100 greatest novels

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Here is a sad discovery: Of the modern library’s 100 best novels I have read a grand total of 11.

I think I need to pick up the pace . . .

Kevin Holtsberry
I work in communications and public affairs. I try to squeeze in as much reading as I can while still spending time with my wife and two kids (and cheering on the Pittsburgh Steelers and Michigan Wolverines during football season).

4 Comments

  1. If it makes you feel better, I’ve only read seven of the Board’s list and twelve of the Readers’ list. Of course, if I’d read all the books I was assigned to read, it would be more like fifteen off the Board’s list, but, c’est la vie…

  2. Hah. You beat me. I was in at 10. But I’m reading Joyce’s Ulysses only because its in the pole position on this list.

    On the other hand, one of the “books” I did read was Dos Passos’ USA, which really should count for three books.

    On the other hand, I rule on the Reader’s List thanks to my extended study of the ouvre of Robert Heinlein. But Battlefield Earth is in third position? Not in this universe.

  3. I was apalled by that list. I can’t understand why 1984 wasn’t at the very leaste ranked five. 1984 is the most far ahead of its time books ever written, well Brave New World comes close but it doesn’t nearly hit the nerve 1984 hits. The Catcher in the Rye is a masterpiece yet was in the sixties some where. That is BS. I also believe Of Mice and Men and johnny got his gun should’ve been on the list. I piss on that list.

  4. That list is a sham, a mockery. Why are there no modern novels? How is Philip Roth’s Portnoy’s complaint better than his book ‘ American Pastoral? ‘
    It’s not.
    Well will people grow up? Evolve?
    Crusty old men with white beards perched on their fucking ridiculous laurels, immutable, bored and boring. Burn the list.

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