I found the second and third books much better. The first book is really just setting the story up for the next three books.
Originally Posted by Scheherazade
I am reading Northern Lights (first one in His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman) at the moment and I cannot say I am enjoying it even though it is not a bad book. Fantasy is not really my thang.
I've read 38 of those on the list...
"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--
Of cabbages--and kings--
And why the sea is boiling hot--
And whether pigs have wings."
Actually Im pretty sure the big read is/was just one in the series of thngs the BBc has been doing in order to increase the intrest in reading and the literacy levels in the Uk, its to do wiuth their mandate of entertain inform and educate. At the moment they are 2 years into an 3 year campaign thing called RAW ( read and write) but since I just wrote 2,000 words on the subject last week for my examIll shut up now before I duplicate it.
But the pioint of the big read wasnt just to see what people were intrested in readin, which it did measure. It was supposedly a snapshot of britians reading tastes at the time.
Anyway they made such a fuss about it ther actually was a measurable increase in people buying books to read , it recaptured intrest and so forth.
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The thing about The Big Read was that people were asked to vote for the book they had enjoyed the most - they were not asked to evaluate it or consider its merit as Literature, which might well have daunted a lot of people. The weekly programmes kept the survey to the front of viewers' minds and a lot of promotion was done in schools and libraries, hence the large number of children's titles in the list. Also it explains the high rating for books that were newly published and so in evidence in bookshops/supermarkets/railway station bookstalls. I suspect a survey made now would find a lot of titles have disappeared and been replaced with equally ephemeral titles.
What did I nominate? Ummm - I can't remember....
Reading promotion in UK has come from an unlikely source at the moment - Richard and Judy, the hosts of an afternoon chat show, have a list of (mostly newly-published) books each year, invite people on to the show to talk about them, go to groups for vox pop opinions and at the end of the year nominate a Book of the Year. They also have a Summer Read list. I can't stand R & J but their choice of books is not bad, not Literary, but good middle of the road titles (though I can't believe it is their personal choice....) and my goodness, do they boost the sale of books - even if only a proportion of people who buy the books read them, many more people are reading newish books than would otherwise do so.
Dont get me started on the Richard and Judy Bookclub. We have a special section dedicated to each section, Summer one is coming up. Drives me bonkers.
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this list make me look moderately well readI count 47 in the top 100 that I've read (or am reading). There are certainly a whole bunch of books listed that I enjoyed very much - If I remember rightly I voted for Dune at the time.
I think its a good representation of what British people read, though as has been commented there are some that are perhaps only on the list because they were out at the time.
I'm British and I'd not even heard of Faulkner until I started frequenting this site... Its no surprise at all, most American authors are simply off the radar for British readers.
Last edited by DapperDrake; 05-22-2008 at 02:20 PM.
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Thia is now 63 out of 200. Surprised no Gaskell.
"Come away O human child!To the waters of the wild, With a faery hand in hand, For the worlds more full of weeping than you can understand."
W.B.Yeats
"If it looks like a Dwarf and smells like a Dwarf, then it's probably a Dwarf (or a latrine wearing dungarees)"
Artemins Fowl and the Lost Colony by Eoin Colfer
my poems-please comment Forum Rules
possibly because the kind of people who read Gaskell watch very little telly and therefore probably didn't know anything about this poll.. which would explain the myriad mainstream titles/children's booksThia is now 63 out of 200. Surprised no Gaskell.
which is why I suggested popularity contests are not usually worth paying any attention to because they only take into consideration those who actually bothered to vote...
Incidentally I live in the UK and I had never heard about this BBC Big Read show...
As for Richard and Judy
When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro
Isn't this what statistics about?
The assumption that a sample group would be representative of the larger population?
Why is everyone against R&J? I don't watch their show, didn't even know that they had a book club but why are you against them?
~
"It is not that I am mad; it is only that my head is different from yours.”
~
Good question.
I can seee why Niamh might have a grudge , I do sort of. Because suddenly everyione wants the same book now and we only have a limited number of one book so people can get quite irrated.
But then again I want to know why a mobile and choclate companies are concidered experts in jududging what is a good book too.
My mission in life is to make YOU smile
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The time has come," the Walrus said,"To talk of many things:
Forum Rules- You know you want to read 'em
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|currently reading
Does anyone else except me think that movies have influenced this list? I see many of the books listed, are also very popular films nowdays. Many young people see the film and then might be inclined to read the novel or the opposite way around. I would say Austen films have actually become a British tradition, by now.
"It's so mysterious, the land of tears."
Chapter 7, The Little Prince ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Actually I was going to say that, a lot of people thought that the lord of the rings came out #1 because of the films rather than people actually reading them.
and I have the Big read book of books ( got given it for my birthday) and actually most of the books have a notation beside them telling you about the adaptions of it.
My mission in life is to make YOU smile
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The time has come," the Walrus said,"To talk of many things:
Forum Rules- You know you want to read 'em
|Litnet Challange status = 5/260
|currently reading
Not sure if that says much. There are many books which are not on the list but have great movies made based on them. Hollywood will never miss an opportunity to invest on great books.
~
"It is not that I am mad; it is only that my head is different from yours.”
~
I've never heard of them until this thread but I just checked their website and I find their pictures kinda annoying.
Do, or do not. There is no try. - Yoda
..... and sometimes books were just meant to be films and sometimes a film was really meant to be a book the makers just got confused.
My mission in life is to make YOU smile
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The time has come," the Walrus said,"To talk of many things:
Forum Rules- You know you want to read 'em
|Litnet Challange status = 5/260
|currently reading
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