What is the most boring book ever?

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Originally Posted by Robert E Lee

I'd have to go with Moby Dick. Oh God, that was dreadful. I've already posted my thoughts about it on this board.

Herman Melville tries to be interesting and avant-garde by giving us gigantic passages about how to hunt whales and scientific stuff (which is all dated by now) while he leaves the story dangling.

I really hated this book.

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agreed!

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Originally Posted by Brian Bean

Thanks for the recommendation but I think that there is a style of writing that I am temperamentally unsuited to. The likes of Joyce, Becket , Kafka etc, who seem to be the literary equivalent of abstract painting, do not conform to my idea of what constitutes readability. I don't say that they are without literary merit but they are just not my type of writers.

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Going to agree here regarding Joyce. My reading is purely for enjoyment & relaxation (have no real interest in examining language or literary techniques) as a result if a books storyline doesnt catch me I will generally put it aside and grab something else instead.

I have tried Joyce a few times but he has always bored the hell out of me (same with Ms Austen)

Moby Dick gets my vote

Without a single doubt: Clarissa by Samuel Richardson

I didn't like "The portrait of a lady" by Henry James. Too wordy, way too confused sentences and with a stupid heroine presented as clever. The end also was so disappointing and kind of masochistic. I've also read "The turn of the screw" (also in translation-I was too bored to read him in English). It was a little better because it was much more brief but still, I didn't like his characterizations nor his general style.

I used to think Hemingway boring too, but I am starting to get a better opinion about him after his "To have and to have not". "The old man and the sea" was a little boring, since fishing is not to my taste :p and "For whom the bells toll" was too heavy for my age then. I must give it a try again :).

I understand how Dostoevsky can be difficult or dull, but at least he had a point to make. "The portrait of a lady" had none.

I also find Dickens boring. I never liked "Oliver Twist" because of the false sentimentality, Copperfield was a little better and "Great expectations" (which I also managed to read only in translation) was interesting due to his female characters Estella and Mrs Hawisham (sp?). The fact is the man uses too many secondary characters to the point you get lost (I remember searching for a quarter who was the gentleman that took David for a walk to find out in the end it was a servant of his aunt 50 pages back!). So although I like his themes I never managed to like his writing.

The Old Man and the Sea was VERY boring. I couldn't finish it.

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Originally Posted by kelby_lake

The Old Man and the Sea was VERY boring. I couldn't finish it.

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Not To Kill a Mockingbird?

:p

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Originally Posted by Scheherazade

Not To Kill a Mockingbird?

:p

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God, why did she bother with Part 1? Or at least the majority? I couldn't care less about kiddies rolling around in tyres. Maybe many a Southerner can identify but hell, I don't come from there, and I didn't care.

PRIDE AND PREJUDICE!!!

It's the most boring book ever!!

Seriously, though, a book which starts with a statement like (I quote from memory) "A man in a suitable position in life has need of a wife," is bound straight for the trashcan.

It's great! That's sardonic ironic humour, silly. Anyway, everyone knows the first line:

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in posession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.

I could do with one of them!

well, i think it was 'wuthering heights'. i did not make it further than the 50th page i think. i don't know why, but for some reason i found it boring when i tried to read it. and the language was also difficult- i was reading it in english. maybe i will try to read it again some day.

the most boring book... ??? really is there such a thing?? i mean when you read you always find a way to make it lively. reading isnt boring.. only when you hate it (an i dnt see how people can) i love to read.

but is there really such a thing as a boring book? 'wuthering heights' yes it is a hard book to read even to americans. im in the tenth grade an i have read it all through within two days. 'to kill a mocking bird' yes it has its borign times. but dont all books? even the most literate books by the most famous writers EX. Laurell K. Hamilton; has some boring parts in her books. you cant blame writers or yourselves for saying there are books that are boring. for there really is no such thing as a boring book. i have read books on cival wars an true accounts on peoples lives an i found them fascinating. you learn more an more with each book you read. no matter how 'boring' you may say. for i believe there really is no such thing as a boring book.

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Originally Posted by Wilfred

There is no boring pieces of literature. Literature is the essance of our soul and to say that it is boring is the utmost insult to our essance as a supurerior human race.

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Not everything that is written deserves to be called Literature...

As odd as this probably sounds, I can't seem to get through Three Musketeers. I always find myself falling asleep haha

quote: Not everything that is written deserves to be called Literature...

that is true.. but it doesnt mean that they are boring does it???

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Originally Posted by Zooey

I cast my vote for Cry, the Beloved Country. While I could appreciate what it was trying to do, I was bored out of my mind the entire time.

And I love Fitzgerald, but gosh, Tender is the Night was a chore to get through!

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I've read Beloved Country several times, and I can't get through the first page without tears coming to my eyes. I love it.