BBC's best British novels

[Greg Anos]

Poetry and short stories were excluded from consideration by the list. Novels only. . .

it was the list of 100 best Novels, after all. . .

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by Rizla

The people who voted this top 25 are a pretty dull bunch. No Harry Potter, no LOTR, no Iain Banks, no Arthur C. Clarke. But we get two Virgina Woolf in the top 25. What a joke. I guess this is what's meant by the literary snobocracy.

No H.G. Wells, either...

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I think it's very unlikely that any children's book would make a "great novels" list. I love reading children's books myself, but by their very nature they don't have the depth of character development that makes a great novel great.

Narnia series made it into the low 90s of the list.

[crich70]

No Oliver Twist or. A Christmas Carol?

[BenG]

They're practically short stories by 19th century standards.

[HarryT]

"A Christmas Carol" is a novella at best, and I don't know many people who'd regard "Oliver Twist" as one of Dickens's better works. It's generally considered to be his first genuine novel (as opposed to his "episodic" earlier works such as "Pickwick") and he was still very much learning how to write novels at the time.

[theducks]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Ah, Robert W Service.

"There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee."

Great stuff for reading aloud.

I have been to Lake Lebarge (1973)

I did not see a marge (would not know one if it fell on my foot ).

[theducks]

Originally Posted by badgoodDeb

You're starting to interest me. What is the title of this piece, please, so I can look for it? Unless it is "The Baldness of Sam McGee" as just mentioned??

His poems are in Project Gutenberg
"The Spell of the Yukon..."

I grew up hearing Service from my dad who was born in Alaska.

[Phogg]

Originally Posted by theducks

I have been to Lake Lebarge (1973)

I did not see a marge (would not know one if it fell on my foot ).

The marge is the edge.

[badgoodDeb]

Originally Posted by theducks

I have been to Lake Lebarge (1973)

I did not see a marge (would not know one if it fell on my foot ).

Originally Posted by Phogg

The marge is the edge.

I assumed "marge" was poetic short hand for "margin". ie. edge

[Phogg]

Originally Posted by badgoodDeb

I assumed "marge" was poetic short hand for "margin". ie. edge

It's an archaic form.

The poem is over a hundred years old though (published in 1907) and the term seems to have been in somewhat more general use as regards geographical boundaries when the line was penned.

[Barty]

I've read 1, 4, 5, 7, 11, 12, 15, 19, 20, 21, 25.

Not bad for a Yank, an immigrated one at that

[Barty]

Originally Posted by HarryT

"Middlemarch" is an absolutely wonderful book. I do encourage you to give it a go!

Heartily agree. Middlemarch is terrific. Don't let the size or reputation put you off.

[aceflor]

I have read 18 of them:

25. White Teeth (Zadie Smith, 2000)
23. Jude the Obscure (Thomas Hardy, 1895)
20. Persuasion (Jane Austen, 1817)
19. Emma (Jane Austen, 1815)
18. The Remains of the Day (Kazuo Ishiguro, 1989)
17. Howards End (EM Forster, 1910)
15. Atonement (Ian McEwan, 2001)
12. Nineteen Eighty-four (George Orwell, 1949)
11. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen, 1813)
10. Vanity Fair (William Makepeace Thackeray, 1848)
9. Frankenstein (Mary Shelley, 1818)
8. David Copperfield (Charles Dickens, 1850)
7. Wuthering Heights (Emily Brontë, 1847)
6. Bleak House (Charles Dickens, 1853)
5. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Brontë, 1847)
4. Great Expectations (Charles Dickens, 1861)
3. Mrs Dalloway (Virginia Woolf, 1925)
1. Middlemarch (George Eliot, 1874)

I would have chosen Vanity Fair as number 1, although Middlemarch would have been my number 2 so not that bad either.
19th Century being very much my period, novel wise (and that applies to French and Spanish novels) I am quite happy to see this list as it is....

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by HarryT

No surprise to see that the great classics of the 19th and early 20th centuries still dominate the list.

To be honest, I think that won't ever change. The classics will stay on these lists because everybody says they should. It often looks as there isn't room for anything 'new'. For me, Lord of the Rings (1954) *definitely* should have been in that list, as well as Shogun (1975), and Mutiny on the Bounty (1932).

(Edit: Bounty could maybe be removed as the authors were American. Clavell and Tolkien are British, AFAIK; or at least, born in a part of the world that was part of the British Empire.)