Reading the Classics discussion

I've noticed that a lot of the works mentioned on this page are 100+ years old, but there are a lot of modern and postmodern works that I would consider classic (Joyce, Beckett, Orwell, Wiesel, etc.). So what constitutes a classic?

A book written before 1960,with literary merit.And still read and liked by a few people.Which has some kind of a reputation.

That's an interesting definition, Henry. When I first read it I thought it made sense, but after I reread it, I started to wonder about its parts. First, how did you choose the date 1960? Second, how large does the audience have to be? Third, what do you mean by "reputation"? Does the subject or its execution come into this? I think of a classic as having something to do with being the best expression/understanding of a particular idea or situation. I'm not entirely in favor of "stands the test of time" idea.

I believe this group goes with the 50 year timeframe. A classic must have been published at least 50 years before.

I think beyond that, the definition is up for grabs. I've never thought of it as "the best expression of a particular idea." Standing the test of time is also very subjective. Few people read William Dean Howells anymore, and if each of us read a bunch of his novels we might come to different conclusions about whether, today, they still speak to us, are relevant, are high quality, or whatever. But Howells was certainly a widely admired novelist for decades.

If a book is not read, it's dead.The 60's changed the culture of the world forever. Nathaniel Hawthorne's first novel Fanshawe,1828, which the author tried to destroy ever copy, a classic? No.

I think a classic is a combination of time past, influence/importance and readability.

The test of time is important for several reasons, IMO. Some good books are quickly dated or do not age well. A classic books should be read by generations and still speak to the reader in a significant way, so requiring that 2-3 generations have passed seems reasonable to me.

Influence/importance can take different forms - presenting a time or an idea in a unique or particularly compelling/clear way, beautiful story or writing, influencing other authors or publishing, etc. Some of this may not be apparent to the average (or even above average!) reader, so some classics may seem odd choices.

Readability - in terms of still being read and being of interest to a modern audience. This is tricky because some books will appeal to some people and not to others. Also, what if a book is no longer particularly "of interest" - does it stop being a classic? There will likely always be an ebb and flow, as the older books have to compete for attention with new books as well as movies, etc.

Good points Susan.What it comes down to is a classic can't really be defined,except for a relative few that are acknowledged by everyone.

I like the points being made, but they seem to criss-cross between a description of the "life" of a classic and the definition of one. A classic will be read generation after generation (Homer and Shakespeare) because of the skill with which their works capture states of the human condition. The language remains accessible. The grammarian Fowler (editors remember him, sometimes fondly) liked to point out that most of Shakespeare's vocabulary consists of one or two syllable words. I think I hear both ideas in the comments here.

I'm not so sure about the sixty year rule. I count One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest as a classic work of postmodern fiction, but it's barely fifty years old. I believe a classic is a premiere or influential work of literature--something that stands out or defines a genre or movement. Whether or not a piece 'stands the test of time' seems like a requirement based in relativity. What constitutes 'standing the test of time'?

Jacob, I agree that the "test of time" criterion is too fuzzy. I think that's part of the description, not the definition, of a classic.

Henry, I'm personally not convinced a book "dies" from not being read. Take, for instance, Independent People by Halldor Laxness, considered an Icelandic classic, and secured Laxness the nobel prize for literature. It stayed out of english print for over 20 years, although I don't remember the exact length of time, and when it came back into print, it saw unprecedented readership.

30 million book titles have been printed in english since 1450.Say ten million survive today.Goodreads has only 700,000,and even these a majority are not read.I have books with no ratings,out of print ones. Sir Charles Grandison is worth a small fortune I have.But try getting it to read.

What I'm saying is that death implies permanence, but plenty of books have simply "come back".

Very few relative to the number of books still around,Steve.Culture changes and most books are soon forgotten.

Hopefully the 50 Shades series will soon be forgotten.

Amen

Jacob wrote: "Hopefully the 50 Shades series will soon be forgotten."

Seriously!!! :o

Henry wrote: "Good points Susan.What it comes down to is a classic can't really be defined,except for a relative few that are acknowledged by everyone."

Well said...

Kinnari wrote: "Jacob wrote: "Hopefully the 50 Shades series will soon be forgotten."

Seriously!!! :o"

All I've been reading is how bad this series is. I'm glad I didn't waste my time on it.

I got into this conversation with a friend of mine. He suggests that a "classic" is a work of literature that is canonized. As long as that work of fiction remains in the cannon, it i considered a classic work of literature. Thought that was interesting...

Side note: If you want a good review on Fifty Shades, check out the one in the London Book Review. Hilarious.

I still don't know how something gets into the so-called canon. Shakespeare was just a pretty good poet with a job in a theater when he started writing. No one thought he was going to be in any canon. He wasn't even considered the best playwright by his peers.

That's my argument. Canonization is determined by a series of scholars that consider a certain group of books influential. Seems to me--everything is relative.

Jeffrey, thanks for the link to Calvino's 14 definitions. I read it and felt that the definitions were very repetitive. They define, more than anything else, someone's reaction to a book that's considered a classic; but they don't define what is in the book that qualifies it as a classic.

My position is that a classic can be identified by the subject matter (a significant moment or experience of the human condition), the language used (sloppy books don't become classics), which means a close look at the vocabulary and sentence structure, and the attitudes and themes explored.

With more emphasis on what is in the book/story/poem, we can separate our own personal tastes from the work at hand. We've all met someone who hates Gatsby or Hamlet, but I have yet to meet someone who refuses to acknowledge the standing of those works.

Jacob wrote: "Hopefully the 50 Shades series will soon be forgotten."

hehe..:D I hope so too, Jacob!

Jacob wrote: "I got into this conversation with a friend of mine. He suggests that a "classic" is a work of literature that is canonized. As long as that work of fiction remains in the cannon, it i considered a ..."

Well, it is hilariously amazing. Thanks for sharing it, Jacob! :)

If you thought it is classic it is classic for you.

Susan wrote: "That's an interesting definition, Henry. When I first read it I thought it made sense, but after I reread it, I started to wonder about its parts. First, how did you choose the date 1960? Second, h..."

I actually use WWII as the cut-off between classic and contemporary. I believe that to be considered a classic a book needs to have been found of value to multiple generations of readers over an extended period of time.

Go back to the books that were most popular, or got the most literary awards, many years back. A few are still read with value, but most of them, books that would at the time have been in many cases considered "instant classics," have long been remaindered and are essentially forgotten.

The test of time is necessary.

I don't buy into the canon of classics idea either.

IMHO, a lot of books on best seller lists speak most to that generation and are not classics. A classic will be read cross-culturally and across time. OTOH, I don't demand that it be widely read *now*, or even widely read in the sense of most literate people having heard of it. Lord of the Rings was WAY off the radar for most readers for decades, and barely recognized by many literati even while wildly popular and selling well.

I read many a "still not a classic" kind of articles in 2003, when Lord of the Rings topped the BBC's "Big Read" list. Personally, I think it's firmly established as a classic -- it's been around long enough to have been read and loved by different generations and its appeal is cross cultural. It's also had a huge impact on the fantasy genre and will continue to be read for that reason.

I also think there are different kinds of classics. People read Dracula or Jane Austen's novels because the characters still speak to them. People read The Castle of Otranto because it was the first gothic novel and because it had such a huge influence on literature, but I'm not sure they'd still be reading it on its own merits. I tend to prefer the books people read because they grow to love the characters to the book people read because of their literary significance; many lists of the "classic canon" lean the other way.

And I agree with Lakshmi that there should be a "personal classic" list. Some of them I hope and believe will become, at the very least, classics of their genre. Others are "quirky personal classics" -- Dodie Smith's The Hundred and One Dalmatians is never going to make a list of "Top 100 classics" I suspect, but it is still read and re-read by many. Not sure if it'd still be around without the Disney movies (which are pretty distantly related), but I love it and so do many people I've introduced to it.

Patricia A. McKillip's The Forgotten Beasts of Eld is a personal classic that I hope goes on to become a more general classic, but only time will tell on that one. Its formal prose style made it a difficult read for some even when it first came out and it's never been outrageously popular for various reasons (primarily because it's shunned by those who hate Mary Sue-ish plots, while the ending outrages those who are looking for a typical Mary Sue-ish heroine), but it's deeply loved by those who connect with it.

I'd love to know whether anyone's reading Harry Potter in my great-grandkids generation. I rather suspect it'll survive, but there's just no way to know.

Only being 18 years old myself, I've always interpreted "classics" to mean books that were studied in High School as well as the books on my AP English approved reading list.
Would you all agree with that? Just because a book is studied in High Schools it is a classic? What about other books that haven't quite drawn the attention of high school course curriculum?

Some high schools stick to true classics, but most do not, depending on educational approach and philosophy. Schools that are based in scope and sequence or unit studies (which is most public schools) will often use current literature that does not end up having much long term impact. Schools that are grounded in the classical tradition (the trivium) are more likely to stick to actual classics.

OTOH, books pretty firmly grounded in their time can become classics, in the sense that they're still being read and that most literate people are familiar with them. I wonder sometimes if some of these books would still be read if so many kids hadn't been assigned them in high school, though.

Alexis wrote: "Only being 18 years old myself, I've always interpreted "classics" to mean books that were studied in High School as well as the books on my AP English approved reading list.
Would you all agree wi..."

I'm not up on all the books read in high school today, nor what other schools than the ones I know are reading, but when my daughters were in high school, about 15 years ago now, they read as lot of books that I certainly didn't consider classic (indeed, that I didn't even consider worth their time to read). I think the teachers were trying to select books that had themes and characters which would interest 16 year olds and encourage them to develop reading skills and habits. One specifically I remember their reading was "Johnny Tremaine," which is hardly a classic book.

That wasn't always the case. If you go back to the McGuffy readers series, they read some very good work then.

When I was in 7th grade (let's not mention how many years ago) my teacher read, over a period of time, Paradise Lost to the class. Now that was a case of a true classic in school, but I seriously doubt that many high school students today would stand for it (nor would school boards accept its religious content).

If you want to name some of the specific books your high school assigns, we can be more specific about which ones which of us would consider classics.

Sheryl wrote: "OTOH, books pretty firmly grounded in their time can become classics, in the sense that they're still being read and that most literate people are familiar with them. I wonder sometimes if some of these books would still be read if so many kids hadn't been assigned them in high school, though. "

Interesting comment! I agree that some contemporary books can become classics. After all, every classic was once a brand new book.

But it's useful sometimes to go back and look at what books were in vogue 30, 40, 50 years or so ago. Some still survive and are potential or actual classics. Others have been relegated to the remainder shelf and the bin of library sale books sold for a nickle and lucky to be bought at that price.

Heh. Yah, obviously some contemporary books can become classics. What I meant to say is that I wonder if some books would still be read if they hadn't become a popular assignment in school. I look at movies that were enormously popular when they came out, all over the newspapers and the like, but a few years later they're entirely forgotten, and compare them to movies who weren't that popular at the time but word of mouth gave them higher sales than expected in the secondary markets, and it's clear that our movie review system is not actually pointing us at the best movies when they come out.

Books are a different animal, obviously, but high school teachers are choosing books based on a very different criteria than most readers are. They are influenced by whether the book will involve the kids they're teaching, whether they can bounce off it to the discussions they want to have, etc. Bless the Beasts and the Children became an assigned book initially on the grounds that it was more "relevant" than A Separate Peace or Catcher in the Rye, because it fit beautifully into units on bullying or animal abuse, because there was a movie for the kids who'll refuse to read the book, and so on.

Now it's considered a classic by many, but would it still be read if there weren't so many educational tools (unit studies, study guides, etc. etc.) built around it? Do people assume that a book must be a "classic" (in the sense of good literature that speaks across cultures and time), just because people have to read it in high school? Would another assigned book actually connect with more people more effectively? Does the fact that it's got the approval of the authorities make people more open to it, so that it speaks to them more easily?

I feel the same way about some college texts. When even fans of James Joyce's Ulysses say it's best read with annotations and a few commentaries at hand, I'm not convinced it's a major classic. It may be classic in its literary impact, but I'm not sure it would still be read for pleasure if it wasn't such a college staple. I'm all for annotated editions of Jane Austen or Homer's epics, and I do think they deepen the appeal of those excellent tales, but when you need annotations and commentaries in order to initially enjoy the book, that book appeals more to the joys of solving a puzzle and making intellectual connections than to the joy of the books I consider classics.

Mind you, I've never read Joyce's book myself. Mostly because everyone I know who loves it insists I need all that other stuff to enjoy the experience. :p Haven't read Bless the Beasts and the Children in probably forty years, either. They both might be excellent books for all I know (Swarthout's book was certainly readable enough).

I just question the idea that the test of time purely sifts the best books out. There's no disputing that it improves the odds considerable, so it's one of the best tests we've got. But it doesn't by any means guarantee a generally readable book, let alone a book any particular individual will appreciate.

Everyman wrote: "If you want to name some of the specific books your high school assigns, we can be more specific about which ones which of us would consider classics."
1. Cry the Beloved Country by Alan Paton
2. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
3. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
4. A Separate Peace by John Knowles
5. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
6. The Pearl by John Steinbeck
7. Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
8. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston.

What would you say about this list?

Alexis wrote: "Everyman wrote: "If you want to name some of the specific books your high school assigns, we can be more specific about which ones which of us would consider classics.

"What would you say about this list? "

1. Wonderful book but I personally wouldn't call it a classic because I don't think it is part of the "great conversation" of Western literature. I don't, for example, see it referred to by many other authors, and I'm not sure there is a message in it which merits it being re-read. But definitely worth reading. (There are many books very worth reading which I personally don't consider classics. One test of a classic, I think, is that it not only is worth rereading multiple times, but it virtually demands rereading, and gives new insights on each rereading.)

2. I don't know the book.

3. Yes.

4. I don't know the book.

5. A good piece of writing, but again I don't consider it a classic because I don't see it as part of the stream of literary thought, and think that most of its value can be ascertained on a first reading, so that it doesn't contain the depth and richness to justify rereading.

6. Yes.

7. Definitely.

8. A classic within the genre of African-American writing. But beyond that, it hasn't really stood the test of time that I think a classic needs to stand. It was out of print and basically unread for many years, re-emerged when an interest in black writing arose during the 70s and 80s, but has it established a place in the canon yet?

3. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque
6. The Pearl by John Steinbeck
7. Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

I agree with Everyman that these are indisputable classics. I also share his doubt about Their Eyes Were Watching God. If I wanted to focus on African-American writing, or just include it naturally within a high school curriculum, I would choose A Raisin in the Sun, the poetry of Langston Hughes, Up From Slavery, or some other work that had been in print consistently and that is loved by people who weren't assigned the book in class.

I was assigned A Separate Peace in high school, and I have never known anyone who has read it unless they were assigned it in high school. That's one I think schools may be keeping alive, because it doesn't seem to inspire the love I think a classic should.

I haven't read it, but I've heard of Things Fall Apart. It's a staple in African schools, but I get the impression it is also read for pleasure. Even if it's only read in assignments, I think it deserves its status as a classic because it's considered the archetype of modern English-language African novels, so at minimum it's a Castle of Otranto-type classic.

My definition of classic is looser than Everyman's, so I'd call Cry the Beloved Country and The Heart is a Lonely Hunter classics because they are still read and still loved outside of the classroom setting. I would not assign them in a high school literature class myself, because kids only spend so many years in school and I agree with Everyman they're not among what I would call the "core classics."

But, as a homeschool mom, I don't assign my high school kids only the core classics, because we read books when studying other subjects. But I would limit myself to the core classics if I was doing a literature, or what my school called English, course, where I would only consider the first three I listed here.

Everyman wrote: "1. Wonderful book but I personally wouldn't call it a classic because I don't think it is part of the "great conversation" of Western literature..."

I find this too narrow a definition. I think that books such as Cry the Beloved Country which show us life in a culture, time or place can be classics.

Everyman wrote: "Alexis wrote: "Only being 18 years old myself, I've always interpreted "classics" to mean books that were studied in High School as well as the books on my AP English approved reading list.
Would y..."

Wow, I can't believe they had your daughter reading Johnny Tremain in high school. We had that assigned to us in sixth grade. I think it's a worthwhile read for children, but by the time you're in high school there isn't much to get out of it. Sadly it seems like kids are getting less of the classics in schools today. My mom teaches middle school reading and is always complaining that they don't get to teach the kids more of the classics because she wants to be able to introduce them to something that might actually make them think, but the books they teach are chosen by the administration and the teachers have no say in it.

By the way, I agree completely with your definition of a classic.