Midwest Geek

but not because of “The Great Gatsby”.

I finished that novel and will be starting on Catcher in just a few minutes, or when ever I finish this post. The overall book wasn’t that bad, however I can’t understand how in the beginning of the book the same author can spend a page and a half describing wind, and at the end of the same novel takes only a single sentence to describe the murder of one of the main characters. I mean come on, what the hell!

Anyway, I now only have 99 more books to go, and have renewed vigor to make it though this list. However last night my wife re-proved that she is in fact smarter then me. I leave you with a portion of the conversation we had last night.

Monk: How is the book going?
Me: Totally horrible, I hate this book.
Monk: I told you, I have no idea why you are doing this to yourself.
Me: Because it’s a wonderful, character-building thing to do. or something.
Monk: Is “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man” on your list or have you read it before?
Me: It’s number 14 on my list.
Monk: Gatsby is MUCH better then that one, “Portrait” was the worst three weeks of my life, I hated reading that in school.
Me: …..
Monk: Do you realize, that if you think Gatsby is bad, that according to the list you now have to read 99 books worse then Gatsby right?
Me: Shit!
Monk: *Laughing uncontrollably*

As you know I started a self-improvement project to read (and in some cases reread) the Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century. I placed my first order to Amazon and have received the first two books on the list last night, The Great Gatsby and Catcher in the Rye. I had thought that since I tend to devour books rather quickly on anything ranging from fly fishing and the balance of life to stories around WWII to Common Sense to modern day Forensic Psychology, that I would be on this list quickly, kinda like a fat kid on cake.

Man was I wrong, with a capital W, capital RONG!

I read Marley and Me in about 8 hours and it was just under 300 pages, freaking Gatsby is only around 150 pages and I am only at page 54 with about 3 hours under my belt. While I read the synopsis of the book and it seems interesting, the book itself is a bloody bore to read. It’s just so very…over-descriptive, and by over-descriptive I mean dreadfully boring. I understand and appreciate the used of the modern and post-modern English language to describe locations, events, people and objects, but to drone on about how wind moves through a living room for a page and a half is killing me.

Now don’t get me wrong, Fitzgerald use of a wording is brilliant, however he could have cut a solid 1/3 out of the book and made it a bit more readable. I have been fighting sleep with this book for 2 days now and I am not sure how I am going to make it. I have thought about just juicing myself up on some high caffeine drinks and lashing the book to my hands, however I don’t drink anything with caffeine in it anymore and I am not that good at lashing anything to anything, so I will just use good old fashion will power.

The thing that really gets me is the fact that this is listed as the greatest book of the 20th century. I mean under what judging guidelines did they come up with? Was it just based on best use of a thesaurus, best writing technique, greatest novel to describe wind for a page and a freaking half? How, I ask you dear readers, is this book considered to be the “#1″ greatest novel of the 20th century? I do think that Fitzgerald is a gifted writer, but the best book written in the last 100 years??

Help explain this to me, because I have to hold on to the hope that I am not stupid.