3 Classics I Didn't Like

I am well aware that this post may be controversial, but there are some classics I don’t like. I was an English major in my undergraduate years, meaning I read a lot and read broadly. But that doesn’t mean I loved everything I read in my classes or in my regular life.

I enjoy the majority of the classics like To Kill a Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, and The Stranger to name a few, but the ones I don’t like are usually popular with others.

I do want to preface these three books by saying this: I read these when I was a teenager and it’s been some years since I have been a teenager. These books have yet to make it back onto my TBR in the years since, but they still are lovingly a part of my classics shelf.

Can you tell I’m stalling? I’ll get into it.

Wuthering Heights

I was so bored by this book. I truly wanted to like this, but I just couldn’t get into it. I got about 100 pages in and just stopped reading. It turned into a book I was dreading to read and put me in a reading slump for a few months after I didn't finish it.

I remember hearing such great things about this book and I was really disappointed by it. From my memory of it, I found it dry and dull. I have yet to pick it back up and finish reading it. To me, the plot dragged on and (at least to me) wasn't interesting. The tone of the whole novel wasn't something that kept me interested either.

The Great Gatsby

I know, I know. This is a deeply divisive one. I don’t get it either! I wanted to like this, but it was just…meh for me.

What I don’t understand is that I enjoyed the 2013 movie (you know, the one with Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey Maguire), but I just couldn't get into the book. While I do like Fitzgerald’s writing and the symbolism of the green light, it just fell short for me. The plot was fine, the characters were fine, everything about it was just that: fine. I think the biggest reason why it fell so short for me was because it has the moniker of "the greatest book ever" by a lot of people, and at the time when I read it, it didn't live up to the hype for me.

I also found my mind wandering the more I read and unable to focus on the story at all. I finished it, but it was distracted reading the whole time. I want to re-read this one, as I’ve heard from some that it’s better when you’re older. Is that true? Let me know in the comments.

But I will say, I do really like the ending sentence of this novel! Just not the novel in it's entirety.

The Catcher in the Rye

It has been some time since I read this book, but I honestly can’t even remember anything of note that happened. I feel like this is a novel people absolutely love or absolutely do not like (not hate!). I fall into the latter.

I was so bored by this book and I couldn’t wait for it to end. And when I did finish it, I felt a sense of, “Oh, okay. That’s it?” I also couldn't stand Holden using the same phrases and words over and over again (like calling everything and everyone "phonies") and it really took me out of the story.

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Don’t worry, these books will forever live on my classics shelf, but sometimes I feel like I’m lying because I didn’t like them! Should I give any of these classics another chance and re-read them now that I'm older? Let me know in the comments down below!