The DU Lounge

"A Tale of Two Cities" was and is still a really good story, I don't care how old you are. My mother told, years later, about a conversation she overheard between my younger (by 4 years) brother and his friends discussing that book. They were having a really animated discussion about how exciting and interesting it was.

I think the problem with a lot of 19th century novels (Dickens especially) is that they are designed to be read aloud. In such case, audiobooks are not a bad thing and kids might be allowed to absorb them that way. I will definitely agree with you about George Eliot, though I found the dramatizations of some of her books enjoyable. I finally got into "The Brothers Karamazov" in audiobook format although many of my friends read it in print in high school and affectionately referred to it as "The Brothers K". Meanwhile I was reading "Kristin Lavransdatter" in the awful 1920s translation and loving it I recently reread it in the modern translation and liked it a whole lot better. Oh, and I still don't like Jane Austen, so sue me.