What was the hardest book you have ever read,

Mine is Gravities Rainbow, I dechiphered it but you have to be a litereary god, there is so much hidden ineuidos, and subliminal wordings, and literary devices.

War and Peace by Tolstoy.


And people, please remember to italicize titles of books. :)

I thought A Clockwork Orange was a difficult read, simply because of Anthony Burgess' writing style. :confused: It's a mix of English and a Russian-derived language of his own invention. It's also one of my favorite reads, so definitely check it out. It's better than the movie, and really not so complex once you get into it.

War and Peace is just big. Ulysses is tricky, the literary allusion is massive and the stream of consciousness prose takes a while read.

"think like a grandmaster" - Kotov

chapter one.

Beowulf in its original form, not long, but it took a while to get through.

the bible. i'd been wanting to read it and when i did, it was SO boring. i mean... i seriously don't see the point of naming ALL of adam's sons and all of their son's as well. i was stuck somewhere on genesis.

Originally posted by airavata
the bible. i'd been wanting to read it and when i did, it was SO boring. i mean... i seriously don't see the point of naming ALL of adam's sons and all of their son's as well. i was stuck somewhere on genesis.

You think the bible was boring, try reading the Koran.

And before someone starts, I don't mean this as an attack on either religion as I follow neither.

i found the book of revelations good though.

"think like a grandmaster" - Kotov

chapter one.

I didn't think that was that perplexing. Damn good book.

Kant's Critique of Pure Reason is an SOB.

Originally posted by katavan
Autobiography of GWB

ROFLMAO

:D

I suggest a book for everyone, a book which will tax your mind and leave you a changed person.........BLACK DIAMONDS AND THE BLUE BRAZIL.

The Sound and the Fury- a book from a learning disabled's pov- quite hard to understand -I believe it is Faulkner

Originally posted by Jerrek
War and Peace by Tolstoy.


And people, please remember to italicize titles of books. :)

I agree here, pretty damn dry, I attempted Joyce's Ulysses, finished the book, still no clue what it was about.

Crime and Punishment, by Dostoyevsky.

Raskolnikov's mind twisting and turning with its feelings of guilt really makes little as clear anymore after reading it.

i know from personal experience that not everyone is good at reading books. whether you are just to lazy or have a disabilty or whatever. i have found that the easiest way to get over this is the following.

YOU SHOULD GET THE BOOK IN AUDIO BOOK FORMAT.

people find it much more interesting and you will find that you will remember and understand the book better. i am sure there is a scientific reason for this, maybe people here might be better to explain why this way is easier.

you may say that all books are not in audiobook format, but there are an ever increasing demand for this way of reading, and i am sure the classics you mention will if not already, surely will be in the future. i would rather listen to an audio format of a book than actually read it.

i would give you an example. i have a stephen hawking book in book form and the audio book form. i tried to read the book but found that even though i could understand what he was saying, it was not enjoyable. then i got the book in audio format. i found this way of reading much more pleasent, and i found that you can understand and take in more knowledge this way. maybe it is just me, but i would guess that most people that pick up a book, would rather it to be in a audio format.

maybe it stimualtes the mind in ways that music and films do, and you don't have to concentrate on actually reading and understanding at the same time like you do when actually picking up and reading a massive book.

i would just say to you people, JUST TRY AUDIOBOOKS

Originally posted by ChildOfTheMind
Mine is Gravities Rainbow, I dechiphered it but you have to be a litereary god, there is so much hidden ineuidos, and subliminal wordings, and literary devices.

I guess that makes you a literary god then, huh?

Impressive.:rolleyes:

Soul Mountain (Ling Shan) By Gao Xinjiang.

Most excelent book, dwelves deep into not only the realms of Chinese idiosyncrasy, mentality and (Taoist) philosophies, but also into the realms human conciousness and spirituality. I still haven't decifered it fully, but it inspired me greatly.

edit: Spelling. of mr Xingjiangs name corrected.:)

at last there is nothing to say - matthew good

Perplexing in a sense...

If not that, then I'd have to give the award to either 'The Universe in a Nutshell' or 'A Brief History of Time' by Stephen Hawking. They are perplexing in the sense that some of the concepts are very hard to wrap your mind around.

Kant's Critique of Pure Reason

just way too much terminology

A Faery Anthology - JRR Tolkien :p
At least, I think that's what it was. It was all about fairies and stuff, but it was hard to read and was enough to make a person go crazy.
It was difficult to distinguish when he was referring to reality, and when not. I tried to read it when I was younger and thought he was insane, lol. Never finished it.

Finnegans Wake, a book that doesn't end but goes on in a loop forever. Made the mistake of reading it in bed at night, then couldn't sleep properly because of sentences going round and round my head like her beautiful hung up on a nail, he, Mr of our fathers, she, our moddereen ru arue rue, they, ay, by the hodypoker and blazier, they are, as sure as dinny drops into the dyke... It was like getting an annoying song stuck in your head. I'm sure part of the intention was that the words should be like music.

brief history of time was a brilliant book. it simplified and explained several theories of the universe really well. it was way simpler to understand it all from this book than from encyclopedia's or from the net, where there was so much of formulae and sums. in fact stephen hawking had included only 1 equation in this book :- E = Mc2^

Originally posted by airavata
brief history of time was a brilliant book. it simplified and explained several theories of the universe really well. it was way simpler to understand it all from this book than from encyclopedia's or from the net, where there was so much of formulae and sums. in fact stephen hawking had included only 1 equation in this book :- E = Mc2^

Absolutely - Stephen Hawking is not only brilliant in a mathematical sense, but in the sense that he has the descriptive ability to reduce things to their basic elements, and to use good examples and explain things eloquently - almost reducing things to being more simplistic than they really are.

Still, if you read right through 'Universe in a Nutshell' or 'Brief History of Time' without any knowledge of physics, ect. - the concepts are nevertheless challenging and will make your head spin.