Classic Books to Read

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. ~ Sir Francis Bacon

Classic books definitely fall into the category of books that should be savored and chewed and digested. These enduring stories, gives us many life's lessons and are written so exquisitely that they never fail to inspire us. So what exactly is a classic book? Or more importantly what are the characteristics of a particular book to be considered as a classic. A classic book is one that no doubt should have an excellent storyline with great readers appeal. But more than that, it should be popular at every age and should always be in people's must read list even after years from its first date of publication. It should be universally appealing, make people ponder and it should profoundly influence people's lives. In English literature the word classic always brings awe and most people consider them to be as important as the Bible.

Classic Books to Read Before You Die

Here is a selection of some of the best classic books everyone should read.

Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
This revolutionary novel by William Makepeace Thackeray is most loved for the character of the protagonist Becky Sharp. It tells the story of Becky Sharp, a beautiful woman who is clever, manipulative and uses her considerable charm to climb her way up the social ladder. It depicts how Becky uses her manipulative charms with a fair bit of deceit, to attract men and get as much wealth out of them as possible. It is a satirical take on the existing British society, which was pretentious and replete with the hypocrisies of the upper classes. This best selling book does not depict the main heroine as some demure kind-hearted belle but rather as a unsentimental and cool women who would do anything to get what she desires.

Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens is one of the most respected and prolific writers who had written many masterpieces, and Oliver Twist is one of them. Oliver Twist is a novel about an orphan boy by the same name who runs away from the orphanage only to fall into the hands of criminals. The book is full of dark humor and it was widely rumored to be based on Charles Dickens' own experience as a child laborer. One of the most famous lines from the book is when young Oliver asks for another portion of gruel saying, "Please, sir, I want some more." The sheer human emotion depicted in the novel and Oliver's innocence makes it one of the most interesting classic books.

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte is a tale of love, passion and tragedy. It created one of the most complex protagonists in classical novels, that of Heathcliff. It is in essence a love story between Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw. The novel soon progresses into a tale of revenge after Catherine marries another man for his wealth and position in spite of being in love with Heathcliff. This novel, set in the moorlands has a gothic quality to it that makes it one of the best classic books.

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
A classic novel, Pride and Prejudice is about Elizabeth Bennet and William Darcy. Elizabeth's mother is very anxious to get her five daughters married off to rich young men. Darcy, who is depicted as being proud and disdainful soon falls in love with Elizabeth, but his nature prevents him from revealing his true feelings for her. The verbal duels between Darcy and Elizabeth make it a very compelling read and one of the best selling books of all times.

Some other classic books are.

• Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
• David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
• 1984 by George Orwell
• Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
• Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
• The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
• One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
• Little Women by Louisa M. Alcott
• The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Emma by Jane Austen
• Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan
• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• Ivanhoe by Walter Scott
• Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
• This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
• Kim by Rudyard Kipling

Classic Books for Children

Here is a list of some classic books for children.

• The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
• Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson
• The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
• King Arthur and His Knights by Howard Pyle
• Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie
• The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
• The Happy Prince and Other Tales by Oscar Wilde
• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
• Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
• Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
• Grimm's Fairy Tales by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
• Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
• A Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne
• Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
• The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling

Classic Books to Read in High School

Here is a list of some of the best classic books to read in high school.

• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
• The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinback
• Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
• Tom Jones by Henry Fielding
• Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
• The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
• The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
• Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
• The Diary of a Nobody by George Grossmith
• In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust
• The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan
• A Bend in the River by V. S. Naipaul

Hope you liked them and will read at least some of them. A book is also said to be a classic, when it portrays the most basic of human emotions, which is what really appeals to a reader; connecting with a certain feeling in the book. The aforementioned lists all contain books which abound with emotions and feelings, which make them classics.