"I've never taken to the taste of tears / they always bring up those impossible years"

[larryhammer]

Somehow I managed to get through 44 years on this earth not realizing that Virginia Woolf's Orlando is not only gorgeously written but laugh-out-loud funny. As in funnier than Lolita. Especially how the narrator mocks the main character's Gary-to-Mary-Sue tendencies. While it would be au courant to humorously blame the world and/or the internets for this failing, in this case I needs must cop to being uncultured, or at least insufficiently cultured.

What "classics" surprised you by being funnier or otherwise somehow better than you expected?

---L.

Comments

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

Moby-Dick is hilarious. This confused me, but I am happy about it.

[larryhammer]

It's also a ripping adventure yarn with bonus facts about whales that is absolutely riveting if you're a certain sort of 12-year-old.

---L.

[stevendj.livejournal.com]

A Hard Day's Night. I somehow managed to reach adulthood without realizing that the Beatles were, as Queen Elizabeth put it, the modern-day equivalent of the Marx Brothers.

[larryhammer]

I'd had that movie inflicted on me a couple times during elementary school -- the first time too young to appreciate it. I liked the music, but not much else. This kinda soured me on it till I was a teen.

---L.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I remember my astonishment at discovering that Jane Austen was funny.

[larryhammer]

I confess I reached her young enough to not have expectations. Plus, it was after liking the P&P miniseries in the early 80s.

---L.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I read her young, too, but from a list of "You should read these books if you plan to go to college." Most of them were dreary tales by white males (Tess of the d'Ubervilles--Hardy--Anna Karenina, etc) so was I surprised to find one that I actually enjoyed--even laughed!

[larryhammer]

Ah, yes -- in the context of Hardy and Tolstoy, Austen would be the joker in the pack.

---L.

[taigerchily.livejournal.com]

reading Faust 4 years ago showed me once more, that laugh and love are close friends.

I had avoided Goethe like the plague during highschool (and that's really not easy in a german speaking country! but i got nice marks without having read a single word, neighter of Faust nor Die Leiden des jungen Werthers :-) ), and i was so amazed how delightful, hilarious and awesome Faust was.

[larryhammer]

I should give that a try. I've been avoiding it myself (especially after bouncing hard off of Werther). And there's even translations by some very good English-speaking poets.

---L.

[snakypoet]

Well, the afore-mentioned Lolita, which I read as an adult and adored in all sorts of ways. Other classics I was mostly introduced to when young, and loved them, so didn't have any prejudices to overcome.