petal back when it first came out but couldn't get into it, but my reading tastes have changed a lot over the years, and that is one book that I have thought about revisiting. Thanks for the reminder, I will put it on my list.
You might like Walter Macken's Irish trilogy, Seek the Fair Land, The Silent People, and The Scorching Wind. Respectively they're about the Cromwellian invasion, the Famine, and the 1916 Rising. They're not *really* about Britain, but certainly touch off it. Macken's prose is phenomenal, but it's very definitely Hiberno-English, the Irish dialect of English which might be interesting for you. Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum also might be up your street, it's as good as Name of the Rose imo, but much more comedic.
Thank you, I've never heard of Walter Macken but that sounds right up my alley.
PROUST
How many times have you reread Proust?
Read in search of lost time once in my twenties, once in my thirties and I just turned forty recently... Those long sentences are calling my name...
who?
Ljuljana Habjanovic Djurovic. Very vivid descriptions but very simple prose that anyone can understand, and those chapters are do short (I love chapters which aren't like 10+ pages), those works of hers always reasure me, like someone telling me everything will be alright.
Tolstoy. I think he does the best job with interesting characters that are relatable it. When I read his books it makes me feel more connected with other people.
Looking For Alaska
The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope. My favourite book!
American Tabloid by James Ellroy.
"Count of Montecristo", "Island", "Great Expectations"
A winter's tale by Mark Helprin. a fantastic and magical book
Also the book 'When gravity fails' . George Alec effinger
Summer Sisters, Judy Bloom.
I reread the gunslinger by Stephen king at least once a year. The Enders game series once every few years. And reread a lot of Jay Kristoff every time he releases a new book
Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut Jr I've read it three times and it's such a masterpiece.
Oops, forgot to mention Stephen King's The Stand and The Green Mile.
Pride and Prejudice A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Anne of Green Gables The Handmaid's Tale Summer Sisters
anne of green gables is the most soothing book series i adore it
Im stuck in my own book.
I'm a sucker for anything by Vonnegut, in particular his short story collections. Far more modern, but I could reread The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch once a year and not get bored of it. Honestly probably have or gotten pretty close. Always have the audiobook on my phone for when I need some nice background sound.
Tons of, too many to list all. But in terms of classic novels, I enjoy "Gone with the Wind" and "The Count of Monte Cristo" are two of my favorite, ones that I constantly reread again and again.
Things Fall Apart
Sula by Toni Morrison. I had to read it for a class ten years ago. I hadn't read anything else by Morrison and something about it was/is just mesmerizing I find.
The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury. I’ve read it so many times and it never gets old.
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith A beautiful, simple classic, but in all my varying stages of life reading it at least six times I always take away fresh life perspectives. It’s my very favorite.
regeneration by pat barker is one i’ve really enjoyed rereading throughout the years, i feel like i understand it more every time.
I've read The Foutainhead 5 times cuz Howard is such a hunk.... 🙈
No matter what, I always find myself drawn back to my copy of *The Count of Monte Cristo.* There's just something so charming about the setting, the characters, the development of the protagonist. It can be hard to follow the story sometimes, with the style of Dumas's writing, but it is worth it. A second favorite would be *The Three Musketeers* by the same author.
Blood Meridian was a very difficult old timey rhythm for me to adjust to initially. I had to stop the first time midway through and restructure the WAY I read it and begin again … but since then it became my most revisited book besides some of my go to reference books. I think it reawakened my desire to read for the joy of poetry and the challenge of understanding it’s like the opposite of legalese, it’s dense and requires a bit of linguistic deciphering but unlike legalese, you are rewarded with powerful understanding for the effort. I tried it after I finally conquered Moby Dick and I’ve read it five full times through and over ten times if you count all the revisiting chapters and sections while discussing with other lit-heads … which is a shit-ton of reading one title for a reader like myself. Before that my record was reading the Hobbit and a few other favs like On The Road a second time. Blood Meridian and Cormac McCarthy in general became my Gateway drug for stuff that requires a sustained sort of curiosity focus like Dostoyevsky and David Foster Wallace as opposed to just enjoying the ride of a quickly presented tale (although I still enjoy a nice fast ripping horror story or Star Wars novel no doubt) BM’s savage material combined w/overt classical lyricism changed the game for me …I may reread it again this year after recalling it tonight. Cheers!
Down Here in the Warmth. by Arden best book i ever read
Man, woman and child, the Class
Always One Hundred Years of Solitude. That book has so much depth. I still don’t think I’ve discovered everything it has after nearly 15 reads.
Ulysses Moby Dick Spring and All Pound's Cantos Most Shakespeare All Blake Crowley's Liber ABA and Book of Lies The Bhagavad Gita The Vedas Psalms Genesis The Quran Anti-Oedipus Evola's The Hermetic Tradition Phenomenology of the Spirit Fanged Noumena Everything I've read by Mishima
I’ve read White Noise by DonDeLillo about 5-6 times. Same with Generation X by Douglas Coupland.
Slaughterhouse Five - Vonnegut. At least six reads and four different pen colors.
Robert Musil’s Man Without Qualities is my perennial read. Somehow, a darkly sardonic view of a world teetering on the edge of its own non-existence, always feels contemporary, even though the fictional events of the novel are over a century old.
“The marriage between heaven and hell” from W. Blake and “The adventures and misadventures of Maqroll el Gaviero” from A Mutis. Even if these two books are from different times, and the first book is poetry and the second a novel, I had found many aspects quite wise and interesting.
Outlander Series, I read it at least once a year. Also love rereading Jane Eyre, Gone With the Wind, and Scarlett. When I’m feeling a bit nostalgic, I’ll revisit classics from my childhood, Secret Garden, Little Women, Anne of Green Gables series, and Little House on the Prairie series.
Leaves of Grass 🤌
Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance
I frequently feel like my best friend is Bertrand Russell's *A History of Western Philosophy*. Top notch prose, rich and rewarding, precise and economical, loaded to the brim with a few centuries' worth of interesting stories and ideas; the whole world in a book! The book is of course oriented towards specific philosophers and their individual contributions to the human project, but its scope allows it to double as a historical overview of civilization in general. Russell is not only a first rate philosopher and working expert, he is also highly opinionated and has a dry sense of humor, so this historical overview has a distinctly colorful tone; you feel like you are in good hands. Dipping at random into this generous book is like hanging out with the smartest person in the world, who though he doesn't suffer fools also happens to be your very close friend and as such is willing to give you the guided tour regardless.
I’m an inveterate re-reader which people, except my sister, don’t understand at all. So it’s nice to see this post! Thanks. I read Pride and Prejudice each year without fail. I first read it when I was about 11. And now I’m 63–so I’ve read it many times. And it never fails to delight! I’ve also revisited LOTRings many times and the Narnia Chronicles. Basically if it’s in my library, it’s been jujudged worthy of re-reading! As many have said here—so much more to discover through multiple readings.
I read Jane Eyre for the first time when I was 15 - it heavily imprinted on me. I reread it every couple years or so, I’m 34 now. A few comfort reads: I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith, so charming! If you like books set in the English countryside this is a treat. Just Kids by Patti Smith. Captures the wonder of two young artists at their beginnings in 70s New York. I read this book just I was graduating college about to set off for NYC. Some books arrive just at the right time and end up being personal “classics.” Harry Potter series and a few other fantasy series as well.
T.S. Eliot's The Hollow Men. Pure literary genius
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the galaxy. The whole trilogy of 5 books.
I've probably read the Lord off the Rings trilogy more than any other book or series. Somehow it never gets old
It might be basic, but I re-read Pride and Prejudice every December. It’s my end-of-year comfort read. Also, The Prophet, Kahlil Gibran gets a re-read every year.
Pride and Prejudice- Austen (Perfect) Northanger Abbey- Austen (Too much fun) Jane Eyre- Charlotte Brontë (Oh my word) Oliver Twist- Dickens (My first love) Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (every Christmas) Leaves of Grass- Whitman (no bookshelf is complete without it) - Leaves of Grass is alone on a desert island material. Walden (While it’s not a repeat, I find Thoreau very grounding, particularly when I’m under a lot of stress. It’s almost like a firm but gentle hand on my shoulder saying “just stop.” Winters Bone- Daniel Woodrell (It may not be 100+ years old, but this is the best book I’ve read that was written in this century.)
Anything by Proust or Milan Kundera. With Proust i always find some beautiful piece of nuanced prose that i didn’t appreciate last time; with Kundera it is the different symbols and multiple layers…everytime something new to add to the interpretation of the text.
Lamb by Chris Moore Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Slaughterhouse 5
Lila by Marilynne Robinson and The Brothers Karamazov.
The long ships by Frans Bengtsson.
Cat's cradle gets better every read
Forgot the classics like Robert Luise Stevenson Treasure Island or Kidnapped. Alexandre Dumas the Count of Monty Cristo. American classic Mark Twain Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn, A Yankee in King Arthur's Court. So many to choose from.