Monday, July 28, 2008

National Endowment for the Arts

NEA List: How many have you read?

If you're the "average" person, you've only read SIX, according to the National Endowment for the Arts.So, here's what you do: Copy onto your blog. Bold the books you have read. Italicize the books you intend to read.

Im actually amazed that Ive read over 30 of these books. Not holding a candle to Amy's almost 50, but hey, Im a math girl to her English girl. Im amazed at how many of these books I read in high school and once again revel at the blessing of a high quality education...truly one of the most loving sacrifices my parents gave to my sister and myself.

When e and I first married, I had a habit of reading a classic novel during the summer (cause I was off school) not necessarily something I would choose to read, but something that would be GOOD for me to read. It was a great habit because it exposed me to stuff I wouldnt have ordinarily picked up to read. I havent done that the last three summers and need to get back on the bandwagon!!

Novels im suprised arent on the list? Ayn Rand's Anthem, more Shakespeare, and more lit from other cultures.

Hats off to Amy for the fun project! Now, I best get reading.




1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen


2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien


3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte


4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling...triple loved this series. Beyone fabulous


5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee...hands down my all time favorite fiction novel


6 The Bible...what can you say? A lost people, A hero, A happy ending. Its amazing!


7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte...high school english. Heathcliff I love thee NOT!!


8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell


9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman


10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens More high schoolliterature!


11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott How many times have read this book??


12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy MORE high school reading


13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller


14 Complete Works of Shakespeare


15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier


16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien


17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks


18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger


19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger


20 Middlemarch - George Eliot


21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell


22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald ...beautiful and haunting


23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens


24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy


25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams


26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh


27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky


28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck You got to give it to Steinbeck for his vivid imagery!!


29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll Crazy crazy mixed up book!


30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame


31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy Read during pregnancy. Loved it but associate it with vomit


32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens


33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis Childhood in bed under the covers reading


34 Emma - Jane Austen


35 Persuasion - Jane Austen


36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis


37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini Definately on my top five. Amazing amazing amazing


38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres


39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden Again...in the top five. Incredible writing!


40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne


41 Animal Farm - George Orwell


42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown Good but tedious. Too much intrigue for me


43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez


44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving


45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins


46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery


47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy


48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood


49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding Freshman lit. I love Piggy!


50 Atonement - Ian McEwan


51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel I cried when Richard Parker leaves the boat. Sobbed!!!


52 Dune - Frank Herbert


53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons


54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen


55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth


56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon


57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens


58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley I love a peek into the future.


59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon


60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez


61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck "I will love him and pet him and..."


62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov


63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt


64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold


65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas


66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac


67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy


68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding The origional Chick Lit!!!


69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie


70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville


71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens Tedium but hey, I had to pass the test!!!


72 Dracula - Bram Stoker


73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett Sweet!!!


74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson


75 Ulysses - James Joyce


76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath


77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome


78 Germinal - Emile Zola7


79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray


80 Possession - AS Byatt


81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens


82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell


83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker


84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro


85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert


86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry


87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White I wanted to BE Fern!!


88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom


89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle


90 The Faraway Tree Collection


91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad


92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery


93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks



94 Watership Down - Richard Adams


95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole


96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute



97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas


98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare... "Out out damn spot!!!"


99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl This book scared me...still does


100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ok, just 14, but I did read the Dune trilogy, the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and the four books in the Hitch Hiker's Guide trilogy (yes, the 4 books in the trilogy), so I think I should get to add 7 more books to my total. What about HG Wells and Jules Verne and Stanley Clark (2001, etc.)? Bah, humbug to the NEA for not including any of those authors.

Taylor

Anonymous said...

I've read 21 of these... many of them have been read in the last 6 years.I have an English teacher in my book club. lol I think Matthew will be the one who shares my love of reading, a refreshing change after the math/science lovers I've raised. It's hard to have dinner conversation about Calulus or Geometry, and the Biology stuff bothers the others--haha
This summer we've read the kids classic versions Tom Sawyer, Phantom of the Opera, Around the World in 80 Days, and started Oliver Twist last night. He has better insight into some of these books than I do!!

Anonymous said...

i've read 6.. i'm pretty sure i have read charlie and the chocolate factory..if not it's 5.
haha

Scribbling Suit said...

Love that yours HAD to have commentary too! What's up with all my friends who haven't read Pride and Prejudice or LOTR? Next assignment, people!

Roses in December said...

Why wasn't Algorithms and Logic on the list? I could have at least had one that I have read. Anne of Green Gables, I have seen the movie so many times, I believe I could quote the verses/lines and it would qualify for reading the book - GREAT story, and a good, rainy, hurricane day movie. Can't say I've ever ready Ulysses - know him, never read it, might be intriguing. Color Purple, excellent! Never read Lovely Bones, but read Lucky by Alice Sebold - my sister-in-law was the district attorney in the case in that book-tough book to read.

I am just plain old NOT a good reader. Gotta give you credit for being so good at it Patti.
Bren