I Like Big Books And I Cannot Lie
October 21, 2015 11:22 AM Subscribe
I don't know how I feel about the inclusion of series in this list. I think it's cheating, especially for Dune, where the first is a perfectly good and complete book in and of itself. I have never even read past halfway through Children of Dune, nor do I have any real plans to.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 11:31 AM on October 21, 2015 [7 favorites]
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 11:31 AM on October 21, 2015 [7 favorites]
Oh, this is a list of long books/arcs that are also good or at least interesting.
I was hoping the 3992 page "Mission Earth" would be listed so I could complain about what a homophobic, anti-intellectual pile of garbage it is.
posted by seraphine at 11:33 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I was hoping the 3992 page "Mission Earth" would be listed so I could complain about what a homophobic, anti-intellectual pile of garbage it is.
posted by seraphine at 11:33 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I have never even read past halfway through Children of Dune, nor do I have any real plans to.
You are very wise. That is a summer I will never get back.
I do love big books. I'm surprised Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell wasn't on that list.
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:34 AM on October 21, 2015 [7 favorites]
You are very wise. That is a summer I will never get back.
I do love big books. I'm surprised Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell wasn't on that list.
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:34 AM on October 21, 2015 [7 favorites]
He left out Against the Day, so I am Against This List.
posted by crazylegs at 11:35 AM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by crazylegs at 11:35 AM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
The article cheats a bit with all the trilogies and whatnot being classed as "big books." (Barker's Regeneration trilogy is really some very not-big books--in fact, Barker is notable for writing relatively short novels.) Also, Pamela but not Clarissa? Pamela is "I can assign this to students without taking up most of the semester" big, whereas Clarissa is "this needs its own course" big.
The Vikram Chandra novel is great though, and I applaud anyone who recommends reading Middlemarch. As a Victorianist, I can't help but think this list could use some more 19th-century fiction in general (c'mon, high Victorian lit is triple-deckers all the way down!).
posted by thomas j wise at 11:35 AM on October 21, 2015 [6 favorites]
The Vikram Chandra novel is great though, and I applaud anyone who recommends reading Middlemarch. As a Victorianist, I can't help but think this list could use some more 19th-century fiction in general (c'mon, high Victorian lit is triple-deckers all the way down!).
posted by thomas j wise at 11:35 AM on October 21, 2015 [6 favorites]
I guess...Pillars Of The Earth is the longest single book I've ever read, then (at the age of like 13 or thereabouts, I have no idea what made me pick it up)? Unless you count LotR as one book, which was the edition I owned as a kid. Anyway, it's pretty rare that I'll even attempt to read anything over 500 pages these days. Life is short, I can't think of many books that long that I felt justified their length.
The last two I even attempted to tackle were The Way The Crow Flies, which my wife assured me really only got going after the first few hundred pages, and 2666, which I guess I was sort of into but after much effort I realized I was only like a quarter of the way through and gave up.
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:36 AM on October 21, 2015
The last two I even attempted to tackle were The Way The Crow Flies, which my wife assured me really only got going after the first few hundred pages, and 2666, which I guess I was sort of into but after much effort I realized I was only like a quarter of the way through and gave up.
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:36 AM on October 21, 2015
Yeah, the series thing makes the list kind of muddy.
I think I'm good to maybe 900 pages? After that I just get exhausted. The internet tells me that Dhalgren is about 830 and that felt like the longest size that I could wrap my head around, at least for a single intellectually challenging novel. And very few novels are "tight" past this length. After a certain point I can assume you are just rambling.
(Also no Proust, WTF?)
posted by selfnoise at 11:36 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I think I'm good to maybe 900 pages? After that I just get exhausted. The internet tells me that Dhalgren is about 830 and that felt like the longest size that I could wrap my head around, at least for a single intellectually challenging novel. And very few novels are "tight" past this length. After a certain point I can assume you are just rambling.
(Also no Proust, WTF?)
posted by selfnoise at 11:36 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
No non-fiction? Bah! I like my books big AND crammed with footnotes.
posted by orrnyereg at 11:37 AM on October 21, 2015
posted by orrnyereg at 11:37 AM on October 21, 2015
Yeah, this list seemed kind of chosen-at-random to me. Lots of books are as long as Pamela. I mean, ffs, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix clocks in at 766 pages.
posted by town of cats at 11:38 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by town of cats at 11:38 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Oh and also, no Tales of Genji? The world's first novel was not messing around. 1216 pages in the Penguin edition.
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:38 AM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:38 AM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
If we're including non-fiction I would say Black Lamb and Grey Falcon is the book I would love to read but never, ever will.
posted by selfnoise at 11:38 AM on October 21, 2015
posted by selfnoise at 11:38 AM on October 21, 2015
I'm kind of surprised Atlas Shrugged isn't on the list. So many people think they're smart for slogging through that thing.
One of my favorite underrated long books is ...And the Ladies of the Club. It's so good I was sad when it was over, even after more than 1100 pages. I love those ladies.
posted by something something at 11:40 AM on October 21, 2015
One of my favorite underrated long books is ...And the Ladies of the Club. It's so good I was sad when it was over, even after more than 1100 pages. I love those ladies.
posted by something something at 11:40 AM on October 21, 2015
It's a very randomy list. Even if I accept whatever criteria was used on faith, why use Stephenson's 1,152 page Cryptonomicon when his 2,671 page Baroque Cycle is sitting right there beside it on the bookshelf. I mean, if Song of Ice and Fire counts...
Anyway, I scored 8 on this test. Is that enough? May I stay on Metafilter?
posted by rokusan at 11:42 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Anyway, I scored 8 on this test. Is that enough? May I stay on Metafilter?
posted by rokusan at 11:42 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Oh hey if we're including a series, all, ALL science fiction fans should totally read the Marq'ssan Cycle. You will be glad you did, especially after DuChamp's writing evens out in volumes two and beyond.
But including multi-book works is a silly idea. Honestly, that probably means that Robert Aspirin's really rather dubious Myth books should be on this list, all twelve of them.
posted by Frowner at 11:43 AM on October 21, 2015
But including multi-book works is a silly idea. Honestly, that probably means that Robert Aspirin's really rather dubious Myth books should be on this list, all twelve of them.
posted by Frowner at 11:43 AM on October 21, 2015
So many people think they're smart for slogging through [Atlas Shrugged]... -- something something
Well, to their credit, many people are 14 years old and certain that they are much smarter than everyone else.
posted by rokusan at 11:44 AM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
Well, to their credit, many people are 14 years old and certain that they are much smarter than everyone else.
posted by rokusan at 11:44 AM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
Personally, I was very surprised not to see A Suitable Boy on the list. But I enjoyed the list, despite its obvious imperfections. And Middlemarch is a favorite, as is Sacred Games, for different reasons but ultimately, really, for the same reasons having to do with writing about the universality of people and their emotions, which is actually why I'm enjoying the hell out of City of Fire.
posted by janey47 at 11:44 AM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by janey47 at 11:44 AM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
Non-fiction is a bit of a different beast...I read a lot of NF, and I quite often wind up thinking "This is interesting, but I'm not sure it's 600 pages interesting."
There are also a lot of regular-length (say, 200-400 pages) NF books that would have made for perfectly good long-form magazine pieces (and that's how some of them start out), but have to be stretched and padded out in order to achieve book length.
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:45 AM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
There are also a lot of regular-length (say, 200-400 pages) NF books that would have made for perfectly good long-form magazine pieces (and that's how some of them start out), but have to be stretched and padded out in order to achieve book length.
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:45 AM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
Dammit, I forgot that I've read Atlas Shrugged. I was happier that way. I guess that's probably the longest book I've read, although I skipped past the speech, which is like...what, ten percent of the whole thing?
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:49 AM on October 21, 2015
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:49 AM on October 21, 2015
I'm surprised Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell wasn't on that list.
Indeed. Or Gormenghast. Even alone, the books should qualify.
posted by bonehead at 11:49 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Indeed. Or Gormenghast. Even alone, the books should qualify.
posted by bonehead at 11:49 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
L'Astrée: 5399 pages, yo.
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 11:51 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 11:51 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Seconding both A Suitable Boy which is the 'anyone can write a 1000+ page book about a multi-generational saga but only a really talented author can write a 1000+ single year saga' book.
posted by hydrobatidae at 11:51 AM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by hydrobatidae at 11:51 AM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
Oh, I was just looking at City on Fire yesterday in a bookstore and wondered where I'd recently heard of it ... but I guess its generally the book that everyone is talking about.
I recently read The Luminaries and the only knock I had against it was its length, which felt like it was forced as a gimmick. Could have ended about 200 pages sooner.
Cryptonomicon, Against the Day, It, Infinite Jest, House of Leaves - that'd be my top-of-the-head top 5.
posted by mannequito at 11:53 AM on October 21, 2015
I recently read The Luminaries and the only knock I had against it was its length, which felt like it was forced as a gimmick. Could have ended about 200 pages sooner.
Cryptonomicon, Against the Day, It, Infinite Jest, House of Leaves - that'd be my top-of-the-head top 5.
posted by mannequito at 11:53 AM on October 21, 2015
Including any series without including The Lord of the Rings is inexcusable, seeing as how it was written as a single book in the first place.
posted by Etrigan at 11:55 AM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by Etrigan at 11:55 AM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
Or if you want real crap and count series, L. Ron Hubbard's 10-volume Mission Earth: 3992 pages, apparently.
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 11:56 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 11:56 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Sometime in the mid-80's, I was riding the bus and reading Gordon R. Dickson's Final Encyclopedia (which back then came out as a single small-print 700-page paperback), and the lady next to me commented on the size of the book and the tinyness of the print. I replied, "Yeah, but you're reading [1,176-page] ...And Ladies of the Club!" "Oh yeah." Hers was a hardbound, so the heft wasn't surprising, but my paperback was noticeably very thick.
posted by bentley at 12:00 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by bentley at 12:00 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
They include the entire Song of Ice and Fire, but not the entire Harry Potter? Why have just Pillars of the Earth and not include its sequel World Without End? Why not Asimov's Foundation series, or all the books in Niven's Known Space, or the Honor Harrington series, or Warrior Cats or Dragonriders of Pern or any of the countless other series that look really big if you take them as a whole?
What I'm saying is I demand literary rigor from my blog posts.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 12:02 PM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
What I'm saying is I demand literary rigor from my blog posts.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 12:02 PM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
Also, Pamela but not Clarissa? Pamela is "I can assign this to students without taking up most of the semester" big, whereas Clarissa is "this needs its own course" big.
I came here to make this very comment.
The prof in the course where we tackled Clarissa had the decency to only assign certain page ranges/letters between certain characters so we didn't have to do the whole thing. But the syllabus for that course had six other novels on it, so there was no way it would have worked otherwise in a single semester.
Then there was that semester I had a Chaucer course and a Shakespeare course scheduled back to back. This meant lugging the Riverside Chaucer (5.2 pounds) and the Riverside Shakespeare (also 5.2 pounds) around at the same time. More crossfit than scholarship.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 12:03 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
I came here to make this very comment.
The prof in the course where we tackled Clarissa had the decency to only assign certain page ranges/letters between certain characters so we didn't have to do the whole thing. But the syllabus for that course had six other novels on it, so there was no way it would have worked otherwise in a single semester.
Then there was that semester I had a Chaucer course and a Shakespeare course scheduled back to back. This meant lugging the Riverside Chaucer (5.2 pounds) and the Riverside Shakespeare (also 5.2 pounds) around at the same time. More crossfit than scholarship.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 12:03 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
Leon Uris's Trinity would be a good addition. 890 pages in the Bantam paperback.
Winds of War/War and Remembrance by Herman Wouk would be another since it's really more one book broken in two volumes and almost 2,000 pages.
posted by Jahaza at 12:03 PM on October 21, 2015
Winds of War/War and Remembrance by Herman Wouk would be another since it's really more one book broken in two volumes and almost 2,000 pages.
posted by Jahaza at 12:03 PM on October 21, 2015
I'm also against this list. In addition to the missing Proust, where's A Dance to the Music of Time, or The Man Without Qualities, or hell, even Atlas Shrugged warrants a mention in the book-size contest.
posted by dis_integration at 12:04 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by dis_integration at 12:04 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
No Trollope?
posted by Jahaza at 12:05 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Jahaza at 12:05 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Well, then there's the Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series, which really is one vast story arc across 20 books, from Master and Commander to Blue at the Mizzen, with all that the latter entails, and which clocks in at 6980 pages, numbered as such in the omnibus edition. Imagine turning to page 4,273!
posted by stargell at 12:06 PM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by stargell at 12:06 PM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
Stephenson's Cryptonomicon and not his Baroque Cycle? No Pynchon? No Dhalgren? No In Search of Lost Time? No Tolstoy? List compiler fail.
posted by aught at 12:06 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by aught at 12:06 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
And really, no War and Peace? The ultimate long book.
posted by stargell at 12:06 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by stargell at 12:06 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
Is there any "series" longer than Balzac's Comédie humaine?
posted by Jahaza at 12:07 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by Jahaza at 12:07 PM on October 21, 2015
The list seems really arbitrary.
posted by vunder at 12:07 PM on October 21, 2015 [5 favorites]
posted by vunder at 12:07 PM on October 21, 2015 [5 favorites]
Ouch, wait; I just noticed the author of the article is a high school classmate. I will contact her directly about the deficiencies... ;-)
posted by aught at 12:07 PM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
posted by aught at 12:07 PM on October 21, 2015 [4 favorites]
And really, no War and Peace? The ultimate long book.
Agreed! Or Moby Dick. Or Anna Karenina.
posted by vunder at 12:12 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Agreed! Or Moby Dick. Or Anna Karenina.
posted by vunder at 12:12 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Emphasize how angry we are
And send her a gift account.
BIAB, making popcorn.
posted by Jahaza at 12:12 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
And send her a gift account.
BIAB, making popcorn.
posted by Jahaza at 12:12 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I'll bet she's already on metafilter and is cowering in fear in the face of the angry mob of readers who DEMAND that their long book favorites be named.
posted by janey47 at 12:14 PM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by janey47 at 12:14 PM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
Emphasize how angry we are...
Yeah, it's an outrage. (Counting a series of books as a 'book' is a pretty bad idea.)
And if she wants to have a Vikram on her list, it should indeed be Seth’s A Suitable Boy. 1,349 pages (1,488 for the paperback), and excellent to boot.
posted by LeLiLo at 12:24 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Yeah, it's an outrage. (Counting a series of books as a 'book' is a pretty bad idea.)
And if she wants to have a Vikram on her list, it should indeed be Seth’s A Suitable Boy. 1,349 pages (1,488 for the paperback), and excellent to boot.
posted by LeLiLo at 12:24 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Yeah, WTF no Proust. I spent 5 years working through it, and don't get nearly enough chances to let others know it. It was worth it though. Totally worth it.
posted by hwestiii at 12:28 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by hwestiii at 12:28 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
I'm pretty sure I told this story before, but when I was about 8 I used the 30$ spending money my parents gave me for a vacation and purchased Don Quixote. Mostly because I was a phony and a narcissist and wanted to impress the bookseller, who looked somewhat intellectual (in retrospect, he was probably just a dude working at a bookstore).
I knew about the story, and it sounded interesting (I heard a excerpt of it being read on the CBC).
So I started reading it and boy was it boring, so I put it away and went back to Archie comics. And every couple of years, I'd find the book, start to re-read it, get bored and file it away.
30 years later, the cycle repeated itself, but this time I paid more attention to what I was reading, and realized I was reading the authors notes on the translation, and the actual story started about 40 pages forward.
Finally, I started to read the book and it was quite entertaining, but this time, life got in the way and I had to shift my reading priorities to other books.
I'll get through that damn book eventually
posted by bitteroldman at 12:29 PM on October 21, 2015 [5 favorites]
I knew about the story, and it sounded interesting (I heard a excerpt of it being read on the CBC).
So I started reading it and boy was it boring, so I put it away and went back to Archie comics. And every couple of years, I'd find the book, start to re-read it, get bored and file it away.
30 years later, the cycle repeated itself, but this time I paid more attention to what I was reading, and realized I was reading the authors notes on the translation, and the actual story started about 40 pages forward.
Finally, I started to read the book and it was quite entertaining, but this time, life got in the way and I had to shift my reading priorities to other books.
I'll get through that damn book eventually
posted by bitteroldman at 12:29 PM on October 21, 2015 [5 favorites]
Helmut Newton's SUMO Measuring 50 x 70 cm and weighing approx. 30 kg Includes a bookholder designed by Philippe Starck. US$ 18,000
posted by Lanark at 12:30 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Lanark at 12:30 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Stephenson's Cryptonomicon and not his Baroque Cycle?
I abandoned all 4 of these books in the traditional "free to good homes" book place in my building and it's been like 3 months and they are still untouched under a fine layer of dust. It is entirely possible that this is because no one can lift the entire trilogy at once.
posted by poffin boffin at 12:43 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I abandoned all 4 of these books in the traditional "free to good homes" book place in my building and it's been like 3 months and they are still untouched under a fine layer of dust. It is entirely possible that this is because no one can lift the entire trilogy at once.
posted by poffin boffin at 12:43 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Sigrid Undset is very readable. And the volumes are thick enough to repel bunker busters.
posted by Public Corruption? at 12:49 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by Public Corruption? at 12:49 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
puffin boffin, I'm with you on the Baroque Cycle, and this despite the fact that I LOVE Cryptonomicon and read it fairly regularly, like once every 2 or 3 years.
posted by janey47 at 12:49 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by janey47 at 12:49 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I used the 30$ spending money my parents gave me for a vacation and purchased Don Quixote...
I'll get through that damn book eventually.
Keep tilting at those windmills, bitteroldman!
posted by Atom Eyes at 12:54 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I'll get through that damn book eventually.
Keep tilting at those windmills, bitteroldman!
posted by Atom Eyes at 12:54 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Any other Far Pavilions fans out there? I read it 5 or 6 times between ages 15 and 19, although I always had problems getting through the last section with all the war fighting. In 12th grade world history, I had to write a paper based on an event from a historical novel, and I chose the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 because I had read about it in that book.
I keep meaning to track down a copy and read it again to see if it holds up.
posted by matildaben at 12:58 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
I keep meaning to track down a copy and read it again to see if it holds up.
posted by matildaben at 12:58 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
If you like your humor very dark, The Patrick Melrose Novels.
posted by Combustible Edison Lighthouse at 1:22 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by Combustible Edison Lighthouse at 1:22 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
No Gaddis!? Come on, wtf!
DeLillo's Underworld is also missing.
posted by chavenet at 1:25 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
DeLillo's Underworld is also missing.
posted by chavenet at 1:25 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
No Sarum? 1200 pages covering England from prehistory until 1985 and I challenge anyone to read the whole thing. I've gotten halfway through twice.
Blackout/All Clear was published as two books, but is really just a single two volume book and also weighs in at nearly 1200 pages. Marginally more readable than Sarum though!
posted by BungaDunga at 1:40 PM on October 21, 2015
Blackout/All Clear was published as two books, but is really just a single two volume book and also weighs in at nearly 1200 pages. Marginally more readable than Sarum though!
posted by BungaDunga at 1:40 PM on October 21, 2015
I thought The Luminaries was excruciating. I got what she was doing with the moon phases and all, but ugggggggh it was dull most of the time. (mannequito: "which felt like it was forced as a gimmick. Could have ended about 200 pages sooner." -- exactly.)
I've read a LOT of these. Not Dune, though. Also, TOTALLY MISSING THE FORSYTE SAGA. If you're gonna read for length + entertainment value, it's the Forsytes.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 1:42 PM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
I've read a LOT of these. Not Dune, though. Also, TOTALLY MISSING THE FORSYTE SAGA. If you're gonna read for length + entertainment value, it's the Forsytes.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 1:42 PM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
BungaDunga: "No Sarum? 1200 pages covering England from prehistory until 1985 and I challenge anyone to read the whole thing"
Hahaha, I enjoyed the SHIT out of that so much I devoured it in under a week in high school. I still remember a bunch of the subplots. I was in kind-of a Michener doorstop phase (The Source, Hawaii) and I think after the library ran out of Micheners, the librarian directed me to Rutherford's Sarum. Rutherford's "London" came out right before I studied abroad in London, so I read it as part of my summer-of-London-related-reading festival.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 1:46 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
Hahaha, I enjoyed the SHIT out of that so much I devoured it in under a week in high school. I still remember a bunch of the subplots. I was in kind-of a Michener doorstop phase (The Source, Hawaii) and I think after the library ran out of Micheners, the librarian directed me to Rutherford's Sarum. Rutherford's "London" came out right before I studied abroad in London, so I read it as part of my summer-of-London-related-reading festival.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 1:46 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
30 years later, the cycle repeated itself, but this time I paid more attention to what I was reading, and realized I was reading the authors notes on the translation, and the actual story started about 40 pages forward.
This gave me flashbacks to plodding through "The Custom House" essay which has shit-all to do with the awesome Scarlet Letter, at the front of which it is always published. Because reasons.
posted by Celsius1414 at 1:48 PM on October 21, 2015
This gave me flashbacks to plodding through "The Custom House" essay which has shit-all to do with the awesome Scarlet Letter, at the front of which it is always published. Because reasons.
posted by Celsius1414 at 1:48 PM on October 21, 2015
I guess we should also point out Tom Wolfe's A Man in Full and Bonfire of the Vanities, even though they're only around 700 pages each.
Also my favorite Mailer -- Harlot's Ghost which is around 1200 pages, and then that reminds me of Laura Warholic, by Alexander Theroux, around 900 pages, which I guess answers my question about Wolfe's contributions. TOO SHORT, WOLFE.
posted by janey47 at 1:50 PM on October 21, 2015
Also my favorite Mailer -- Harlot's Ghost which is around 1200 pages, and then that reminds me of Laura Warholic, by Alexander Theroux, around 900 pages, which I guess answers my question about Wolfe's contributions. TOO SHORT, WOLFE.
posted by janey47 at 1:50 PM on October 21, 2015
There's also that other Thomas Wolfe whose books are long and entertaining.
posted by chavenet at 2:02 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by chavenet at 2:02 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
stargell: "Well, then there's the Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series, which really is one vast story arc across 20 books, from Master and Commander to Blue at the Mizzen, with all that the latter entails, and which clocks in at 6980 pages, numbered as such in the omnibus edition. Imagine turning to page 4,273!"
Keith Richards is a fan.
posted by chavenet at 2:06 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Keith Richards is a fan.
posted by chavenet at 2:06 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I'm surprised 1q84 wasn't on that. It clocks in at 928, though I guess it was technically published in japan as three volumes, though it's clearly one book and was released as such for the west.
posted by Ferreous at 2:14 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by Ferreous at 2:14 PM on October 21, 2015
Really, Middlemarch? Love the book, but wow not so long. And where's Ada?
posted by trip and a half at 3:27 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by trip and a half at 3:27 PM on October 21, 2015
I read the first four books of Dune, the books so far of A Song of Ice and Fire, Les Misérables, Cryptonomicon, and I gave up on Infinite Jest. Of those, Les Misérables was the most satisfying. Epic fantasy and science fiction just don't have the same impact. Hugo's lengthy discourses on things like the battlefield at Waterloo and the sewers of Paris are pretty unique, and more accessible than the asides on architecture in Notre-Dame de Paris. I liked Cryptonomicon quite a bit, mostly for the WWII parts. I've also read a chunk of Swann's Way but Proust is challenging.
I'd like to read Don Quijote in Spanish, simply because that seems like a life achievement in itself.
posted by graymouser at 3:55 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I'd like to read Don Quijote in Spanish, simply because that seems like a life achievement in itself.
posted by graymouser at 3:55 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
DeLillo's Underworld is also missing.
Underworld isn't the first book I wanted to throw at a wall, but it is the first one that would've caused considerable structural damage, probably to load-bearing parts.
posted by chimaera at 4:10 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Underworld isn't the first book I wanted to throw at a wall, but it is the first one that would've caused considerable structural damage, probably to load-bearing parts.
posted by chimaera at 4:10 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
graymouser: "I'd like to read Don Quijote in Spanish, simply because that seems like a life achievement in itself."
This is the goal I've set for myself in improving my Spanish language skills -- since on the kindle you can click on words you don't know and the translation will pop up, I'm stumbling my way slowly through children's fairy tales and hoping to move up to young adult Spanish-language fiction sometime next year, and then I've got a couple trashy romance novels. Don Quixote in Spanish is sitting there on my kindle, waiting for me to get brave enough!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 4:32 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
This is the goal I've set for myself in improving my Spanish language skills -- since on the kindle you can click on words you don't know and the translation will pop up, I'm stumbling my way slowly through children's fairy tales and hoping to move up to young adult Spanish-language fiction sometime next year, and then I've got a couple trashy romance novels. Don Quixote in Spanish is sitting there on my kindle, waiting for me to get brave enough!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 4:32 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
Not to deprecate Don Quixote, but I gave up on it a few years ago after having its virtues touted to me by a friend who loved it, because as far as I could see, it was the same three or four pages repeated over and over and over. The subtleties were lost on me, I fear.
posted by janey47 at 4:46 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by janey47 at 4:46 PM on October 21, 2015
I'm surprised they left off Neal Stephenson's latest Seveneves. That is pretty much three books in one tome. But I guess 861 pages isn't all that impressive.
posted by MarvinTheCat at 4:57 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by MarvinTheCat at 4:57 PM on October 21, 2015
In non-fiction, I have the original 7-volume edition of Rising Up and Rising Down by William Vollmann. 3350 pages, about twenty pounds. Bought it ten years ago and I still haven't made it to the end.
posted by JohnFromGR at 5:34 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
posted by JohnFromGR at 5:34 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
If you add the rest of the Baroque Cycle to Cryptonomicon, you get a bigger stack.
posted by Chuffy at 5:42 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by Chuffy at 5:42 PM on October 21, 2015
And this is why I love ereaders- you can carry around all the books on this list and not throw your back out!
posted by Lucinda at 6:14 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by Lucinda at 6:14 PM on October 21, 2015
This is like a list of feverish reading experiences that I later regretted. Clan of the Cave Bear and Atlas Shrugged are in contention for the worst books I ever read ragged. Not that there isn't merit on the list.
posted by Bistle at 6:41 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by Bistle at 6:41 PM on October 21, 2015
Now for some obscurity... Philip Freund - The Volcano God. 1000 pages. It's a single volume but really a set of linked novels about a bunch of intellectuals in London during the blitz. I kept noticing it at the library given its size - 8 by 6 by 4. I finally checked it out and got hooked. Freund was better known for his book on creation myths and his amazing series on the history of theater. This book is an obscure treasure. Well worth tracking down.
Then the best. All twelve volumes of Casanova's memoirs. A good 10 inches of shelf space. He was so much more than the libertine we think of. His memoirs are an insanely addictive read. It's the most personal thing I have ever read. You feel as though he is a friend sharing his stories with you. He has his bad points and he's honest about it. If you want a truly rollicking ride through the 1700's all over Europe this is the thing to read.
posted by njohnson23 at 6:44 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Then the best. All twelve volumes of Casanova's memoirs. A good 10 inches of shelf space. He was so much more than the libertine we think of. His memoirs are an insanely addictive read. It's the most personal thing I have ever read. You feel as though he is a friend sharing his stories with you. He has his bad points and he's honest about it. If you want a truly rollicking ride through the 1700's all over Europe this is the thing to read.
posted by njohnson23 at 6:44 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I like long books and have read many of the books on the list. As such, I feel qualified to say that this is a really weirdly truncated list and leaves off way more than it includes. Did the author just do a basic google search for "long books" and include the authors they recognized?
Vollman (already mentioned) should be right at the top of a list like this, with a whole set of authors such as Pynchon and le Carre following. Marlon James' A History of Seven Killings is almost as long as The Goldfinch and deserves at least honorary mention. Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago trilogy is heavy going but interesting; Uris's Exodus and the other connected books is not heavy going but for a good decade seemed inescapable in used book bins and hostel bookshelves. Mahfouz's trilogy is 1368 pages when published in one volume. And where is Bolaño?
posted by Dip Flash at 7:31 PM on October 21, 2015
Vollman (already mentioned) should be right at the top of a list like this, with a whole set of authors such as Pynchon and le Carre following. Marlon James' A History of Seven Killings is almost as long as The Goldfinch and deserves at least honorary mention. Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago trilogy is heavy going but interesting; Uris's Exodus and the other connected books is not heavy going but for a good decade seemed inescapable in used book bins and hostel bookshelves. Mahfouz's trilogy is 1368 pages when published in one volume. And where is Bolaño?
posted by Dip Flash at 7:31 PM on October 21, 2015
Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago trilogy is heavy going but interesting
But it's non-fiction. For long Solzhenitsyn fiction you'd have to go with his Red Wheel cycle. Four books in eight volumes, I believe. Still not yet completely translated into English, but progress is being made.
posted by Jahaza at 8:10 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
But it's non-fiction. For long Solzhenitsyn fiction you'd have to go with his Red Wheel cycle. Four books in eight volumes, I believe. Still not yet completely translated into English, but progress is being made.
posted by Jahaza at 8:10 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I can't say I like or dislike books of any given size, but I did measure The Executioner's Song with a ruler. About a three-incher, that one.
posted by scratch at 8:30 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by scratch at 8:30 PM on October 21, 2015
Our Mutual Friend should be in there. It's the book that single-handedly killed my fascination with Dickens. I can reread the absurdly long Les Miserables every few years and enjoy all zillion pages, but OMF is an unreadable critical darling of all the people who ceaselessly recommend dense interminable tomes as some sort of hazing ritual to conspicuous literacy, so it surprises me that any list trotting out the to-be-expected DFW doesn't also ring that bell.
For me, textual gigantism is usually a clear indicator of an author without the ability or desire to edit, and it's interesting to me how many of my favorite books are in the two hundred page arena, and yet yield new images and concepts to me with every rereading. People love to trumpet Dune as a masterwork of worldbuilding, but The Ophuichi Hotline does far more in a third of the space.
posted by sonascope at 8:41 PM on October 21, 2015
For me, textual gigantism is usually a clear indicator of an author without the ability or desire to edit, and it's interesting to me how many of my favorite books are in the two hundred page arena, and yet yield new images and concepts to me with every rereading. People love to trumpet Dune as a masterwork of worldbuilding, but The Ophuichi Hotline does far more in a third of the space.
posted by sonascope at 8:41 PM on October 21, 2015
Did the author just do a basic google search for "long books" and include the authors they recognized?
It looks like a simple curated list:unacceptable understandable.
posted by brianrobot at 8:44 PM on October 21, 2015
It looks like a simple curated list:
I’ve tried to find a balance of male and female authors, literary and genre novels, modern and vintage releases, and I can actually say that I’ve read all of the books on this list.Now, the inclusion of series is, as noted by pretty much everybody above, an odd choice. (You know what's a really long movie? Star Wars.) But the exclusion of Garth Marenghi's The Oeuvre is
posted by brianrobot at 8:44 PM on October 21, 2015
seraphine: "I was hoping the 3992 page "Mission Earth" would be listed so I could complain about what a homophobic, anti-intellectual pile of garbage it is."
I read the whole thing, and man, I wish I hadn't. There were one or two interesting ideas in the first book, and then Hubbard (or whomever really wrote these) clearly decided the only thing worthwhile was getting down a bunch of words and sending it off to the printers.
Although Villainy Victorious is a pretty perfect pulp-style title.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:54 PM on October 21, 2015
I read the whole thing, and man, I wish I hadn't. There were one or two interesting ideas in the first book, and then Hubbard (or whomever really wrote these) clearly decided the only thing worthwhile was getting down a bunch of words and sending it off to the printers.
Although Villainy Victorious is a pretty perfect pulp-style title.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:54 PM on October 21, 2015
Not a Stephen King fan, I guess. The Stand (uncut), IT, and Under the Dome all clock in at over 1000 pages, and arguably the Dark Tower series is one multivolume work (especially as he revised the first book, The Gunslinger, which was originally published as several short stories published over a few years, to work better with the rest of the saga. The series currently runs at 4,250 pages, not counting various tie-ins from other works.
posted by Halloween Jack at 9:04 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by Halloween Jack at 9:04 PM on October 21, 2015
I'll weigh in with Shogun, it's a swell doorstop! Really, it does exactly what a big book should do, it hooks you in the beginning and just keeps on going until the end...
I haven't read 'Texas', but I've enjoyed several of Michener's other long tomes.
I could never get anywhere into 'Don Quixote', it just seemed awkward and stilted in translation. I have heard that it's hilarious in the original.
In addition to the missing Proust, where's A Dance to the Music of Time, or The Man Without Qualities, or hell, even Atlas Shrugged warrants a mention in the book-size contest.
I would highly recommend A Dance to the Music of Time if you think that you might like a well-written bittersweet comedy/drama about English society through the 20th century.
I slogged up the tall mountain of 'The Man Without Qualities', and when I finished, for my labours I was rewarded with: "The End of Part One..."
Ayn Rand doesn't write novels, she writes technical manuals about the privilege she deserves.
posted by ovvl at 9:04 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
I haven't read 'Texas', but I've enjoyed several of Michener's other long tomes.
I could never get anywhere into 'Don Quixote', it just seemed awkward and stilted in translation. I have heard that it's hilarious in the original.
In addition to the missing Proust, where's A Dance to the Music of Time, or The Man Without Qualities, or hell, even Atlas Shrugged warrants a mention in the book-size contest.
I would highly recommend A Dance to the Music of Time if you think that you might like a well-written bittersweet comedy/drama about English society through the 20th century.
I slogged up the tall mountain of 'The Man Without Qualities', and when I finished, for my labours I was rewarded with: "The End of Part One..."
Ayn Rand doesn't write novels, she writes technical manuals about the privilege she deserves.
posted by ovvl at 9:04 PM on October 21, 2015 [2 favorites]
I'd have to say that "A Suitable Boy" is perhaps my favorite long book of all time. Longer than "Infinite Jest" but it felt so much shorter.
I'd also like to put in a good word for "Quinqunx". Maybe "The Inheritance Trilogy" though I'm not sure series really count (though this is more of a single story). After all, we could add up all the discworld books and get to a pretty hefty pagecount though most are pretty short, and similarly for the Culture books (some of which weigh in at 800+ pages individually).
posted by Death and Gravity at 9:23 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
I'd also like to put in a good word for "Quinqunx". Maybe "The Inheritance Trilogy" though I'm not sure series really count (though this is more of a single story). After all, we could add up all the discworld books and get to a pretty hefty pagecount though most are pretty short, and similarly for the Culture books (some of which weigh in at 800+ pages individually).
posted by Death and Gravity at 9:23 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
To bring up a hobbyhorse of mine, Finnegans Wake. Though only 628 pages, since its last sentence is the first half of the first sentence, you could consider the text to be a circle and thus infinite in length.
posted by njohnson23 at 9:26 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
posted by njohnson23 at 9:26 PM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]
Every page of Finnegans Wake counts for about fifty pages of most fiction if you really read it carefully. Which would make it add up to about 30,000 pages.
posted by Death and Gravity at 9:41 PM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
posted by Death and Gravity at 9:41 PM on October 21, 2015 [3 favorites]
Not quite the same, but I picked up a copy of 40 A Doonesbury Retrospective for $11 on ebay, now I'm wondering how i'm going to read the damn thing. I'm actually thinking I need to buy a bigger desk.
posted by quarsan at 10:02 PM on October 21, 2015
posted by quarsan at 10:02 PM on October 21, 2015
One night, while the kid was scanning the shelves, Amalfitano asked him what books he liked and what book he was reading, just to make conversation. Without turning, the pharmacist answered that he liked books like The Metamorphosis, Bartleby, A Simple Heart, A Christmas Carol. And then he said that he was reading Capote’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Leaving aside the fact that A Simple Heart and A Christmas Carol were stories, not books, there was something revelatory about the taste of this bookish young pharmacist, who in another life might have been Trakl or who in this life might still be writing poems as desperate as those of his distant Austrian counterpart, and who clearly and inarguably preferred minor works to major ones. He chose The Metamorphosis over The Trial, he chose Bartleby over Moby-Dick, he chose A Simple Heart over Bouvard and Pécuchet, and A Christmas Carol over A Tale of Two Cities or The Pickwick Papers. What a sad paradox, thought Amalfitano. Now even bookish pharmacists are afraid to take on the great, imperfect, torrential works, books that blaze paths into the unknown. They choose the perfect exercises of the great masters. Or what amounts to the same thing: they want to watch the great masters spar, but they have no interest in real combat, when the great masters struggle against that something, that something that terrifies us all, that something that cows us and spurs us on, amid blood and mortal wounds and stench.{Roberto Bolaño, 2666}
posted by shakespeherian at 10:03 PM on October 21, 2015 [8 favorites]
JohnFromGR: "In non-fiction, I have the original 7-volume edition of Rising Up and Rising Down by William Vollmann. 3350 pages, about twenty pounds. Bought it ten years ago and I still haven't made it to the end."
I have this too. Haven't even started!
posted by chavenet at 2:34 AM on October 22, 2015 [1 favorite]
I have this too. Haven't even started!
posted by chavenet at 2:34 AM on October 22, 2015 [1 favorite]
Related: Time necessary to read selected bestsellers (in hours)
posted by zakur at 6:49 AM on October 22, 2015
posted by zakur at 6:49 AM on October 22, 2015
And this is why I love ereaders- you can carry around all the books on this list and not throw your back out!
With huge ebooks I throw my *eyes* out instead... if I read intensively on the Kindle for weeks at a time I inevitably have to get my glasses prescription tweaked. (The woes of a 50 something.) This is my justification for spending $60 at the local Friends of the Library book sale last weekend.
Also, can't believe I forgot Vollmann in my earlier comments, and in rebuttal to someone or other upthread, wow, I thought Underworld was simply amazing start to finish.
posted by aught at 6:52 AM on October 22, 2015 [1 favorite]
With huge ebooks I throw my *eyes* out instead... if I read intensively on the Kindle for weeks at a time I inevitably have to get my glasses prescription tweaked. (The woes of a 50 something.) This is my justification for spending $60 at the local Friends of the Library book sale last weekend.
Also, can't believe I forgot Vollmann in my earlier comments, and in rebuttal to someone or other upthread, wow, I thought Underworld was simply amazing start to finish.
posted by aught at 6:52 AM on October 22, 2015 [1 favorite]
I can't decide whether I'm sorry I ever posted this or immensely grateful. How the hell am I going to fit a seven-volume William Vollman into my bookshelves, much less my reading schedule? Nevertheless, thanks to all who mentioned this. It apparently was published during a lull in my book acquisitiveness. Now, of course, I'll have to pay a premium for the set. O woe is me. JohnfromGR, or chavenet, are you in the market to sell?
posted by janey47 at 9:37 AM on October 22, 2015
posted by janey47 at 9:37 AM on October 22, 2015
a bigass Bolaño quotation
hear that, Nazi Literature in the Americas fans
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 9:40 AM on October 22, 2015 [2 favorites]
hear that, Nazi Literature in the Americas fans
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 9:40 AM on October 22, 2015 [2 favorites]
I recommend reading stephenson's baroque cycle first then cryptonomicon...those are the kind of books you stare at when not reading...
posted by judson at 12:27 PM on October 22, 2015
posted by judson at 12:27 PM on October 22, 2015
If series are fair game, why leave out the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books? There are 175 volumes (depending how you count them) of Nancy Drew and 190 (likewise) of The Hardy Boys. Even if each volume is merely 100 pages, that's still a corpus of tens of thousands.
And they can't hold a candle to Perry Rhodan, which at 39 volumes of over 2800 installments (not including spinoffs), has more chapters than most novels have pages.
posted by ardgedee at 3:55 AM on October 23, 2015
And they can't hold a candle to Perry Rhodan, which at 39 volumes of over 2800 installments (not including spinoffs), has more chapters than most novels have pages.
posted by ardgedee at 3:55 AM on October 23, 2015
why leave out the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books?
because they're children's books that aren't very good
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 6:59 AM on October 23, 2015
because they're children's books that aren't very good
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 6:59 AM on October 23, 2015
Very disappointed to see that it was long rather than BIG books.
But no long books list (when series count) could be complete with The Malazan Book of the Fallen.
posted by bouvin at 10:33 AM on October 23, 2015
But no long books list (when series count) could be complete with The Malazan Book of the Fallen.
posted by bouvin at 10:33 AM on October 23, 2015
> because they're children's books that aren't very good
Neither intended readership nor quality were considered prohibitive for the recommendations of the Harry Potter and Mission: Earth series.
I don't take my own suggestion of Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys seriously mostly because they're not series with continuity, they're just a bunch of one-volume episodic stories in a shared universe.
The Perry Rhodan books (and spinoffs), on the other hand, aren't so easily dismissable. They're also pulp literature with myriad authors, but there's much more of an effort at creating a single universe with a standard continuity, and it's possible to make a case that there's some crazy-ass super-long-form storytelling going on. It's got to be one of the outer boundary markers of high-wordcount literature, if you're looking for one.
posted by ardgedee at 5:05 PM on October 23, 2015
Neither intended readership nor quality were considered prohibitive for the recommendations of the Harry Potter and Mission: Earth series.
I don't take my own suggestion of Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys seriously mostly because they're not series with continuity, they're just a bunch of one-volume episodic stories in a shared universe.
The Perry Rhodan books (and spinoffs), on the other hand, aren't so easily dismissable. They're also pulp literature with myriad authors, but there's much more of an effort at creating a single universe with a standard continuity, and it's possible to make a case that there's some crazy-ass super-long-form storytelling going on. It's got to be one of the outer boundary markers of high-wordcount literature, if you're looking for one.
posted by ardgedee at 5:05 PM on October 23, 2015
I don't take my own suggestion of Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys seriously mostly because they're not series with continuity, they're just a bunch of one-volume episodic stories in a shared universe.
They're sort of along the same lines of the midrash-esque Mad Max films.
posted by shakespeherian at 6:13 PM on October 23, 2015
They're sort of along the same lines of the midrash-esque Mad Max films.
posted by shakespeherian at 6:13 PM on October 23, 2015
hear that, Nazi Literature in the Americas fans
I like long books, including 2666, but I love Nazi Literature in the Americas. It is everything good about Bolaño's longer prose, distilled to perfection and minus the "There are simply too many notes" extraneous pieces.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:24 AM on October 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
I like long books, including 2666, but I love Nazi Literature in the Americas. It is everything good about Bolaño's longer prose, distilled to perfection and minus the "There are simply too many notes" extraneous pieces.
posted by Dip Flash at 1:24 AM on October 24, 2015 [1 favorite]
janey47: "I can't decide whether I'm sorry I ever posted this or immensely grateful. How the hell am I going to fit a seven-volume William Vollman into my bookshelves, much less my reading schedule? Nevertheless, thanks to all who mentioned this. It apparently was published during a lull in my book acquisitiveness. Now, of course, I'll have to pay a premium for the set. O woe is me. JohnfromGR, or chavenet, are you in the market to sell?"
Sorry, but no! (It's a beautiful set of books and I do want to read them.)
posted by chavenet at 2:32 PM on October 28, 2015 [1 favorite]
Sorry, but no! (It's a beautiful set of books and I do want to read them.)
posted by chavenet at 2:32 PM on October 28, 2015 [1 favorite]
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posted by Kitteh at 11:29 AM on October 21, 2015