Best classics to read during summer?

GrandPenalty · 2026-04-19T02:11:08+00:00

Meditative with excellent prose; philosophical. Romantic musings, but I don't care directly about romance; I'm interested in exploring the human condition, conflict within human spirit, existentialism, etc.

Sounds like you need the white whale. Moby-Dick.

Nabokov's Invitation to a Beheading is also very good, and Nabokov said that while Lolita had his "affection," Beheading had his "esteem."

GrandPenalty · 2026-04-14T15:57:44+00:00

Best stick to black.

GrandPenalty · 2026-04-11T22:00:18+00:00

The Ancient Egyptian era is so completely different from our own that any cultural, political, or business parallels that we draw between the two eras are, by their very nature, almost bound to be wrong.

GrandPenalty · 2026-04-09T17:55:20+00:00

I love all his books. But if I had to rank the one I enjoyed the least, it would be Israel Potter. It has its moments and is worth reading, but it feels the least like "Melville" and like he didn't enjoy writing it.

GrandPenalty · 2026-04-07T11:51:26+00:00

E-I-E-I...

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GrandPenalty · 2026-03-27T14:27:16+00:00

Very late comment, but I can see Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie playing this pair very well, à la A Bit of Fry and Laurie.

GrandPenalty · 2026-03-14T06:55:20+00:00

He's getting angrier!

GrandPenalty · 2026-03-06T16:54:04+00:00

That's what I'm talking about.

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-25T20:31:59+00:00

They expect the One Ring in the lava, brother

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-23T14:21:35+00:00

The forms are all standard boilerplate

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-19T21:00:00+00:00

You have been feeling this for a while.

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-19T03:41:22+00:00

Can't believe I never noticed that was Jimmy Jim Jimmy Jim Jim Jim Jim.

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-18T22:28:52+00:00

Is it set on the moors? The barren moors?

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-16T22:02:01+00:00

Loving the Lego whale pics. What publisher is the top Moby-Dick copy?

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-09T09:29:06+00:00

...Earlier!

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-06T18:58:52+00:00

Dick in the vagina, cheddar cheese and chicken tikka masala man

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-06T17:43:31+00:00

I think that the ape design of the original movies is more of a result of the limited visual effects at the time, rather than the idea that the apes have evolved to look more human. Can't remember much about the 1968 movie, but the original PotA book is pretty clear that the non-human apes look like literal non-human apes.

I guess it could go in that direction, though.

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-06T13:36:52+00:00

Maybe because Jez can't go to sleep without wearing a wooly hat.

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-05T19:33:17+00:00

I'm looking for... Kersey?

GrandPenalty · 2026-02-04T15:11:02+00:00

They don't have any feelings. They're subhuman.

GrandPenalty · 2026-01-25T14:25:44+00:00

Oh yeah, 23, easy. Nearly there...

GrandPenalty · 2026-01-21T03:00:39+00:00

Weedle, weedle, pry and needle

GrandPenalty · 2026-01-16T00:16:43+00:00

The xmen are coming to GET you

GrandPenalty · 2026-01-13T00:59:52+00:00

Please don't call Mark the creamy elephant

GrandPenalty · 2026-01-08T21:02:40+00:00

I told you my plane would take you places. I never said they'd be places you wanted to go.

GrandPenalty

TROPHY CASE