10 classic books; 5 enjoyable, 5 not so much

From the 6 foot high pile next to my bed, five classic books I just can’t seem to finish:
1. Moby Dick
2. Don Quixote
I’ve made a run at both of these so many times over the years. I’d like to assign them to my daughter. I’m afraid she’ll call family services on me if I do. Has anyone besides an English professor ever finished these books?
3. The Bible. Even read as literature, I can’t do it. I’ve made it through Genesis, Daniel, Ruth and Matthew. That’s all. Several translations.
4. Herodotus, The Histories. We have the Landmark edition, which weighs a thousand pounds and stops my breathing when placed on my abdomen while lying in bed reading. My daughter “assigned” this book to me. She loved it—calls the guy the ”Ancient Geek”.
5. Sei Shonagon, The Pillow Book. This one begins with a dog story that makes me ralph. It goes on for hundreds of pages that have no point that I can ascertain, about people that make reality tv contestants look smart. Except that they murder each other. I guess it just proves that people can be vile and shallow no matter what century they live in.
And five classics that kept me up all night:
1. Sigrid Undset, Kristin Lavransdatter. Actually, this kept me up for about a week, as it’s a trilogy. I bought the first book on a Friday evening, thinking that I wasn’t sure if I wanted all three. Saturday morning I helped them open the bookstore, and the whole weekend was shot after that. Great medieval saga, heartbreaking and compelling.
2. George Elliott, Middlemarch. This was in the other pile when I was younger, but when I picked it up a couple of years ago, it suddenly had transformed from dull to compelling. Certain books speak to certain ages, and I think you might need to be over 40 to really get this one. A great delineation of older, but sadly wiser, and what we pay for that knowledge.
3. Mark Twain, Joan of Arc. Twain thought this might be his best book. It isn’t, but it’s sweet and believable, and the man sure could tell a story.
4. The Epic of Gilgamesh. Okay, maybe this is cheating because what we have is fragmentary and pretty short. But I found it a touching portrayal of friendship, the quest to find and develop an authentic self, and the despair of confronting mortality.
5. Charlotte Bronte, Wuthering Heights. I just read that this is one of the most hated books assigned to high school students. Is thwarted romance and heartbreaking yearning dead? Do we have no time for vividly evoked place and passion? Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier are probably rolling in their graves.

I do suspect that different books speak to us at different ages and after different life events. For years, I could not get through the Iliad, then forced myself to read it before dear daughter found it on her reading list. Where before it had seemed to me a simple gory catalog, now it seems one of the greatest anti-war works ever written. Who can fail to read about all the painful, individual deaths without mourning the lost lives, the tragedies of someone’s brother, son, father? Who can fail to root for Hector, trapped in a situation not of his making, trying to do the right thing as it destroys his life? Can we not all identify with Achilles, who makes such bad decisions in anger and finds out too late what really means something to him? It didn’t keep me up nights, but it did make for compelling reading.

They’re called classics because they bear up well for a second, a third, a late-in-life reading. Just maybe not all of them. Or maybe I’m not old enough, yet.