Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Novels of… the 1850's, pt.2 (1856-1859)

Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Novels of… the 1860's, pt.1 (1860-1864)

I've been working my way through 1859 recently. Here's how I'd rank:

1. Adam Bede
2. A Tale of Two Cities
3. On Liberty
4. The Lifted Veil (Eliot)
5. Family Happiness (Tolstoy)
6. The Bertrams (Trollope)
7. Home of the Gentry (Turgenev)
8. The World of Ice (Ballantyne)
9. Oblomov (Goncharov)
10. Village of Stepanchikovo (Dostoevsky)
11. The World of Ice (Ballantyne)
12. Our ---: Sketches from the Life of a Free Black (Wilson)
13. Popular Tales from the Norse
14. The Ordeal of Richard Feverel (Meredith)

Adam Bede is the only Eliot I haven't read.

How's Richard Feverel? I've started The Egoist three times, assuming Meredith and I are simpatico (otoh I like his poetry and wish it were more anthologized).

why 1859? it's a big year for me as it's also the year of the earliest recorded sounds

I’ve been reading through the 19th century year by year—1859 is where I’m at now

Fevered has an interesting concept—a father raising a son in an experimental system. Of course the son rebels. I lost some interest along the way though.

Did you start at 1800? If so, holy moley that's impressive.

Nice going! I've been curious to read a book by George Meredith for the somewhat silly reason that I have the book "The True History of Mrs. Meredith and Other Lesser Lives" by Diane Johnson on my bookshelf, but feel like I should read something by George Meredith first.

xpost yeah, six years ago. It seemed like 90% of the novels published between 1810 and 1830 were written by Sir Walter Scott.

In the mid twentieth century replace Scott with Simenon.

Do you read anything else, or do you go all 19th century all the time?

I mostly just read children's books to my son now, and comic books

But I used to read mainly new books, so this project is a bit of a corrective