Classic Novels

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by rkomar

How about defining "Classic" as being perpetually reprinted?

Nothing wrong with that definition. But we then have to include, as classics, many religious texts, The Prophecies of Nostradamus, and several works beloved by people almost everyone else thinks are bigots.

Traditionally, a classic, in addition to being perpetually reprinted, is a book that is widely taught, and written about, by scholars of literature or philosophy, and commonly believed to have layers of meaning. Plus, a classic was a book generally educated people will have read in order to learn how best to live their lives.

The curriculum of pre-twentieth century universities commonly amounted to reading and discussing these books -- and hearing lectures about them. A few small American colleges still have a classics-centered curriculum, as here:

http://www.sjca.edu/

The traditional classics concept is inherently elitist, and as dated as the English class system.

One reason for the death of the classics concept is that there came, with passage of time, to be so many great books that even English professors can't be assumed to have read them all.

Another is that the disagreement over which books are truly great, while it always existed, is now so overwhelming as to make it impossible to say what it a classic. And a lot of today's literature scholars probably do not even believe the concept is valid.

Now, personally, I think I do know a classic when I read it. Charlotte Brontë wrote classics, and Wilkie Collins did not. But both are probably taught at Harvard, and with roughly equal respect or disrespect for the values at the heart of their works.

When Gone with the Wind is commonly called a classic, maybe your definition, rkomar, does follow the word's current usage.

Favorite twentieth century classic novel: The Good Earth by Pearl Buck.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I'm just trying to prove that classic is not a fixed definition and that a lot of it is based on opinion. This is why classic is not a good classification. Too many variations.

Upthread I posted *a couple* definitions of Classic Literature. They are definitions that *most* people would agree with. Obviously you don't. Until you get "Supreme Arbiter of Classic Literature" after your name, you're just going to have to live with other peoples opinions.

If you don't like a "Classic" don't read it. Telling other folks that what you don't like isn't "Classic" is just going to get you ignored.

Which is what I'm going to do.

[crich70]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

It has nothing to do with video games. It has to do with the writing. The story may be good. But it's the writing. It's just not something a lot of people can get into. Shakespeare is like that. The writing is too much of a chore to plow through (for example)

Ah but at the time that Shakespeare wrote his plays he was using the current vernacular of the people. While I don't imagine they talked in rhyme back then the words that we need a glossary for were common knowledge to the average person on the street at the time his plays were written.

[crich70]

I think a classic is a book that has survived for several generations of readers. We still read Dracula for example but there were many other books back then that have faded into obscurity.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Not all classic books have to be old. What about modern classics?

Where did I say "old"?

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

When Gone with the Wind is commonly called a classic, maybe your definition, rkomar, does follow the word's current usage.

Gone with the Wind IS a classic.

[rkomar]

Thanks @SteveEisenberg, for the well-thought out description. I think you're right about some books being perpetually published without having literary merit, and thus, that condition isn't enough to define a classic book.

Personally, I do think that classics can be low-brow, as well as high-brow. Your example, "Gone with the Wind", is a good one. As long as it exhibits a lasting perception of excellence within a class, anything can be a classic. So, I align myself with the modern usage, but I wonder how many today can say that they know the elitist "Classics" you referred to? One hundred plus years ago, they were studied in the original languages (French, Italian, Latin, Greek,...), and I doubt that even the privileged students hold that kind of thing as necessary today. It's no wonder that many scholars have given up on the old definition, as you say.

[Belfaborac]

Originally Posted by rkomar

...exhibits a lasting perception of excellence within a class...

Best definition so far and the only one I'd go with.

[rkomar]

Originally Posted by Belfaborac

Best definition so far and the only one I'd go with.

Damn! I had just re-read it and thought "exhibits" should have been "elicits". "In vino erratas".

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by JohnGalt

It's interesting to me that you would use Dumas and Sabatini that way. Dumas is older, but they are almost a tomAto tomahto sort of comparison. But my all-time favorite novel is hands down the Count of Monte Cristo. Dumas had the guts to leave Mercedes an old maid, while Sabatini would have just made Maximilian his secret son and they'd all forgive Mercedes and live happily ever after....

Well it has been a while since I wrote that post, but my guess is that I choose to link those two authors simply because Dumas has a number of books in the canon of Classics and Sabatini has been for the most part forgotten except by a fairly small readership. Yet, the works of both authors do bear a number of similarities.

--
Bill

[Jozawun]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Gone with the Wind IS a classic.

I think if you come up with a definition that fits GWTW in as a classic, the definition ought to be wide enough to satisfy Mr JSWolf.
In fact, it should cover just about any book he's ever read.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by Jozawun

I think if you come up with a definition that fits GWTW in as a classic, the definition ought to be wide enough to satisfy Mr JSWolf.
In fact, it should cover just about any book he's ever read.

Uh-huh. I guess the fact that it's still being read after 75+ years means nothing.

[Belfaborac]

To be honest, I think it's still being read almost entirely because of the movie. If the movie hadn't been made, or hadn't been such an excellent film, no-one would have remembered it today.

[Jozawun]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Uh-huh. I guess the fact that it's still being read after 75+ years means nothing.

it doesn't mean nothing, but long-term popularity doesn't, of itself, make it a classic, any more than does popularity alone.
Some books now generally described as classics weren't popular originally, and/or aren't popular now.
Still, if you think GWTW is a classic, it might help if you say what makes you think so - in other words, give us a definition of classic.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by rkomar

Personally, I do think that classics can be low-brow, as well as high-brow. Your example, "Gone with the Wind", is a good one. As long as it exhibits a lasting perception of excellence within a class, anything can be a classic.

Totally agree. Nothing "highbrow" about Sir Henry Rider Hagard's "King Solomon's Mines", to give another example - it's a "boys' own adventure story" - but I'd certainly regard it as a classic. To me a classic is a book that's stood the test of time. Any book which has remained constantly in print for over a century is most assuredly a classic, IMHO.