it’s one’s duty to comment on the BBC’s Big Read. 21 books in the final running to be proclaimed “the UK’s Best-Loved Book”. And Tolkien won. Well, what else can you expect when the poll is done while the films are coming out? I suppose he would have been up there even if it weren’t for the films, but I still suspect the result of being influenced by them. Most likely Colin Firth diving into the pond must take some of the blame (credit?) for Jane Austen’s second place, as well. The fact that I am much more partial to dear Jane (Tolkien would be unlikely to make my list at all, unfortunately), does not blind me completely. The Potter hysteria, of course, has also been fed by the films. In fact, all the more credit to Pullman (whose books are pretty good though I detested his mythology when I read them last time – must consider a reread) for making the third spot with no films to bump him up. Adams, of course, should always be near the top of such lists, as should Milne. Harper Lee is currently high on my TBR list, so I can’t really comment.
This is the official top 21:
1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
And here, as further comment, the “same” top 21 according to me (minus the ones I haven’t actually read).
1. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
2. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
3. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
4. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
7. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
8. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
9. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
10. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
10. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
10. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
14. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
14. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
14. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
The last three would not have made my top 100 list, the four at 10 might have, but would have been a lot further down. And other books would have squeezed into the top nine, but at least those belong up there somewhere. I’d also like to note that I prefer several of the other Narnia books to TLtWatW, and I would put the Dirk Gently novels ahead of the Hitch-Hiker series. I can never make up my mind whether P&P or Emma is my favourite Austen novel. Winnie the Pooh (which, btw, should be Winnie-the-Pooh) isn’t necessarily Milne’s best either.
Oh well.
Go see if you can beat me on the quiz – I got 8/10.