A Contest for Classics Lovers ~ from Penguin

 

For a change of pace here on Layers of Thought – let’s think about classics while asking the question: 

Which are your favorite Classic? ~  Join this poll and perhaps win a prize,  three Penguin classics and a book bag.

Here’s how it all began ~ Last year Penguin compiled a list of the 10 Essential Penguin Classics they thought every person should read.  *Just be careful not to sign up for last years sweepstakes on the above link, like I did.

Penguin thought their list was complete, but now admit they were wrong. Thanks to outstanding, passionate feedback and questions (like where was Don Quixote? War and Peace? On the Road?), now the list is being recreated with readers’ choices.

So help to redefine the Top 10 Essential Penguin Classics. Click here to peruse the long list of 100 and then vote for your top 10 before November 1st. Everyone who votes will be entered for a chance to win ~ one of three tote bags filled with three Penguin Deluxe Classics.

In November they will announce a shortlist of 25 classics, determined entirely by readers’ votes and opinions. Wait there's more - for the true classics die hard fan who would like to be a bit more involved - check for updates regularly on the Top 10 Essential Penguin Classics website and chat about your choices at the Essential Classics Redux community page.

Its a great time to read classic with the weather getting cooler here in the Northern Hemisphere and still cool enough to ponder a classic on the Southern side.

Please note that this contest if only for the US, and am currently working on getting international Penguin updates.

Shellie’s Choices:

Favorites:

1. MY ÁNTONIA by Willa Cather
2. THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck
3. OF MICE AND MEN by John Steinbeck
4. LEAVES OF GRASS by Walt Whitman
5. THE SCARLET LETTER by Nathaniel Hawthorne
6. METAMORPHOSIS AND OTHER STORIES by Franz Kafka
7. FRANKENSTEIN by Mary Shelley
8. WALDEN AND CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE by Henry David Thoreau

Hope to Read:

1. ANNA KARENINA by Leo Tolstoy
2. CANDIDE by François Voltaire
3. EAST OF EDEN by John Steinbeck
4. ON THE ROAD by Jack Kerouac
5. GREAT EXPECTATIONS by Charles Dickens
6. WUTHERING HEIGHTS by Emily Brontë
7. GULLIVER'S TRAVELS by Jonathan Swift
8. JANE EYRE by Charlotte Brontë
9. DON QUIXOTE by Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra

Disliked or Abandoned:

1. THE ODYSSEY by Homer; Robert Fagles (Translator)
2. THE ILIAD by Homer; Robert Fagles (Translator)
3. PRIDE AND PREJUDICE by Jane Austen
4. LITTLE WOMEN by Louisa May Alcott
5. HEART OF DARKNESS AND THE CONGO DIARY by Joseph Conrad
6. THE CANTERBURY TALES by Geoffrey Chaucer

*All above active links go directly to the Penguin page description for the books.

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And just in case I have not overloaded you with enough information here is an interesting related link:

• Check out Marilyn Monroe’s literary classics appearing on her book shelf via Galley Cat.

So dear readers which are your favorite classics? Which did you really dislike or that you were forced to read as a youngster? Which do you really hope to read one day?

Have a great Friday!