This is a big question with so many perspectives and asterisks involved. It surely depends on the genre, the themes, the tone, and writer’s intentions, and even more besides. As a professional book critic and ex high school English teacher, it’s my opinion that books are, in general, unjustifiably long. But there is a lot …
Classic books
Novellas provide a special kind of reading experience, and require their own kind of skill to craft. Shorter than a novel (but still often expected to carry the same narrative heft) and longer than a short story, novellas are exciting in their uniqueness. They can be re-read more easily and therefore provide more thematic satisfaction …
Oscar Wilde was arguably the finest wordsmith the English language has ever known. Outside of Shakespeare, nobody could ever turn a phrase like Oscar Wilde. These Oscar Wilde quotes, from his various plays, stories, his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, and from his everyday life, all demonstrate that with boldness and clarity. Wilde was …
The twentieth century saw the publication of many of the greatest works of literature ever written. All around the world, writers were inventing entire genres, pushing boundaries, blending fiction and philosophy, and so much more. Many of the great novels that we call modern classic books today were written in the 20th century. And beyond …
Declaring anything one of the best books of all time is a bold statement that we are sure will be met with plenty of disagreement from fellow readers. That said, what you’ll find amongst these very best classic books are novels that have stood the test of time and become beloved, well-studied, well-revered works of …
I’ve written and spoken before about how exciting Chinese literature in the 21st Century is. If you aren’t paying attention to the wealth of imaginative, surreal, political, and evocative Chinese novels in translation right now, you really should be. Chinese literature, however, has a very particular legacy. So much so, in fact, that this legacy …