Hello readers and welcome to our Weekly FAQ thread! Our topic this week is: Which contemporary novels do you think deserve to become classics? We're all familiar with the classics, from The Iliad of Homer to F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. But which contemporary novels, published after 1960, do you think will be remembered as a classic years from now?
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Octavia Butler’s books
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
Hula by Jasmin Iolani Hakes.
The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins. I will stand by this take.
It’s a bit tough to say, but these are the novels that probably will, in 100 years time, be seen as the classics of our time (1990 to present)-
Infinite Jest- David Foster Wallace
The Road- Cormac McCarthy
The Corrections- Jonathan Franzen
Underworld- Don DeLillo
2666- Roberto Bolaño
The Neopolitan Quartet by Elena Ferrante.
The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai
Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
Ursula K. Le Guin’s novels, especially The Dispossessed
His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
Octavia Butler’s works, especially Kindred
I think David Sedaris’s books deserve classic status, but most likely they’ll remain somewhat on the fringe
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A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth!
The Neverending Story by Michael Ende
Such Times by Christopher Coe!
Gilead, Marilynne Robinson
Stoner, John Williams
Last Night at the Lobster, Stewart O’Nan
When I think about a “classic”, I think about a novel that will resonate with all of humanity, and shows us things about ourselves that we may not see or be able to articulate. I just finished “Lonesome Dove” and that is my vote here. I am confident people will be reading this 100 years from now.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
From recent dead:
2666 – Bolano
Experience – Martin Amis
Light Years – Salter
Austerlitz – Sebald
The Crossing, Blood Meridian, sutree- Cormac McCarthy
Rabbit at Rest – Updike
Beloved, Song of Solomon – Morrison
Augie March, Humbolt’s Gift – Bellow
The Counter Life – Roth
The Collected Stories – Munro
Infinite Jest – Foster Wallace
New York Trilogy – Auster
Sea of Fertility – Mishima
A Perfect Spy, Tinker Tailor – LeCarre
Among the living:
Underworld- DeLillo
Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell
Remains of the Day, The Unconsoled – Ishiguro
The Sea, The Shroud – Banville
Atonement- McEwan
My Struggle – Knausgaard
The Overstory, The Gold Bug Variations – Powers
Wind Up Bird Chronicle – Murakami
A Suitable Boy – Seth
Narrow Road to the Deep North – Flannagan
Outline – Cusk
Checkout 19 – Bennett
The Flamethrowers, Creation Lake – Kushner
The Black Book – Pamuk
Midnight’s Children – Rushdie
Gilead – Robinson
The Neapolitan Novels – Ferrante
The remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro, 1989
The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver, 1998
Tender is the flesh is the best contemporary dystopian I have ever read!!!!
Sometimes a Great Notion – Ken Kesey
Blood Meridian – Cormac McCarthy
The Godfather – Mario Puzo
Setting the bar at 1960 (65 years ago) makes this too easy. For example, Lonesome Dove, Shogun, and The Godfather all qualify easily IMO.
All the Light We Cannot See – Anthony Doerr
Watership Down, published 1972. By focusing on animals as the main characters, the heavier themes, such as authoritarian government, can be discussed in ways that feel *slightly* less bleak than if the characters were human.
The Sparrow – Russell
The Poisonwood Bible – Kingsolver
We, The Drowned – Jensen
The Shipping News – Proulx
Homegoing – Gyasi
Night Watch by Terry Pratchett
Good Omens by Terry Pratchett et al.
The Time of Our Singing by Richard Powers
11/23/63 by Stephen King
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams
The Deed of Paksennarion by Elizabeth Moon
Dune by Frank Herbert
The Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean Auel
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein
The Gods Themselves by Isaac Asimov
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Watership Down by Richard Adams
The Cider House Rules by John Irving
The Neverending Story by Michael Ende
Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
The Last Unicorn by Peter Beagle
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins
Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah by Richard Bach
The River Why by David James Duncan
Widdershins by Charles de Lint
The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
The Accidental Tourist by Ann Tyler
Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel
The Princess ~~Brine~~ Bride by William Goldman
Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
The Riddle Master trilogy by Patricia McKillip
Zen and the Art of ~~Motorpickle~~ Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
Darkmage by Barbara Hambly
(This is a list in progress, based on books I’ve read which qualify, and whose authors haven’t (so far) had non book related newsworthiness. My Storybook read list is different (link in profile))
– The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
– A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
– The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
– Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
– Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
– Atonement by Ian McEwan
– Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
– I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman
– Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart
– Stoner by John Williams
good question, have something to think about now.
I who have never known men
I think *Harry Potter* kinda already is, love Rowling or not. The popular thing does not necessarily need to become a classic but it is kinda already a staple and I don’t see that changing any time soon. Like is that kind of soft middle-gradeish fantasy a bit silly compared to *serious* works? Yes. But Dracula and Frankenstein were a bit melodramatic and silly too and they’re definitely classics. Also I still to this day haven’t really seen another series do the thing where the prose and complexity of the story change as the main character (and the audience at the time) ages. That’s neat.
Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMultry
Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys
Atonement by Ian McEwan
On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
Prophet Song by Paul Lynch
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
Blonde by Joyce Carol Oates
Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
The Lesser Bohemians by Eimear McBride
Nights at the Circus by Angela Carter
Swamplandia! by Karen Russell
The King Must Die by Mary Renault
The God of Small things by Arundhati Roy
The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber
Ahab’s Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund
Two-Step Devil by Jamie Quatro
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
The quantity theory of reality by Will Self
My dark vanessa
the road by Cormac McCarthy.
It’s super bleak but also strangely beautiful, hitting hard on a human level, about love, survival, and morality, in a way that stays with you long after you finish it. The way it makes you feel every choice and every moment just lingers.
Half-Drawn Boy by Suki Fleet
Rainbow in the Dark by Sean McGinty
The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak
Mon vrai nom est Élisabeth, de Adèle Yon, une lecture incroyable et nécessaire