Hardest Book U've Ever Read?

#1 taranutan

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 01:12 AM

I'm reading Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, and mg it's hard-going. Every page-turn is an apprehension... feel like giving up. A classmate gave up on Lolita because of its language gymnastics while another gave up on War & Peace because of its length. What's yours?

#2 0rchid

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 05:27 AM

LOTR trilogy. Omg... I only managed to get through the first 2 because I saw the movies first. it's one thing to watch a battle, but it's quite another thing to read about it cuz it's hard to keep track of who died and who didn't. I started reading the third one, but I gave up 20 pages into it.

Frankenstein was really annoying to get through as well. had to read it for English class in high school and i think about 3/4 of the class ended up going to sparknotes for summaries :x

And I'm probably gonna be one of the few people to say this, but I've tried reading Pride and Prejudice at least 4 times but i've never gotten beyond 1/4 of the book cuz the writing style annoyed me so much. it's just so... gossipy... lol. too much trivial dialogue.

I wasn't too crazy about Interview With A Vampire either. In contrast to Pride and Prejudice, there's just too much description about the setting in this one. I think Anne Rice went on for over 4 pages just describing what Lestat's house looks like.

"Les Mis�rables" by Victor Hugo (eventhough it was a condensed version) and "L'�tranger" by Albert Camus have got to be the worst of the bunch though.. had to read both of them for french class. boring as hell... especially L'�tranger...

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#3 daulism

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 07:43 AM

Heart of Darkness - Joesph Conrad
This was my face reading it:

I didn't really like Wuthering Heights either.

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#4 hungrycollegeboy

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 09:50 AM

The Scarlet Letter

That whole book was one long sentence.

#5 sushisushiii

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 10:14 AM

war & peace by leo tolstoy

i have been reading it for almost a year now (oh god) and i truly love the story, but it is painstakingly long to digest everything... and considering that it is 1200+ pages definitely does not help...

#6 SnowApple

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 10:22 AM

QUOTE (hybrid_marionette @ Jul 29 2009, 09:43 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Heart of Darkness - Joesph Conrad
This was my face reading it:

Seriously. I wanted to go commit suicide afterwards.

#7 taemoo

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 10:32 AM

QUOTE (taranutan @ Jul 29 2009, 04:12 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I'm reading Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, and mg it's hard-going. Every page-turn is an apprehension... feel like giving up. A classmate gave up on Lolita because of its language gymnastics while another gave up on War & Peace because of its length. What's yours?

I would also vote for Lolita. Ulysses would be a close second. Hopefully I can finish these 2 before I die

#8 etoile

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 11:40 AM

QUOTE (SnowApple @ Jul 29 2009, 11:22 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Seriously. I wanted to go commit suicide afterwards.

seriously. it was the hardest 100 hundred something pages ive ever had to read.

#9 pri-T

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 11:47 AM

Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man - James Joyce is all about stream-of-consciousness writing so that was incredibly difficult to get through and a complete torture.
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner - I have a love/hate relationship with this book. I enjoyed it a lot but at times it was pretty difficult to get through.

Lolita is actually one of my favorite books.

#10 hyeminnie

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 12:41 PM

QUOTE (taemoo @ Jul 29 2009, 02:32 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I would also vote for Lolita. Ulysses would be a close second. Hopefully I can finish these 2 before I die

Lolita had me pulling out hairs.
another one would be Absalom, Absalom!

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#11 lilsh0rtnancy

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 01:37 PM

Any Chinese novel. The names are too difficult to remember and the writing style is so different from what I'm used to.

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#12 Justalilodreamer

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 01:48 PM

House of Leaves, its not hard to read but i couldn't figure out wth was going on

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#13 orange.xin.wo

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 01:56 PM

The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. His writing is hard for me to get into.
Also, Brisingr. Not as in I can't read it, but it's just hard for me to get into.

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#14 hellosunshine1024

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 02:13 PM

a clockwork orange
god i didnt understand ANYTHING. they had like slang from another language that made up the whole book.
:P

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#15 darcyausten86

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 02:21 PM

Mansfield Park - Jane Austen

It was boring and I couldn't stand Fanny Price.

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#16 taranutan

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 03:36 PM

QUOTE

Lolita is actually one of my favorite books

It's one of mine too, just on the level of delightful play on language, it's right up there with Moby Richard (the Melville novel, forum robot force-changed the second word, LOL, reminds me of a school internet censor robot that blocked everything with "sex" in it including sexton, middlesex, etc). Richard Tracy. Charles Dickens. Ha ha, yeah playing with the robot... I have a bit too much time on my hand.

QUOTE

James Joyce is all about stream-of-consciousness writing so that was incredibly difficult to get through and a complete torture

Yeah I don't dig SOC as well. Now that you mention it, Miller's Tropic of Cancer was pretty torturous for me.

QUOTE

Any Chinese novel...

lilsh0rtnancy, did you read those in chinese? The hardest chinese book for me is Zizi Tongjian, I was reading an abridged version and even then I had to give up 2/3 thru it. It was SOO long. War & Peace looks like an ant beside it. I heard that Mao Zedong read it cover to cover for an insane 17 times, in the original ancient chinese!

#17 yoh

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 07:05 PM

QUOTE (sushisushiii @ Jul 29 2009, 11:14 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Definitely. Also Paradise Lost. I always end up falling asleep. Now it's just an ornament on my bookshelf :|

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#18 jesster.

After all this time?

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Posted 29 July 2009 - 07:33 PM

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott.

My mom's friend's mom got me that book for christmas in seventh grade, about three years ago. I read to pages 150 something, then I gave up =____=