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From 41 to 53 in two years.

"You're doing well - you're clearly an avid reader. Keep at it, pal!
You checked more than 95% of quiztakers."

Pillsonista, I'm chortling over your disdain for Buzzfeed! Well done!

A year ago I wrote " Well, I'm not so well-read with only 23/155 on that list, but there will never be time to read them all. That is OK. I will just try to enjoy the one I am reading now."


Hmmm, I got "You checked off 24 out of 155 on this list!" Again I say, that it is OK. There are thousands of excellent books in the world, it's impossible to put them all on one list. The best book is the one that I am interested in reading next!

Numidica wrote: "Pillsonista, I'm chortling over your disdain for Buzzfeed! Well done!"

Cheers, N. 🍻

It's the conceited condescension of this list that's really annoying. There are any number of people who haven't read a single book from it who are so much better read than anybody who has. They may not be books that make the index determined by Buzzfeed's algorithm, but leave it to the smarminess of that website to appoint themselves arbitrators of what is considered "well read" and what is not.

Anybody who reads Berlin Alexanderplatz simply because it's mentioned on some peremptory roll call deserves all they get and then some.

Very true, I have lots to look forward to!

I’ve read 17/155. I’ve read the wrong books by some of the named authors. Damn.

Patty wrote: "I’ve read 17/155. I’ve read the wrong books by some of the named authors. Damn."



Haha I understand. That was my problem too!

6/155 Yikes! I think that's the low score. I definitely need to get started ASAP. I'd like to say my school and college education failed me as I'll be a senior in college next year, but let's be honest. I just suck at picking up classics. That's not to say I haven't read a ton in my lifetime, only a small percentage of which is reflected on my ŷ������ account as I recently created it, but as far as classics go...

The ones I have read are The Adventures Of Huckleberry Fin, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, The Great Gatsby, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, 1984, and Animal Farm. The first, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Animal Farm were the only ones read for school. Although I did read shortened versions of at least a few others on Buzzfeed's List for school as well and I nominated A Clockwork Orange in another group for a group read. It currently is tied for first place so it will likely be read soon.

I know that I looked at this list before, but perhaps I did not post on it �� in any case, I could not find my post, but my score three years ago would have been 6/155. Now, once I finish To the Lighthouse, it shall be 16/155.

The list is heavily weighted toward English literature and like most of these lists, is woefully lacking in Chinese literature (and not only Chinese, but it stands out having only a single short story when their are centuries of classics that have been widely read throughout East Asia and beyond).

I took a crack at creating such a list myself based on the many I’ve seen (I don’t know why I like lists, lol):
Already I can see changes that I would make, some books that I would have included rather than some that I did, but I think most of the major classics are included (EDIT: I can’t believe I forgot the western epics, Homer’s Odyssey at the least! I shall have to compile a second edition...)

Only 26%(10 books) I used to think I was a reader.

It looks like I didn't increase my score at all since last year. My current unabridged Poe read will get me at least one point, but as it stands, incorporating this list as some sort of goal wouldn't do my personal sense of reading progress any favors.

Erin wrote: "I know that I looked at this list before, but perhaps I did not post on it �� in any case, I could not find my post, but my score three years ago would have been 6/155. Now, once I finish [book:To t..."

I LOVE your list, Erin!! I've only read 37/20%, but many are on my radar, and what's really exciting is there are many I've never heard of! Off to check them out ��

(It must have been fun to come up with this!)

I've read 60. I don't think I did this one before. I included 2 short story collections that I may not have read but read a collection by the author mentioned.

Just 17/155, good I joined here! Though I actually read other books by quite some of the authors XD

I got 73, which put me in the 98th percentile.

I posted a comment four years ago and I had read 52. Now I'm at 64 so not much better in 4 years. I would like to think I have read more diversely than the list represents.

Erin, I like your list. I have a long, long way to go to doing well on it but many of the books are ones I hope to get to. I have read 48 on your list or 26%.

Erin wrote: "EDIT: I can’t believe I forgot the western epics, Homer’s Odyssey and Beowulf at the least! I shall have to compile a second edition..."

Yes! More Erin lists! (Although I do admit my enthusiasm is not completely unaffected by how much I've usually read on them...)

32/155...yikes!

Kelly_Hunsaker_reads wrote: "I got 73, which put me in the 98th percentile."

that's strange because my 60 put me in the 90 something %. It must change by day

13/155. However, I should note that I didn't count books that I've only read parts of, or DNF.

Only 28. What have I been doing with my life?

I just paid attention to this. I got 52 out of 155 and cannot believe that's better than 94 percent of quiz takers, particularly since I have consciously avoided all Russian novels after my trilingual grandmother told me they are never the same when not written in Russian. (she could speak, read and write 3 languages fluently and as a youth could get by in another one--she learned English in her 20s and that is one of the three fluent ones). I have read that enormous Man without Qualities one, though.

I have some I plan to read in the future, but many of these are books I'll never read because I have no desire to :)

Kathleen wrote: "I LOVE your list, Erin!! I've only read 37/20%, but many are on my radar, and what's really exciting is there are many I've never heard of! Off to check them out ��

(It must have been fun to come up with this!)"

I'm so glad to hear that! ^_^ I've discovered many books through such lists and hoped to do likewise, especially to draw attention to classics beyond the traditional western canon. I still have a LOT to read myself -- my score on my own list is only 22/12%.

Yes, I do enjoy coming up with these lists and always end up discovering books while looking up references to create them -- I shall never be caught up on my TBR, lol!

Laurie wrote: "I posted a comment four years ago and I had read 52. Now I'm at 64 so not much better in 4 years. I would like to think I have read more diversely than the list represents.

Erin, I like your list. I have a long, long way to go to doing well on it but many of the books are ones I hope to get to. I have read 48 on your list or 26%."

Agreed! I think some of the lists they compiled from were much more appropriate for an overall well-read than others, although it is still better, IMHO, than many similarly intended lists that I have seen.

And thank you, I'm glad you liked the list -- and at three times the average, 48 read is an impressive number! =)

Aubrey wrote: "Yes! More Erin lists! (Although I do admit my enthusiasm is not completely unaffected by how much I've usually read on them...)"

Lol, well, you are usually among the top scores on my lists -- often the top 1% -- no doubt both because you are widely read and because your reviews and lists have a strong influence on my own TBR. =) After finding that I not only left out Homer but Virginia Woolf as well, I'm definitely working on a second edition! =o It definitely helps to utilize some organization to be able check a list for duplications and omissions but it was my first on ListChallenges!

How fun to revisit this list. Do I always agree with these lists' choices? NO, but I still cannot resist taking the quiz again. This year 30/155 which is 19% and two years ago it was 23/155 15%, so I have read 7 from this list in the last 2 years. Still a long way to go.

Erin wrote: "I know that I looked at this list before, but perhaps I did not post on it �� in any case, I could not find my post, but my score three years ago would have been 6/155. Now, once I finish [book:To t..."

Erin I also took your quiz. I have read 13/186 which is 7% , so even lower than the Buzzfeed! LOL

Erin wrote: "After finding that I not only left out Homer but Virginia Woolf as well, I'm definitely working on a second edition! =o It definitely helps to utilize some organization to be able check a list for duplications and omissions but it was my first on ListChallenges!"

Practice makes perfect. I put out my 65th list a few days ago, and I still forgot a couple of authors whom I could have included. Oh well. More reason to give them some love in a future one.

I first took the quiz in January of 2017 and my number was 54.

I just re-took the quiz, and my result was 72 (which put me at the 98th percentile)! So I was glad to see I had added 18 books without even paying any attention to this particular list :)

There was mention that a list was heavy on British authors. It made me wonder how much British Literature that I had read, so I made a British Literature shelf. Turn out that 117 books out of 1180 were British Literature, so that's about 10% . Most of those that I read were due to the influence of this group over the last few years. My books are overwhelmingly American, leaning toward children's or science fiction.

Terris wrote: "I first took the quiz in January of 2017 and my number was 54.

I just re-took the quiz, and my result was 72 (which put me at the 98th percentile)! So I was glad to see I had added 18 books withou..."

Wow that is a huge increase. Way to go.

Lynn wrote: "Terris wrote: "I first took the quiz in January of 2017 and my number was 54.

I just re-took the quiz, and my result was 72 (which put me at the 98th percentile)! So I was glad to see I had added ..."

Thanks! But gotta' keep reading! ;)

87/155 which, while not nearly as many as Pillsonista, still makes me a professional reader with the same salary as her.

75/155 up from 67/155 in 2017. Can't say that many of the ones I haven't read are actually on my short-list though.

Brian wrote: "87/155 which, while not nearly as many as Pillsonista, still makes me a professional reader with the same salary as her."

I've just re-read the list out of sheer curiosity and... I mean...

☑️ The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
☑️ Moby-Dick by Herman Melville
�� Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
☑️ Essays by Michel de Montaigne

Seriously, which one of these is not like the other?

Then you have Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret between Augie March and The Decameron. The Big Sleep but nothing by Ross MacDonald or Dorothy Hughes? My best guess is that the curator of the list, Ailbhe Malone, is semi-literate at best and just googled "classic books" and, wallah, another superfluous Buzzfeed list came to be.

I'm a little embarrassed that I took the list seriously enough to spend any time actually checking the boxes.

A solid 90 now (that Poe was probably what bumped me up one). I spied a few that I'll be getting to for my challenges this year (Decameron, Dead Souls, maybe some others), so those'll be nice to check off when I re-remember that this board exists in a year or two.

Wow. I am so impressed with you all! I just checked again, and am only up 12 since 2016!! From 38 to 50. At this rate ... well, I don't want to think about that. :-)

I'm on 30/155 but there are a lot on there I'd still like to read!

I'm at 66/155 on the OP list and 20% on Erin's list, and of course Erin, your list looks much more intriguing.

In general the problem with this sort of thing is, how do you pick one book by an author? It's easy to see why it's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for Adams or Dead Souls for Gogol, but how do you choose one book for Dickens, Balzac, Kawabata? Not easy and I don't see why I'd count someone less well-read if they read The End of the Affair, The Quiet American, and Brighton Rock but didn't get to The Power and the Glory.

So a couple tablespoons of salt in order here.

Will edit in some more:
Honestly Erin, I bookmarked your list and will dig in, and now I wish I could see some other members of this group link the recommended or well-rounded lists they have. GR shelves, even. I'll head over to the Bingo folder and rootle about, though I'm so bad at reading to a challenge (sucks half the enjoyment out) that I don't go there much.

J_BlueFlower wrote: "From 41 to 53 in two years."

Now 59 after 1½ more years.

I have a lot of books I have read some parts of:
Fairy tales by Hans Christian Andersen : Read the most famous ones and a few more. But not everything (everything would be 1000+ pages). According to this list there are 157 fairy tales

The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri. : Only read part 1

Stories by Anton Chekhov : What Stories? All of them? I just read a collection, but probably not the right ones.

Stories by Franz Kafka: Read some of them

Essays by Michel de Montaigne : Read about 1/3

98/155 A lot of the ones I haven't read are part of my reading plan for the next couple of years.

Increased a tad to 94/155 since last I posted. I've another thirteen on hand that I could very well incorporate into my 2022 challenges, but I'm not going to force any of them.

I'm up to 80/155. I was surprised, because there are a lot of books on this list that I have not even considered reading.

Nente wrote: "...and now I wish I could see some other members of this group link the recommended or well-rounded lists they have."

Silly me didn't see this part of your message the first time around, Nente, but I do have a list of 20th c. works, or New School according to this group's jargon, that I compiled a while back based on a combination of literary reputation, average rating, and popularity. It's highly biased towards my personal library and I wouldn't consider every work conducive towards being "well read", but it's an interesting spread, if I do say so myself:

72/200 on Aubrey's list
89/155 on Buzzfeed list

I only got 49/155. I can see lots of books on that list I'd like to read and lots more that I have no desire to read. Lol.

Only six books. There are a few books I want to read though. I'll check a few years later.

35 out of 155, to dare, but I don’t think this list necessarily defines being well-read. I think there are some better books and there are books I have no interest in reading.

I did appreciate Slayer’s question, though! I guess I am making up for a mis-spent youth by participating in this group.

47 of 155.

12/155

32/155 now. 12/1/2022