Great American Novels

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>>9504101
>lol why did Melville put all those whale facts in???

>Freedom by Jonathan Franzen
>Let me just say that I take no issue with Jonathan Franzen personally. I’ve never met him. Were I to see Jonathan Franzen in real life, I would probably say, “Hey, that guy looks like Jonathan Franzen,” and I would go about my day. Unfortunately, Freedom didn’t do it for me. It is a very trying book if you are the kind of person who is not obsessed with birds.

Can this person not understand the meaning of some books isn't just what they are at face value?

>Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
>Exactly zero people have finished this book. If you did finish it, you are better than all of us and likely a demigod, but there’s no way you had a good time. If you did not finish it—if you couldn’t bring your dumb, less evolved self to appreciate all 1,100 pages and roughly 50,000 footnotes—then don’t feel bad. You too are valid.

The "criticism" is "it's too long for me [and I'm projecting this onto everyone else]". Epic.

>Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner
>When Faulkner completed this book, he handed it to his friend and apparently said, “I think it’s the best novel yet written by an American.” It is for this reason and no other that it has earned such a low ranking on this list, because there is something terrible in me that thrives on contradiction. Sorry, William Faulkner. Your book was good; it's just that I am awful.

Basing a ranking and criticism off an edgy reaction to an unverified anecdote

And these are the people kids use to study literature

>>9504101
To Kill a Mockingbird is really mediocre. Idk why Americans overrate it so much

>Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Exactly zero people have finished this book. If you did finish it, you are better than all of us and likely a demigod, but there’s no way you had a good time. If you did not finish it—if you couldn’t bring your dumb, less evolved self to appreciate all 1,100 pages and roughly 50,000 footnotes—then don’t feel bad. You too are valid.

I hate this sassy Buzzfeed writing. Just about everywhere I look, it's written in Buzzfeed

fucking

REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

>>9504167
I feel you on that one... that writing style is fucking obnoxious.

>I am skeptical of anything that is "unanimously" lauded.
Then again, what do you expect from a community that relies on others to finish their high school homework?

>>9504345
>I am skeptical of anything that is "unanimously" lauded.
Well, there's at least some amount of healthy skepticism, I think. Obviously I won't use her as my example, but if you're reading a book you know "everyone" thinks is great, you should still be the one who evaluates the book for yourself.

it sounds like a person tried to read five books assigned at their high school and finished three of them. why else would you rank 5 books on a scale of "great" to "bad"

>>9504133
It's taught in schools because it's written by a women and teaches us that retards and niggers aren't evil. People only think it's good because it's one of a few books they can understand and, as most people don't read after high school, it's one of a few books they can actually discuss.

Ah yes, the only nine American novels ever written

>But I have done my absolute best to expunge Melville’s extraneous whale facts from my memory because, at the end of the day, I just do not want to be the kind of person who knows that much about whales.
What's wrong with being that kind of person

Moby Dick is honestly the best pleb-filter novel of all time. Whenever somebody says the cetology chapters were extraneous or boring they immediately out themselves as a retard and I can safely disregard their opinion on anything literary.

>>9504101

To Kill a Mockingbird is just genre garbage and the author is a one hit wonder. The book has no merit as literature and If it was written now it would've been forgotten within a week.

>>9505696
>if it was written now it would've been forgotten in a week
really makes me think........

>>9505668
Why is that? I just got to the first chapter where this is happening.

>>9505696
>If it was written now it would've been forgotten within a week.

author would have been villified for suggesting that a woman might lie about being raped

>>9506239
>author would have been villified for suggesting that a woman might lie about being raped

Oh shit, yeah
People are willing to recognize it in the abstract, but freak out when there's a specific instance and then start going off about how that perpetuates rape culture without being able to think about it from literally any other point of view, casually disregarding anything that might be unfavorable to them.