Great Great Books

[justcarol67]

> Thank you Sherry, I will look into your suggestions.  And yes, I am 
> interested in any book someone thinks is "Great, Great"
> 
> Thank you all,
> 
> Bonnie
>

How about that flawed masterpiece, "Moby Dick," which combines
literary allusions, treatises on whaling, high tragedy, and epic
quest, without abiding by expectations of genre and narrative
technique that hadn't yet been established? Melville's style takes a
while to get used to, and Ishmael (the narrator) drops out of the
picture for long periods even though he's ostensibly telling the
story, but the book exercises an odd fascination. Last time I read it
(1998), I was compelled to analyze my favorite scenes in essays no one
would read. I was new to the Internet then, and if online discussion
groups existed, I didn't know it. Too bad. 

Anyway, I think it deserves its place as a literary classic and I
highly recommend it to anyone who wants to make the effort to read it.
A familiarity with the Bible and with Shakespeare is helpful but not
essential, and you can choose either an annotated or an unannotated
edition.

Carol