The most depressing list ....

[dfloyd]

I just received an e-mail from ABE Books listing the ten most depressing best sellers. they are, in order of depression, I guess:

1. The Road - Cormac McCarthy
2. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
3. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
4. 1984 - George Orwell
5. Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand
6. The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
7. Night - Ellie Wiesel
8. On the Beach - Nevil Shute
9. The Bluest Eye - Toni Morrison
10. Lord of the Flies - William Golding

I have read about half of these, but some were fantasy .... they describe events which really never happened, such as Atlas Shrugged. For me, In Cold Blood by Truman Capote was depressing because it wasn't fiction. Nevertheless, I couldn't put it down and finished it in about a day and a half. What is the most depressing book(s) you have read?

[Idril]

The Idiot by Dostoevsky. I had to take a break about half way through because it was beginning to have a seriously negative effect on my frame of mind. I went back after reading several light, fluffy, comical books thinking I had cleansed my palate enough and that it couldn't get any worse...but I was wrong, it could and did get worse. :p

[Haunted]

The Heart of the Matter — Graham Greene

I'm very surprised this book is not on Litnet. Graham Greene didn't even make the Author List here. As depressing as it is, it's an award-winning title and it's also on Time magazine's 100 Best English-language Novels.

[dfloyd]

I was never depressed by Dostoyevsky, possibly because I admired his writing so much. I have read The Idiot twice along with Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov, and the Possessed.

The Graham Greene novel is somewhat depressing, but he could also be very funny as in Our Man in Havana.

The fictional work I found to be depressing is Conrad's Heart of Darkness.

[Haunted]

^ I found Conrad's Heart of Darkness depressing too. When the movie (based on the book) came out, I stayed away from the movie theater as far as I could :p

[wat??]

I've never been depressed by Dostoyevsky (or any Russian author for that matter), but Kurt Vonnegut is, I find, very bleak and cynical in most of his novels.

[Dark Muse]

I would agree with 1984 being depressing.

Some others that come into my mind

The House of Mirth
The Beast in the Jungle
The Jungle
Aztec
The Red Tent
Druids

[JuniperWoolf]

I didn't think that The Grapes of Wrath was depressing. I read it when I was depressed once and it made me feel a lot better.

[Frankie Anne]

"Ethan Frome" was pretty depressing, I thought. I just finished "Jude the Obscure." I found it sad, but not especially depressing. I suppose there is a difference?

I agree, too, Dark Muse, about "House of Mirth." I had to reread the last chapter twice so I could absorb it all. Interesting that it and "Ethan Frome" are both written by the same author.

[Dark Muse]

I haven't read Ethan Frome yet, but I have the book

[Jozanny]

I think one has to look at Ethan Frome as Wharton's answer to the class consciousness of Henry James. They were friends, and with this short novel she was reminding The Master that poor rural people have tragic moral codes too. If you study the novel as social commentary it is less depressing than it is looking at American rural scenes from a startling perspective, with its own aspect of truth to it.

[dfloyd]

but I have a copy of the book, signed by Upton Sinclair, which has gone upwards in value. I don't find that depressing.

[sadparadise]

I found As I Lay Dying to be a very depressing book. I would agree with The Road as being the most depressing book. The Road never leaves you feeling as if there is any hope for these two apocalyptic hitch hikers. It still remains my favorite. However, I did not read all of the books listed. I did not find 1984 to be overly depressing, perhaps enlightening more than depressing.

[Veva]

For me The Bell Jar was definitely not depressing. I remember after finishing it I felt very optimistic, don't know why. Though I knew that she was still sick and that the author killed herself, I felt like living.... :idea:

[prendrelemick]

I find reading Dan Brown's books very depressing.

[Logos]

The Heart of the Matter — Graham Greene

I'm very surprised this book is not on Litnet. Graham Greene didn't even make the Author List here. As depressing as it is, it's an award-winning title and it's also on Time magazine's 100 Best English-language Novels. He may be added to the author list some day but he has no works in the public domain.

[Boo Radley]

^ I found Conrad's Heart of Darkness depressing too. When the movie (based on the book) came out, I stayed away from the movie theater as far as I could :p

Yes. It affected me in a similar way. Maybe dark, foreboding and intense would sum it up for me.

[mal4mac]

I admire certain aspects of Dostoyevsky's writing, but he's pernicious. Definitely depressing. Macbeth written by Macbeth. I'm reading "Demons" at the moment. He kills off the nicest, simplest character after spending many pages making you fall in love with her. OK the character development was wonderful, and the interactions between her and the many other (mostly pernicious) characters complex and intriguing. But that just makes it all the more depressing when she is mudered! Now he's about to finish off one of the nicer male characters... He makes Hardy look like a little ray of sunshine...

[Bloomsday]

the bell jar is probably the most depressing book I've read..

its sort of hard to be depressed by books like in cold blood or any of dostoevsky's novels, cause they're just so good

[chrismythoi]

i think many of chekov's short stories are very bleak. they emit vast quantites of pathos to the point where the reader wants to cry.
champagne is my favourite so far, but i have only read a small fraction of them all

[My name is red]

i didn't think Lord of the Flies - William Golding was depressing,if it's depressing then what is Good Morning,Midnight by jean Rhys? or The Lover by Marguerite Duras?

[The Comedian]

While not a novel, Eugene O'Neill's "Long Day's Journey into Night" is the most depressing thing that I've ever read.

[Niamh]

While not a novel, Eugene O'Neill's "Long Day's Journey into Night" is the most depressing thing that I've ever read.

That is quite depressing all right. :nod:

East of Eden. I found that depressingly sad.

[Annamariah]

I've read 1984 and Lord of the Flies, but while they were in a way depressing, I never cried when I read those. Tess of d'Urbervilles didn't bring tears into my eyes either, though it is a depressing book too. And I'm the one who cries with almost every book I read and movie I watch :eek:

[formality hater]

Khaled Hosseni's A Thousand Splendid Suns had a miserable ending!:(

[Scheherazade]

Mrs Dalloway... I found it depressing because it was like sitting in the parlour of this lady I felt no connection with, listening to her incessant ramblings about things I didn't give a farthing about.

[Jozanny]

Mrs Dalloway... I found it depressing because it was like sitting in the parlour of this lady I felt no connection with, listening to her incessant ramblings about things I didn't give a farthing about.

I now have to consider this a challenge to rescue Virginia Woolf from you:lol:

I am surprised you don't find yourself in sympathy with her humour, as you manage to get me to lighten up now and again:D!

[Scheherazade]

Virginia Woolf is probably at the top of my "unbearable" authors list... :eek:

There! Now you know what a pleb I am! :eek2:

[dfloyd]

Someone who despises Virginia Woolf as much as I do! I have read hundreds of books, most of them classics, but To the Lighthouse is the only one I couldn't finish. The only thing I like about Virginia Woolf is the Edward Albee play.

[Scheherazade]

but To the Lighthouse is the only one I couldn't finish. Same here... I couldn't pass the 20th page.

I read only Mrs Dalloway and Orlando, to be honest but they were enough to put me off for the foreseeable future (liked the latter better).

[Jozanny]

This contemporary antipathy startles me a little, on a more objective note. I studied To The Lighthouse in university, and think it is one of her more powerful post-war satires, and I find Orlando funny, though I have yet to get to Dalloway. I would not say she's equal to Lampedusa, Musil, Proust, or the other high modernists, but I do consider her a minor great, because she aptly captures the fragmentation that takes us up to the WW2 era.

I won't turn blue about it though :D.

[Dimitra]

1984 yes it leaves you in the end with a feeling of despair but Jude the Obscure definitely no for me.

Journey to the End of Night by Celine was the book that left most depressed.But it is also my favourite book.:)

[sixsmith]

Surely 'Tess of the d'Urbervilles' is a contender.


And Orwell's first outing, 'Burmese Days', is also in the mix.

[mal4mac]

And Orwell's first outing, 'Burmese Days', is also in the mix.

Orwell's novels are not only depressing in subject matter, but are depressing for anyone who admires Orwell and wants to find more reasons to admire him by reading his novels. They are depressingly lacking in characterisation, and (apart from 1984) they have boring plots, are totally humourless, and are bereft of novel ideas. If, like me, you look on Orwell as a guiding light in the area of politics then avoid his novels like the plague (except 1984.) It's depressing to me in every way that his novels are so bad. Read his essays.

[grotto]

“Jude the Obscure” I loved! It ranks in my top ten books list, it’s so beautifully painful!

[sixsmith]

Orwell's novels are not only depressing in subject matter, but are depressing for anyone who admires Orwell and wants to find more reasons to admire him by reading his novels. They are depressingly lacking in characterisation, and (apart from 1984) they have boring plots, are totally humourless, and are bereft of novel ideas. If, like me, you look on Orwell as a guiding light in the area of politics then avoid his novels like the plague (except 1984.) It's depressing to me in every way that his novels are so bad. Read his essays.

I don't think Orwell's novels are quite as terrible as you assert. 'Burmese Days' is certainly humorless but i thought it had some reasonably compelling things to say about imperialism and i remember feeling a good deal of sympathy for Flory - though he was a bit 2D. I also enjoyed 'Coming up for Air' although i'm something of a sentimentalist. But certainly no one is going to confuse either of these with great works. As for his essays, that's a discussion for another time and place.

[Buh4Bee]

How about On the Road? I found that depressing.

The Bell Jar is also pretty bad.

[Fen]

Of Mice and Men

[Dr Jekyll]

The Idiot by Dostoevsky. I had to take a break about half way through because it was beginning to have a seriously negative effect on my frame of mind. I went back after reading several light, fluffy, comical books thinking I had cleansed my palate enough and that it couldn't get any worse...but I was wrong, it could and did get worse. :p

Yes I agree. After reading Chekhov and Dostoevsky's Notes From the
Underground I started to have a rather dark look at the world. Of course, that is gone now, but I'll never forget those works and how they left psychological
impact on me.

[Jozanny]

If I am going to play in the spirit of this thread, my pick would be The Recognitions (http://books.google.com/books?id=O061ku-tJqwC&dq=william+gaddis+recognitions&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=uo2jQtyf8I&sig=rthq1idIjVGjCsi0ykgw1bG6Jgo&hl=en&ei=KuPISufSBMy2lAf21rGSAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3#v=onepage&q=&f=false) by William Gaddis. For me it falls into that rare category I reserve for brilliant failures, and it is a difficult novel to explain, and yet, it is a novel instantly recognizable as a part and parcel of the Eisenhower era, preoccupied by the nature of fraudulence and original spirit of artistic voice.

It is horridly long, ponderous, and when I was younger I have no idea how I got through it, missed a great deal, but its cynicism pretty much matched my own. Of course, I started rereading it during my relocation, and hope with search engines available I might miss less, but I'd recommend it only to very sturdy stuck in the mud readers, as it is as terrible as it is powerful.

[qimissung]

I've read "Far From the Madding Crow" and loved it, but I can't read any of his other things. "Jude the Obscure"? The very idea is unbearable. I've seen the movie, and like Haunted I will stay far, far away from the book.

I read "Ethan Frome" when I was very young. I loved it. I thought it was sad. I could never re-read it.

I did like "The Bell Jar." I would like to re-read it sometime.

[Scheherazade]

Ethan Frome is one of the most depressing books I have read, I think.

And I cannot stand Thomas Hardy mostly because of his constant drama and self-pity.

[Lulim]

I read only two novels by Thomas Hardy: "A pair of blue eyes" and "Far from the Madding Crowd". Do you consider it depressing? -- I figured it mostly rather ironic, but then, perhaps I didn't catch the finer tunes ...

[Scheherazade]

Far from the Madding Crowd is my favorite Hardy novel; its tone is very different from those of, say, Tess, Jude or Native. I didn't think much of Major of Casterbridge either but I didn't find it as depressing either.

Just realised I read too many Hardy books to be able to claim that "I can't stand him." :p

[Niamh]

Another depressing book is Gaskells Ruth.

[sixsmith]

If I am going to play in the spirit of this thread, my pick would be The Recognitions (http://books.google.com/books?id=O061ku-tJqwC&dq=william+gaddis+recognitions&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=uo2jQtyf8I&sig=rthq1idIjVGjCsi0ykgw1bG6Jgo&hl=en&ei=KuPISufSBMy2lAf21rGSAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3#v=onepage&q=&f=false) by William Gaddis. For me it falls into that rare category I reserve for brilliant failures, and it is a difficult novel to explain, and yet, it is a novel instantly recognizable as a part and parcel of the Eisenhower era, preoccupied by the nature of fraudulence and original spirit of artistic voice.

It is horridly long, ponderous, and when I was younger I have no idea how I got through it, missed a great deal, but its cynicism pretty much matched my own. Of course, I started rereading it during my relocation, and hope with search engines available I might miss less, but I'd recommend it only to very sturdy stuck in the mud readers, as it is as terrible as it is powerful.

'The Recognitions' is another on my 'to do' list. I'm stuck in the mud but not particularly sturdy, so it could be a very confusing experience.:)

[Jozanny]

'The Recognitions' is another on my 'to do' list. I'm stuck in the mud but not particularly sturdy, so it could be a very confusing experience.:)

If you do get to it while I am yet among the living, I am not sure I can be of much help. Gaddis plays a deliberate game of deception, and I think wading through that to sort it all out is a possible flaw; he is not post-modern in the Gardner/DeLillo sense, but he shares with T.H. White the enjoyment of toying with the reader. I love The Once and Future King for several reasons, but The Recognitions invites my labor without my gratification--at least not on the first dance.

But good luck when you get to it! ;)

[qimissung]

I read only two novels by Thomas Hardy: "A pair of blue eyes" and "Far from the Madding Crowd". Do you consider it depressing? -- I figured it mostly rather ironic, but then, perhaps I didn't catch the finer tunes ...

I don't consider Far From the Madding Crowd depressing. I mentioned it, I think, merely to show I have read some of his work. It'\ is, in fact, the only one of his books that I find readable.

And Scher, maybe you can say you dislike him precisely because you have read him. You have a better reason for not liking him than I do.

I'm still not going to read him, though. :D

[kiki1982]

Far from the Madding Crowd is not depressing. Thestartof Naturalis, or Hardy's later style, is already in it with the murder and Troy getting drunk and everything, but the end is still positive, so nothing much is doomed.

I can understand why some people just find him too depressing.

[kasie]

Mann - The Magic Mountain.

[manolia]

Lord of the flies..because of what happens to one of the characters (don't want to spoil the book for those who haven't read it yet).
Of mice and men.
The sound and the fury.

[Fen]

I read only two novels by Thomas Hardy: "A pair of blue eyes" and "Far from the Madding Crowd". Do you consider it depressing? -- I figured it mostly rather ironic, but then, perhaps I didn't catch the finer tunes ...

I didn't find Far from the madding Crowd depressing either I thought it was rather amusing.

[isidro]

Elie Weisel's is depressing from that list. Night is also nonfiction and about death camps.

However, notwithstanding the fictional nature I vote Lord of the Flies. At least with Night we know that the Holocaust is over and many people are fighting to keep it dead. Lord of the Flies destroys entirely the idea that people are good and that safety in this world exists.

[mal4mac]

However, notwithstanding the fictional nature I vote Lord of the Flies... Lord of the Flies destroys entirely the idea that people are good and that safety in this world exists.

Is any great literature *truly* depressing? Although, on the surface, a bunch of schoolkids murdering each other seems depressing, I found it helped get me through a tough school. It gave some explanation & consolation for the nastiness of the school experience, and an example of how things could be much worse...

[Chabonist]

By far the most deppressing thing I have read is "Death of a Salesman" by Arthur Miller. I cried while trying to re-tell it to someone. It's deppressing but very importent for any person to read period. I think the reason its so depressing is anyone can identify a part of themeselves that would be capable of working hard towards impossible dreams and we see that part of ourself in the tourmenting dellusianal main character.

The Bell Jar was deppressing but not in the same sort of way for me because it was about such a individualized expierence. I think that another one that is really up there for me is "Brave New World." I haven't read grapes of wrath but I did read "Of Mice and Men" Which although was heartbreakingly sad was so beautiful to that it didn't have the impact on me as did the previously mentioned reads.

[Emil Miller]

I've read "Far From the Madding Crow" and loved it, but I can't read any of his other things. .


I often long to be Far from the Madding Crow(s). Seriously,there are two colonies occupying different parts of the square where I live and they fight over the territory like mad; the noise is deafening and I often wish I had a shotgun. Although we are all prone to amusing typing errors, the best one I have seen on LitNet is 'The Wrath of Grapes' and as an inveterate wine drinker I know exactly what that means.

As for depressing novels, I found Crime and Punishment to be one of the most depressing novels I have read.

[kiki1982]

Haha, Brian Bean :lol:, I did not even see that!

[Modest Proposal]

There seems to be a slight difference in definitions. I guess there is depressing in a personal/dramatic way, and depressing in a prophetic/foreboding way.

I found "Anna Karenina" heartbreaking, even though I usually have a lot of trouble sympathizing with aduletry. I think I would have disliked her more if Tolstoy tried to excuse her, but as he just told her terrible story I couldn't help feeling for her immensely.

As for books depressing in their prognosis of humanity or the future, I find Mann very depressing. I also felt the predetermination in Wharton sad, but her witticisms so lighthearted that I never minded the grim fate of man for too long.

[jcondylis]

I agree with a couple of people about Dostoyevsky, his work is not that depressing, although i did find parts of The Devils (The Possessed) rather slow paced. I find that if I read some one like Schopenhauer, as great and insightful as he was (i know its not a novel/story of any sort) he really puts me in a depressed and misanthropic state.

Has anyone read much of James Joyce's works? I have just began to study his works and they seem full of dull monotony, but thats what makes them great, apparently.

[dfloyd]

I read James Joyce and wonder at his great con which has all the literature professors in all the universities proclaiming that Ulysses is the greatest book of the twntieth century. A con greater than Ponzi's. Then I think that in spite of his great con, Joyce had ill health and had to wear glasses made of Coke-bottle bottoms, and suddenly I'm no longer depressed.

[five-trey]

Mourning Becomes Electra is absolutely tragic.


And while I don't find Dostoevsky's novels as depressing as the next man, I thought The Idiot was pretty heavy.

[mmmmmm]

Far From the Madding Crowd, which is one of my favorite novels, isn't really depressing. In fact, its ending is perhaps more satisfying and more joyful than say, something Austen wrote.

I didn't find anything too depressing about 1984. I got accustomed to the dystopian world by the end, and thus, the conclusion didn't leave me sad or anything--you expect a depressing ending from such a bleak book, which in a sense makes it less tragic.

Bridge to Terabithia tears me up. =D