Comments on: Britain’s bookworms: misanthropic and death-fixated

By: Waffle

Waffle — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 18:01:17 +0000

Quick links for monday…

Chris Lightfoot is dead. I liked his weblog. He dropped off my radar a bit when he stopped posting frequently, but had he returned, I would have found out from many other bloggers linking to him enthusiastically. He only wrote……

By: Katherine

Katherine — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 13:09:07 +0000

Just to make Tess even grimmer, I do believe that she is in fact raped rather than seduced (although we might be talking about a different event – I must admit I can’t read Hardy – utter grimness interspersed with interminable pastoral description is really not my thing).

On the upside of the list – no.1 is a “lives happily ever after” sort of tale.

By: ejh

ejh — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 07:59:26 +0000

What, Hardy isn’t easy reading?

By: Welshcakes Limoncello

Welshcakes Limoncello — Sun, 04 Mar 2007 20:33:48 +0000

Love it! Your one-sentence summary of the Bible is superb and I’m with you on Hardy – a miserable man! Do you think the people who say they’ve read these books actually have? – None of them are exactly easy reading, are they?

By: .

Sat, 03 Mar 2007 19:54:45 +0000

Couldn’t agree more about Catcher in the Rye – maybe I read it at the wrong age but it honestly is the most overrated book I’ve ever come across.

By: Friendly Fire

Friendly Fire — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 12:15:01 +0000

Well, when that bloke what wrote the Holy Grail Tom Hanks bullshit can become a billionaire we know that as a species, the Human Race is doomed.

By: Ally

Ally — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 10:08:31 +0000

These kind of lists always make me wonder whether the people who voted have actually read the books, or if they just think that they *should* have.

By: ejh

ejh — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 09:47:19 +0000

Hardy’s hateful running theme was that the lower classes should know their place.

No it wasn’t. It was that people from the lower classes who don’t know their station get crushed by hateful attitudes rife among the richer classes. It’s unlikely that Hardy, whose background was humble, would have had anything other than sympathy for these characters (and Jude in particular).