Reading group classics - will these authors really be remembered 100 years from now?

Postwar novels dominate as 15 are chosen from 100 modern-era books

John Ezard
Saturday August 27, 2005
The Guardian

If 500 of this country's most fervent readers have got it right, the past 25 years have been a golden age for classic fiction, the past 15 years have been even better and the past five years have verged on the platinum.

Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife (2003) is more enduring than Thomas Mann's Death in Venice, Ian McEwan's Atonement (2001) is more penetrating than Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway, Captain Corelli's Mandolin (1994) is of higher merit than Ernest Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls and Sebastian Faulks' Birdsong (1993) is greater than Graham Greene's The Power and the Glory.

This perspective will be news to most critics, academics and publishers, although publishers will be grateful for the boost for their newer titles. But it is the firm view of 48 book reading groups across Britain.

The verdict, discussed in today's Review supplement, is the fruit of seven months spent by the groups debating which titles published during the 20th century or so far this century will be considered classics in 100 years time.

One group member summed up their dilemma in deciding what makes a classic by asking: "Can we enjoy it or does it have to be worthy?"

These groups, in their role as discriminating readers, were asked by the publisher Vintage to come up with a list of their top 15 modern novels. Vintage, part of Random House, did so to celebrate its 15 years of publishing literary paperbacks.

The readers chose only two novels - the first world war classic All Quiet on the Western Front and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World - from the years before the second world war, which are usually considered the golden age of literary modernism.

Then their choice jumped to the 1960s, with Alexander Solzhenitsyn's One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch, Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird and Joseph Heller's Catch-22.

Nine of their favourite titles were published in or after 1980, three come from the 90s and four from the first three years of this century

The four latest books include two acknowledgedly substantial novels, Atonement and Mark Haddon's Whitbread prize winner, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. But no one in the UK books scene has previously ventured to suggest that the 21st century is producing enduring masterpieces at a rate faster than one every year.

Yesterday, however, the choice came as no surprise to Guy Pringle, publisher of Newbooks magazine, which is in touch with readers and readers' groups.

"The groups involved have not taken this lightly," he said. "But my guess is that the groups are keener on more recent fiction than in going back over the classics. The level of reaction has confirmed to me that people might say they like reading the classics, but they don't do so as often as they say.

"Classic titles have always been the hardest to shift when we have special offers for readers' groups. Even an easy and amusing classic like Three Men in a Boat was slow to move. But I know from what I've read in discussion groups that discussion about this choice has been very wide-ranging and thoughtful."

Tom Palmer, the reading partners coordinator for the government Reading Agency, set up the Vintage project with the 48 groups.

"Some groups read classics only, but the majority go for modern fiction. It's stuff like Captain Corelli's Mandolin that a lot of them read - good-quality middlebrow material."

Mr Palmer estimates that Britain has at least 10,000 reading groups. "I know of 400 in the East Midlands alone," he said.

Vintage gave each group free copies of 100 of its titles to choose from. This 100 had no books by Evelyn Waugh, James Joyce, DH Lawrence, William Golding or other writers usually considered classic, but otherwise included a fair spread.

Vintage's public director, Rachel Cugnoni, said of the project: "It's not a list created by academics or literary critics, but by ordinary readers. This is what makes the list authentic.

"To pin down exactly what defines a classic is hard to do and certainly open to debate, but ultimately what all recognised classics must have is the affirmation of large numbers of readers. These are the classics of the future."

Mary Rossall, a member of a reading group from Cumbria, said, "Even group members who were on holiday still took part - emailing their thoughts on their latest reads.

"In every single meeting we've had, we've ended up talking about how to define a classic. Is it literary merit? Is it a story that stays with you long afterwards? Is it a book that gives voice to people or events which would otherwise be silenced or forgotten?

"Can we enjoy it or does it have to be worthy?"

Writers themselves have difficulty defining what a classic amounts to. For Tim Lott, the book must "say something not merely of the time, but for all time".

Ruth Rendell has defined a classic as something that must be completely original: "Nothing like it has ever been done before. A classic may not be easy to read, but demands care and concentration and will seldom have much immediate appeal to those whose past reading has been thin on the ground or confined to the lightest of fiction. Even to them, when they persevere, it may turn out to be a favourite book, the most rewarding they have ever read."

Top 15 best reads

The Handmaid's Tale
Margaret Atwood, first published in 1985

Captain Corelli's Mandolin
Louis de Bernières, 1994

The Name of the Rose
Umberto Eco, 1980

Birdsong
Sebastian Faulks, 1993

The French Lieutenant's Woman
John Fowles, 1969

Memoirs of a Geisha
Arthur Golden, 1997

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time
Mark Haddon, 2003

Catch-22
Joseph Heller, 1961

Brave New World
Aldous Huxley, 1932

To Kill a Mockingbird
Harper Lee, 1960

Atonement
Ian McEwan, 2001

The Time Traveler's Wife
Audrey Niffenegger, 2003

Star of the Sea
Joseph O'Connor, 2003

All Quiet on the Western Front
Erich Maria Remarque, 1929

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn,1962



Guardian Unlimited Books | News | Reading group classics - will these authors really be remembered 100 years from now?