2025 Classics Reading Haul

Classics Books I want to read in 2025 :

British Classics :

1. 1984 (Reread) - George Orwell
2. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
3. Flush - Virginia Woolf
4. Jane Eyre (Reread) - Charlotte Bronte
5. Lady Chatterley's Lover - D.H Lawarence
6. Enchanted April, The - Elizabeth Von Arnim
7. Last Man, The  - Mary Shelley
8. Mill on The Floss, The  - George Elliot
9. Night Is Darkening Around Me, The  - Emily Bronte
10. Return of Native, The - Thomas Hardy
11. Utopia - Thomas More
12. Woodlanders, The  - Thomas Hardy
13. Villette - Charlotte Bronte
14. Wives and Daughters - Elizabeth Gaskell
15. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte

French Classics :

1. Fortune of the Rougons, The - Emile Zola
2. Phantom of The Opera, The - Gaston Leroux

American Classics :

1. Ethan Form - Edith Wharton
2. Farewell to Arms, a - Ernest Hemmingway
3. Grapes of Wrath, The - John Steinbeck
4. Last of The Mohicans  - James Fenimore Copper
5. Little Princes, a - Frances Hudgson Burnett

Russian Classics :

1. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
2. Death of Ivan Ilyich, The  - Leo Tolstoy
3. Karamazov Brothers, The - Fyodor Doestoevsky
4. Master and Margarita, The - Mikhail Bulgakov

Reading Statistic :

January :

1. Grapes of Wrath, The - John Steinbeck (Born, 27 Feb 1902)
2. Death of Ivan Ilyich, The  - Leo Tolstoy  
3. Ethan Form - Edith Wharton (Born, 24 January 1862)

February :

     4. Bleak House - Charles Dickens (Born, 7 February 1812)

     5.  Utopia - Thomas More (Born, 7 February 1478)

March :

    6.  Sang Jenderal di Dalam Labirinnya - Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Born, 6 Macrh 1927)

    7.  Jane Eyre (Reread) - Charlotte Bronte

April  :

    8.  Enchanted April, The - Elizabeth Von Arnim

    9. Fortune of the Rougons, The - Emile Zola

May :

    10. Master and Margarita, The - Mikhail Bulgakov

    11. Little Princes, a - Frances Hudgson Burnett

Review Lady Audley's Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon

• Lady Audley's Secret, considered as a sensational novel, was highly popular in the 19th century. Published in 1862, it became a notable work by Mary Elizabeth Braddon. The novel reaps the sensation because it has themes of bigamy. Lady Audley's secret combined Gothic horror with psychological realism.
• Lady Audley had climbed up her social status from a governess named Lucy Graham till she ensnares even the wealthy widower, Michael Audley. She made it with her childlike beauty, her most valuable asset.Robert Audley, the nephew of Michael Audley, wanted to comfort his grieving friend, George Talboys after the death of his wife. He took him to Audley Court to have dinner with his new aunt, but the lady avoided them. After they sneak out of the forbidden room to see the lady's portrait, George Talboys is missing.
• Robert is represented as an amateurish detective to search for clues and to investigate the missing of his friend. The mystery leads to the secret of Lady Audley and her past lives. He pursued questions of identity along the paths and corridors of English country houses.
• Lady Audley is a self-centered woman, just driven by her own desire, her action as a reflection of her desperation for her poverty and her social status.
• The favorite character obviously falls into Robert Audley. The changes in the character of Robert from lazy and idle make him more focused, disciplined, and motivated. He is obsessed with the mystery of George's disappearance, he longs for closure about his friend’s disappearance and is willing to do anything to attain it. Some readers think that he is a homosexual because he has a strong feeling for George, but I think it's normal, he finds justice not only for his friend, but also for his uncle and the future of the Audley family.
• This novel became my comfort reading, with a third-person narrative, flowy and fast-paced. It feels like reading Agatha Christie's work, but it's not the same because of Braddon's rich narrative, but sometimes it's verbose. Writing a review of a mystery novel is quite difficult for me not to spoil the main story. Overall, I think this book is the best choice for anyone who loves the Victorian era. It is also compared with The Woman In White by Wilkie Collins.

REVIEW (ULASAN NOVEL) O Pioneers! by Willa Cather

"A pioneer should have imagination, should be able to enjoy the idea of things more than the things themselves."

O Pioneers! is a profoundly feminist novel that was published in 1913 by American author, Willa Cather. This is the first book from the Great Plains Trilogy series, one pack with The Song of The Lark and My Antonia. This book refers to many northern European immigrants who traveled to settle in Nebraska. Pioneers means the first generation who first owned the wild land, which means the land is free. Instead of succeeding in their new land by farming, many of them failed to conquer it. It's because they have no experience of farming, and basically many of them come from the working class and didn't know how to manage the prairie. But, many of them become successful landowners.

Alexandra Bergson, the protagonist of this novel, promised her father on his deathbed to manage the praire which her father failed. She lived along with her brother, Lou, Oscar and little Emil Bergson. She works and toils through the prime years of her life. When her brother lacked foresight and judgement, she could take on the role of a patriarch, making critical decisions about the land, labor and finance.

The feeling of being at one with nature makes Alexandra ignore her personal feelings. The land for her is much more than just physical space. She has a deep emotional and almost spiritual connection to the land. The land became her identity, and her responsibility to future generations.

"The land belongs to the future, Carl; that’s the way it seems to me. How many of the names on the county clerk’s plat will be there in fifty years? I might as well try to will the sunset over there to my brother’s children. We come and go, but the land is always here. And the people who love it and understand it are the people who own it—for a little while.” (Alexandra)

I like it when the novel is like a super account of human life from the past. A book like this is more than just reading. We not only see the point of view of people who struggle through life and their way of living, but also the depiction of places, the landscape and the circumstances. Willa Cather is the brilliant author who wrote the very first account of The Great Plains of America.

https://nebraskastudies.org/en/1850-1874/who-were-the-settlers-who-was-daniel-freeman/the-immigrant-experience/

Ruang Buku Megga Rated : ✬✬✬✬(4/5)

Title : O Pioneers!

Author : Willa Cather
Publisher : Book-of-the-Month Club
Year : 1995 (First Published in 1913)
Format /Pages : Hardcover / 309 pages
ISBN : 9780739433249

Review dan Ulasan Novel Mary Barton - Elizabeth Gaskell

Mary Barton, a poignant novel and the first Elizabeth Gaskell work that was published in 1848. This is the second novel that I have read from her. As always, her narrative is well constructed and easy to read. Elizabeth Gaskell is good at mixing romance with social critique and political commentary, so, she has never disappointed me so far.

The original title of this work is Mary Barton: A Tale Of Manchester Life. True to the title, the work portrays the lives of people in Machester as an industrial town. Gaskell underscores their working class, poor people, their starvation, their slumming area, their pride, their social gap, also the way of living between workers and masters. The author realistically depicts the conditions in the city of Manchester during The Great Depression in 1839.

The titular character, Mary Barton, is Gaskell's heroine. A young and beautiful woman from working class family, ambitious become a "lady", and want to marries whealty men who can escaped her and her family from poverty. When her mother died, Mary lives with her only father, John Barton as a workers at the mill and the representative for workers' rights and joining Chartism movement.

Mary had an affair with the mill owner's son, Harry Carson, assuming that he would marry her. Readers may think that Mary is shallow, but she doesn't have another choice. She thinks she can make it with her beauty. It's sad to think her mother and her older brother died because there was not enough money to buy medicine. Mary rejected Jem Willson, who loved her, for Henry. 

Henry Carson's privilege contrasted sharply with the dire poverty and hardship of workers. They envy the ease of life of the upper class while they are suffering. Food shortages and malnutrition. Why don't the masters increase their wages? Then, something terrible happened, something that turned Mary's life. Can she be the 'lady' she wants to be?

What had happened to the life of Mary Barton, had changed her personality. Her bold and her integrity win the hearts of the readers, and she deserves the title of heroine. Mary is surrounded by her neighbors and friends who are loyal and support her. There are many subplots which are told about Mary's blind friends, Margaret, who has a beautiful voice, Alice Willson who become the mother role model for Marry, and the mysterious disapperance her aunt, Esther.

All the thematic expositions, of birth, death, social class, and love, are centered on Mary Barton. The tale about master vs workers as if it never ends. From The Movement of Chartism through this day, workers are getting better rights from year to year. This book is an interesting read, made me a little bit smarter. Sadly, because too many characters died, nevertheless, it ended up beautiful.

Ruang Buku Megga Rated : ✬✬✬✬✬(5/5)

​Title : Mary Barton
Author : Elizabeth Gaskell
Publisher : Penguin Popular Classics
Year : 1994 (First Published in 1848)
Pages : 372 pages
ISBN : 9780140621020

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Review Jude The Obscure - Thomas Hardy

The story revolves around the protagonist, Jude Fawley. He dreamed become a scholar at university in another town, Christminster. It's says dream because Jude is from a working class family, and didn't afford to pay his tuition. Jude teaches himself Classical Greek and Latin in his spare time, while working in his great-aunt's bakery, with the hope of entering university.

His one reckless action in his youth, committed on the seduction of a butcher girl, had set his dream apart. Jude marries Arabella Donn, after she lies that she's pregnant, they have unhappy marriage, then Arabella leaves him. This sets in motion the events that form the main storyline until Jude meet his cousin, Sue Bridehead. This moment marks the beginning of Jude's deep emotional attachment to Sue, a relationship that becomes central to the novel. 

The first impression the reader forms on Jude is a person who is firm with his dreams but powerless because his circumstances and societal expectations have thwarted him. His sincere actions call for a lot of sympathy. Sue's independence shifts to defiance of traditional gender roles. She is an extremely intelligent woman who rejects Christianity and flirts with paganism. She is both admirable but deeply flawed. Hardy also associates Sue with many of his heroines, like Tess d'Urbervilles (Tess of d'Ubervilles) and Eustacia Vye (The Return of The Native). The rest of the characters: Richard Phillotson, Arabella and Little-Father-time are overshadowing their bleak life and their bright dream. All of them are flawed, but Richard Phillotson is an ambiguous character, making it difficult to label him as right or wrong. His choices are shaped by societal norms.

"I can’t bear that they, and everybody, should think people wicked because they may have chosen to live their own way! It is really these opinions that make the best intentioned people reckless, and actually become immoral!’   (Sue, Part Fifth chapter VI, pg. 293)

The entire content of this novel is still about Jude Fawley and his obscurity in philosophy and society. Jude's and Sue's unconventional love story encourages readers to question traditional norms. The pursuit of dreams and societal judgment resonate deeply with modern readers. Hardy seems to propose that we should battle against our tragic fate. At some time. He shows that the battle itself is futility.

I am very grateful that Thomas Hardy has published many books! His books always pushed my reading slump away, his flowy narrative and his beautiful depiction of rural Dorset in the 19th century are something I can't find in contemporary books. But, Jude The Obscure is too emotional, tragic had left me in tears.

"Their philosophy only recognizes relations based on animal desire."

Ruang Buku Megga Rated : ✬✬✬✬ (4/5)

​Title : Jude The Obscure

Author : Thomas Hardy

Publisher : Alma Classics

Year :  2019 (First Published in 1895)

Pages :  448 pages

ISBN : 9781847498076