Ranking all the Victorian Authors I've Read
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- Опубликовано: 15 окт 2024
- #Victober
In which I rank many a Victorian author . . .
Authors Mentioned
Bram Stocker: / 6988.bram_stoker
Edwin Abbott: / 3093075.edwin_a_abbott
George Du Maurier: / 113849.george_du_maurier
George Eliot: / 173.george_eliot
William Makepeace Thackeray: / 3953.william_makepeace... wil
Charles Kingsley: / 15568.charles_kingsley
Captain Marryat: / 4099543.frederick_marryat
Joseph Conrad: / 3345.joseph_conrad
Rhoda Broughton: / 632260.rhoda_broughton
Emily Eden: / 141789.emily_eden
Rudyard Kipling: / 6989.rudyard_kipling
Richard Jefferies: / 16038.richard_jefferies
Robert Louis Stevenson: / 854076.robert_louis_st...
Andrew Forrester: / 525907.andrew_forrester
Benjamin Disraeli: / 47030.benjamin_disraeli
Jerome K. Jerome: / 3352.jerome_k_jerome
George and Weedon Grossmith: / 30762.george_grossmith
Richard Marsh: / 3348.richard_marsh
Allen Raine: / 2373995.allen_raine
R. D. Blackmore: / 545254.r_d_blackmore
William Morris: / 8127.william_morris
Lewis Carroll: / 8164.lewis_carroll
Ella Hepworth Dixon: / 518721.ella_hepworth_d...
George MacDonald: / 2413.george_macdonald
Mary Elizabeth Braddon: / 45896.mary_elizabeth_b...
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: / 2448.arthur_conan_doyle
Charlotte Mary Yonge: / 176982.charlotte_mary_...
Wilkie Collins: / 4012.wilkie_collins
George Bernard Shaw: / 5217.george_bernard_shaw
George Moore: / 5348195.george_moore
Frances Trollope: / 767847.frances_milton_...
H.G. Wells: / 880695.h_g_wells
Harriet Martineau: / 55843.harriet_martineau
Ellen Wood: / 1779542.mrs_henry_wood
Amy Levy: / 514999.amy_levy
Amy Dillwyn: / 2373996.amy_dillwyn
George Meredith: / 12222.george_meredith
Oscar Wilde: / 3565.oscar_wilde
J. Sheridan Le Fanu: / 26930.j_sheridan_le_fanu
Margaret Oliphant: / 14266369.mrs_oliphant
Anne Brontë: / 8249.anne_bront_
Geraldine Jewsbury: / 684447.geraldine_jewsbury
Dinah Mulock Craik: / 166852.dinah_maria_mul...
Emily Brontë: / 4191.emily_bront_
George Gissing: / 4532116.george_gissing
Thomas Hardy: / 15905.thomas_hardy
Charlotte Brontë: / 1036615.charlotte_bront_
Anthony Trollope: / 20524.anthony_trollope
Full ranking video: • Ranking Anthony Trollo...
Elizabeth Gaskell: / 1413437.elizabeth_gaskell
Charles Dickens: / 239579.charles_dickens
Full ranking video: • Least to Most Favourit...
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This was quite a feat. And I think it's brave of you to admit that you dislike George Eliot, when she's held in such high esteem, especially by academics.
Book taste is very personal and everybody likes different things :)
Your love of the Victorian authors is very contagious! I started reading 19th century stuff a few years ago and maybe now have read about 50, nothing compared to your efforts!! But I always come back to your channel to discover authors I have only vaguely heard of or never heard of, you are a great resource and inspiration for further explorations of the wonderful world of Victorian works. All these books are available as free epub downloads, I download them onto my phone and have now problem reading them. I have read all the 14 Dicken's novels on my phone, very easy!
Dickens is my favorite as well. To me he writes the most memorable characters..
This was truly epic Katie! You really do have the most infectious love of Vic Lit & i feel totally excited & inspired soooo many works for me to investigate in the years to come thank you!!😍🧐👍🥰
Thanks :)
Such a brilliant video - thank you! And fascinating to see all their images as well. I'm looking forward to your video about Wilkie Collins.
Excellent video ......I don't have the extensive knowledge of victorian authors as your good self and I have many more to read, but over the years of being able to read more fiction since retiring from health care, where my reading was extensively non fiction; I have crawled out of my comfort zone of light reads to more indepth novels and " classic " literature and I am hooked.
Thank you for your continued enthusiasm for victorian literature in general and I cannot wait for your own novel .
Wow! This was a terrific presentation of Victorian authors. Thanks for finding and including an image of each author along with synopses of so many novels.
Anthony Trollope is now one of my favorite authors thanks to you enthusiastically sharing your thoughts of his writing.
Already a big Thomas Hardy fan, you inspired me to complete all the novels.
We part ways on our opinions of Villette and Shirley. They were each low key reading experiences for me. Literary discussions would be pretty boring if we all shared the same opinions.
Katie, thanks again for all the work you do researching and filming your frequent videos. I enjoy and appreciate them.
Thanks very much :)
I've come across you after coming across George Gissing, who I'd never heard of. I loved your presentation. I do wish you would talk a little slower. You had so much I wanted to hear, and your knowledge and enthusiasm are most inspiring, but I often had a hard time keeping up because you talked to fast!. (A complement, really, as I didn't want to miss anything you said!). I'm just diving into Gissing, through short stories ("Fleet Footed Hester" -- a short story and my first experience of Gissing -- has led me to more short stories, and I'll soon embark on Grub Street). Now, I don't agree with all your opinions, but that's to be expected. "Lord Jim," by Conrad, is a terrific novel. Marlow, character and first-person narrator of the book, is one of the greatest and most compelling storytellers I've ever come across (a creation of Conrad, obviously). In any event, keep up the great work!
Valuable video as always! I learn interesting things and enjoy your enthusiasm. Thank you for sharing! 🫖
I love this video idea Katie! There are so many different Victorian authors that I have yet to read. You've read a lot more than me, but it's funny to see how our opinions on various authors and works differ. You know that I don't hate Dracula nearly as much as you do. I need to fully form my opinions of George Eliot. I absolutely hated The Mill on the Floss, but I have such fond memories of studying Middlemarch in school. I guess I should reread Middlemarch and read more by her to form my full opinion, but after The Mill on the Floss I'm not tempted. I need to rewatch this and write down a whole bunch of books that I really want to read, and I need to stop commenting on so many authors lol. I can't say I'm surprised by your top rankings! I think they might be similar for me, but I need to read more Dickens among other things.
Love your content, love your videos, and love that beautiful smile of yours. Cheers.
Love that I could predict your favourites.. Elizabeth Gaskell and the brontes are my favourite classic authors but I do need to try others
Katie, The whole video is fabulous yet I loved the beginning the most! I had not ever heard you talk about books you hated so I found that quite fun. I love Gaskell, Trollope, and the Brontes. I haven’t read any Dickens that I can remember, so I started listening to the Pickwick Papers and am enjoying it. Thanks again!
Thanks very much!
Wow! What an active Victober 🍁. I have to thank you Kate for you are the one that introduced to me Victober several years ago. Through your channel, I now follow other enthusiasts and have read so many great novels. I love your cozy ideas which I will incorporate several into my month. In live in Southern California so autumn is slow to arrive but that doesn’t stop me. Yesterday on the “eve” I started The Woman in White and yes, I have never read The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow, but I will this month. Happy Victober and I’m looking forward to all your videos🍂🌼🍁🧡🎃
Oops. I believe I posted this on the wrong video. Never the less, Katie, you were one of the booktubers I found through Kate and I’m glad I did. I enjoy your videos and have read several of your discussed books. Thank you🍂Happy Victober🧡🍂🌼🍁
Vanity Fair is one of my favourite books, and one of the few I have read twice. Please give it another read.
I think it's definitely one I'll return to in the future :)
I read quite a bit but recently realized I haven't read many Victorian authors. This video has made me excited for the journey and has given me lots of ideas about what to read next. Well done!
Wow, a fantastic video. I hadn't heard of half the authors! I'll have a look in our local library for some of your 4 star reads they seem very interesting.
I just started _The Moonstone_ by Collins and like it. Looking forward to your video about him.
love this video! i always love hearing from people who are much better at book-things than i am. reading vilette right now, really enjoying it! my most recent read before that was middlemarch, which i also enjoyed, although i’m one of those people who is bad at criticism and therefore enjoys most things they read lol. lovely video again!
What a wonderful way to start Victober! There are so many authors that I need to discover. I have just started The Romance of a shop and very much looking forward to my reading experience. Anthony Trollope is my favorite Victorian author, you are so right in saying that he can be trusted. When I start one of his books I feel like meeting a friend again.
That's just it! :)
What a tour de force to start Victober with this. Wonderful. I have to stop fretting about your reaction to Eliot. Maybe you should put her right away for a decade and come back to her fresh then to see what you think. Meanwhile I need to try Dillwyn and Oliphant.
Thanks, Ros :) I'm afraid I don't think Eliot will ever be for me!
@@katiejlumsden never say never. But you are probably right.
I enjoyed this video! Thank you for showing some of the less well-known Victorian writers. I had not heard of many of these writers. As I commented on you Wilkie Collins video, I am reading “The Woman in White” at the moment. I might give “Lady Audrey’s Secret” a try as I see it is also in the “sensation novel” genre. Also, I really had a difficult time finding a copy of Craik’s “Olive”; since I enjoyed “Jane Eyre” I thought I’d read this novel since you recommended it!
Thanks so much for this list and I guess I would say my favorite Victorian author is George Giseing and I say that because I have read two of his books The Odd Women and New Grub Street and I loved them both..
I think we all knew who would make it into the number one spot. I have similar opinions about Arthur Conan Doyle and Wilkie Collins, and as I make my way through Anthony Trollope I become furthermore impressed by his work. Otherwise, I am heartily impressed with this video. There's so many folk listed to go and explore, as it transpires I've only navigated towards the popular Victorian authors.
Thanks for such an interesting, informative video! Dickens, Trollope and Gaskell are amongst my very favourite authors, but I would include Joseph Conrad too (though he is more Edwardian than Victorian). I hope you can get an opportunity to read more of his work - he is an astonishingly good writer.
Thank you for your wonderful videos. You have given me great recommendations. Your excitement for Dickens prompted me to read David Copperfield. I now love Dickens as well. First author that makes me laugh out loud.
I enjoyed your classification of these authors and your reasonings for how and why they were placed in your list. I was also very impressed by the amount you books you’ve read. Some of these authors I have never read myself and so I was interested to hear about. Although, I can’t agree with your placement of George Elliot, as I love her writing very much, especially Middlemarch and Daniel Deronda. However, I totally agree with you that Dickens deserves to be up at the top of the list, his range of characters and narratives is so impressive and his storytelling is amazing, full of wit and charm. Lastly, I am so glad to have found someone else who dislikes Dracula so much. I agree with you completely that it really isn’t a great novel, mainly in my opinion because stoker’s portrayal of Johnathan Harker as being quite clueless half the time gets mildly irritating after a while, in addition to the fact that the female characters are only there to represent fragility, being mere chattels or playthings to be controlled at will.
My TBR has just expanded massively!! Fantastic video.
Gaskell and Charlotte Bronte are firm favourites (I am start Shirley next). All the Gaskell novels I've read are just fantastic!! I'm on the fence with George Elliott, I did enjoy Middlemarch and Silas Marner, but didn't enjoy Adam Bede. I think I read Thomas Hardy too young and was really scarred by Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Maybe it's time to revisit his work? Trollope is the next author on my list... followed by another 20 from this video alone!! 😅
I read Tess quite young and didn't love it and got more into Hardy later with Far From the Madding Crowd - I recommend that one. I highly recommend Trollope, too - he's wonderful!
*gasps* no Dracula for Victober!! I was shocked. LOL Seriously, though, these days people aren't allowed to disagree, so I am fine with it, if baffled. I mean sure the book was a bit dull in some places, but Vlad Tepes! I did like the 1931 movie better, I enjoy movie Renfield far better really, and loved him in Love at first Bite and Dead and Loving it, both well done Dracula comedies.
My favorite Victorian book ever is The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. So brilliant and so misunderstood. The movies always get it so painfully wrong, it gripes my soul.
Bella L
This video was SO MUCH FUN! I found myself cheering my favorite Victorian authors on as you were going through your list. I just want to put a wee plug in for Bram Stoker as I've read Dracula twice and loved it even more the second time ... so had to chuckle when you announced he made the top (or bottom) of your ranking. 😄 Very happy to see Wilkie Collins made it at number 23 ... my favorite number and he has had my heart since "The Woman in White" came into my life. I'm really looking forward to your video on him. He lived a strange life, did he not? For me, it kind of makes his writing even more impressive knowing his background. So happy to see the 3 sisters made it in the top ten! "Tenant" was pretty mind blowing (again, much has to do with the author and our impression of her). As for Dickens ... awhile ago you either did a video on "Our Mutual Friend" or you mentioned the book in a broader sense in a video on Dickens; either way, I found a lovely copy at a used bookstore (I can't read Dickens in anything but an old book) and plan to read it this winter!!! Let the cold weather commence!
Thanks very much! Wilkie Collins is sort of fascinating. He is very hit and miss for me, but when he's good, he's amazing! I hope you like Our Mutual Friend :)
It's the Dickensian aspect.
A great start to Victober! Thanks for the list. I’m now canceling my nonessential plans this month so I can just read!
I'm enjoying your videos so so much!!
I'm rather early on in my victorian journey, but I'd say Thomas Hardy is my favourite so far.
This has given me so many ideas and I'm sure I'll refer back to it 😊
Thanks very much :)
omfg yes. Whenever people are saying they're reading Dracula, I have this urge to tell them to read Carmilla instead. The prose is so much better and ended up being a more suspensful, romantic and melodramtic read, which is what I usually look for in vampire stories. Carmilla came out twenty five years before Dracula as well! A really underrated novella, so I'm so glad to see an author-booktuber singing Fanu's praises.
Right?! Carmilla is just amazing and so much better than Dracula.
Thanks for this video 🙏. So interesting. I already know I will listen to it many times 🤗
This will be such a great reference list to return to. I loved hearing all your reasoning 😊
Wow - so good! Thank you Katie. I'm reading Hard Times right now - amazingly clever - I can see why you love him.
Awwww!!! George Eliot is my favorite! 💗💗💗 😂 AND the Brontës, Anthony Trollope, Thomas Hardy and Margaret Oliphant.
Fantastic summary! However, I don’t agree regarding Dracula - loved it! Sometime, would love to see a video about why you did not like it - that would be interesting.
Eternally long videos for an eternally long Victober. Just perfect 🍁
Thank you so much for this! I have read and enjoyed one or two books each by several Victorian authors, but I appreciated being introduced to others I have never read or even heard of. I put several of the Elizabeth Gaskell novels you discussed on my TBR. Have you ever read "To Say Nothing of the Dog" by Connie Willis? It's a time travel comedy (set largely in the Victorian era) and it takes its inspiration from Jerome K. Jerome's Three Men in a Boat. It's the funniest book I have ever read and though I liked Jerome's book, I found Willis's book vastly more entertaining.
The hair throughout this video is great. Victorian hair is fantastic. Love this list!
Haha, right?!
You've said it all, Katie, what's left for me to add? Nothing, except to say I'm reading The Mayor of Casterbridge, and Marian Withers, for Victober. Also I am watching the 1983 adaptation of Jane Eyre, which I'm enjoying-I thought the 2006 video was superb, too. I sure like your take on authors and books, thanks! Oh, yes, Jane Eyre got me started into classic literature, too. I've preordered your new book as a personal, to me, Christmas gift, even though I cannot open it until March! It's supposed to be released in the US February 28th.
Thanks so much, Larry!
I'm a lifelong reader of everything but Victorian fiction and falling in love with it now.
"Should I try something else by Bram Stoker?". I love that he followed up 'Dracula' with a novel called 'Miss Betty'. I don't suppose his writing improved any, but it sounds more like your kind of thing. I've always wanted to check out 'The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland'. Enjoyed this video; will be returning to it with pen in hand.
One day, perhaps, I'll try something else by him . . .
I admire your insight 🌸
Wuthering Heights is not even a book, it's a complete and utter force of nature...I felt absolutely knocked off my feet after reading it, I was simply hypnotised and mistified. That book is magical! Other-worldy stuff
Awesome! Thank you so much for this list.
Wow…very impressive! I think I’m more fond of authors who are reminiscent of the Victorians era than🎉 I am of Victorian novels themselves. I’m thinking of E.F. Benson, Barbara Pym, and authors of that ilk. Of the books mentioned, I most enjoyed The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Vanity Fair, Three Men in a Boat, Middlemarch and Dracula. My two favorite Novels are Great Expectations and The woman in White. Have always wanted to read Trollope.
I remember reading Mary Barton by Gaskell in grad school and enjoyed it. Agree with Dickens!
I often find it ironic (and slightly depressing) how my two favourite Victorian authors are ones who died young and from whom we didn't get many novels: Emily Brontë & Oscar Wilde 🧡💛🧡
Anthony Trollope is fast on his way to becoming my third favourite (The majority of my next year's Victorian TBR is by him) and my love affair with Victorian Literature pretty much started with Charles Dickens so he's up there too :D I'm starting The Pickwick Papers tonight.
While book tastes are subjective, your verdict on George Eliot makes me sad. Middlemarch was a book that changed my life when I read it, aged 40. I think you might enjoy Eliot when you're older
I would like to recommend Alexander Dumas. My daughter and I have read 18 classics so far and my favorite is The Count of Monte Cristo. We also loved The three Musketeers. I also love Charles Dickens
Dumas was French and therefore not under Queen Victoria’s rule. I want to try his books but I haven’t gotten to him yet.
I have to say Charlotte Bronte is number one as Jane Eyre is my favorite book of all time. Next would be Anthony Trollope, Wilkie Collins, and Elizabeth Gaskell. This took a lot of effort on your part and I really appreciate it.
individuals are so funny because my two favorite victorian authors, while a bit basic choices, are george eliot and dickens!! and yet they are on opposing ends of your ranking! i love how people can have such different experiences with books! makes for a more interesting world :)
Books are just so subjective, aren't they? :)
I KNEW IT. I knew that somewhere out there in this wide world, there existed another classic literature reader who also doesn't like George Eliot. I cannot stand her books (except Daniel Deronda, and even that one was hard to connect with), but all my other classics friends look at me like I'm such a philistine.
You're not alone! She's just really not for me.
Really loved this, so many authors I need to discover. Do you have any recommendations for getting books by some of the lesser well known authors?
So, Project Gutenberg, or Amazon's free kindle editions are good for out of print Victorian novels. There are also lots of publishers like Goodwords or Hardpress who print out of print classics.
@@katiejlumsden brilliant thank you 😊
Eh! Treasure Island dull?
Enjoyed your list. Thanks for posting.
LOL William Morris got lucky he's a good artist. News From Nowhere sounds really interesting though. This was such a cool video! I love getting these thoughtful but brief reviews of each author, many of which are of course new to me. I'll definitely have to watch this again when reading from some of these authors to sort of adjust my expectations of their writing. Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
Yeah, he definitely should have been lower on the list :')
Happy victober !! This is such a fun way to start victober and makes me want to make my own ranking of authors :)
Thank you for introducing me to so many authors I've never heard of! I think I've read at least 1 book by 19 of these authors. If you want a so bad it's funny Victorian novel and author check out Guy Fawkes or The Gunpowder Plot A Historical Romance by Ainsworth. I'm curious which Victorian nonfiction writers you've read. Victorian history books and biographies can be hilarious with their asides about academic rivals.
Haha good to know . . .
Interesting. 2Star authors, Capt Marrayat Children of the New Forest i read a few years ago, but enjoyed it, and still am enjoying it, even though it is fading into the distance now. Could it be a lad/male thing? Or a historical novel? Whatever next!?
Everyone's favorite literary savant. 🙂💗
Number 2 is a big surprise! I had started to wonder whether I had listened carefully enough at the bottom of the list, when the name came up … :) Will need to read.
Oh, I LOVE Gaskell so much. I highly recommend her books :)
Totally agree on Flatland and Heart of Darkness- both left me cold. Wilkie Collins is actually one of my favourite Victorian authors so he’d be up there with Trollope, Gaskell and Dickens for me. And unusually I prefer Anne out of the Brontë sisters- but love them as a whole body of work. I’ve started Thou art the man by Mary Elizabeth Braddon for this Victober and it’s started off pacy and instantly grabbed my attention- I do like her writing xx
What a lovely idea, I enjoyed this video tremendously and you've read so many! I need to think about my list, which is quite a bit shorter, and will do a bookstagram post about it.
This was great fun, though I wish you had used captions. A number of these authors I have not heard of, and you sometimes spoke so fast that I couldn’t make out their names. Who was #2 for example?
There's a full list of all the authors in the description, in the order they're mentioned :)
@@katiejlumsden just started listening to Wives and Daughters. 😊
We share the same top 2! I may get there with Trollope but I have only read 2 of his so far.
Give William Makepeace Thackery another chance! Becky Sharp in Vanity Fair is the amazingly quick witted and sassy. 💁♂
Great video! I just ordered Heartsease by Charlotte Yonge I hope to read this month:) It will be a 1st by this author for me.
Not widely known these days is the wonderful (and still interesting) music criticism of Shaw. Worth looking up especially if you are a musician or like the classical music. Vanity Fair is worth rereading - Becky Sharp (the main character) is unforgettable. I recumbent The Secret Agent by Conrad. Kipling I find problematical in terms of imperialistic attitudes. There is a wonderful statue of Oscar Wilde in Dublin. Of course painted in bright colors. Again (from my comment in another video) 5 extra points for Anne Bronte. She deserves to be better known.
I liked Adam Bede because it involved faith. It had a female evangelist. It's been a while since I've read it but the feelings have stuck with me of how much I loved it. I've read all around the Brontes but I do want to read them. It doesn't seem fair that some of these Victorian authors wrote lots of books while poor Jane Austen, my fearless leader, Oh captain, my captain, only wrote so few. And when she had an opportunity to write, she couldn't. Those five years she was set adrift with her parents in Bath and other watering holes threw her into a desert. Just what she could have done if she had been stable during that time. Elizabeth Gaskell has written some that come close. I love Cranford and Wives and Daughters. I've read Ruth and Mary Barton and was very angry at the end of them.
I did like Dinah in Adam Bede, actually - she and Seth were the characters I wished the novel had focused on more! I do so wish Jane Austen could have lived into the Victorian period and written about society at the time. It would have been wonderful.
I disliked Vanity Fair as a young person, but I find it really fascinating now. (The main character is not an always likeable heroine, and I don't think that I was ready for that when I first read it.) I can imagine you might appreciate more now that you did when you were young!
Yeah, I think I need to give it a reread sometime :)
Just brilliant, Katie! Until I started watching you, I didn't know anyone in my "real" life that loved Dickens and Trollope and Jane Eyre like I did. Thank you for this massive list which I will save for future reference. I hated both Vanity Fair and Dracula, so you are not alone. Re: RL Stevenson--try *Kidnapped*--so much better than Treasure Island. Re: GBShaw--he wrote an interesting novel *The Unsocial Socialist*, which is interesting from a political & gender perspective. Looking forward to your take on Wilkie Collins--jury's out on him for me, too.
I must try Kidnapped, and The Unsocial Socialist sounds very up my street, so I must read it!
I love Emily and Charlotte Bronte the most, but Gaskell, Dickens (and Eliot) are very high on my list as well. :) I still have not read any Gissing or Trollope, it's on my list for next year ;)
This was everything !!! 🎉❤
Great Expectations is awesome
I love Dracula. I will probably read it again this month. I started listening to the Island of Dr Thoreau. I did get the Lady in White and Far from the Maddening Crowd. I did order Hide and Seek. I love the picture of Dorian Gray. I don't know if this is victorian, but I love his opera Salome.
That's some list of authors and I'm green with envy you've read so much of them!Do you ever go outside the English Victorian canon for books written by men and women of other nationalities at that time period,not including Scottish,Welsh and Irish figures?✨
Oh yes, often. This video was just a ranking of Victorian, so British and Irish, authors 1837-1901, but I've also really enjoyed lots of 19th century French, Brazilian and Japanese novels. I'm probably more internationally read in the 20th century, though, to be honest.
So many authors to check out!
That was fun ... would love to have a heated argument with you. :-) No idea who'd be at the top were I to attempt this exercise, but I'd take great delight in putting Thomas Carlyle right at the very bottom.
Haha I didn't rank him as I was leaving out non-fiction, but yes. I've read quite a bit of his non-fiction and he wouldn't rank highly XD
@@katiejlumsden Sartor Resartus is the most excruciating novel I can think of offhand ... please spare yourself the experience!
Gaskell is my favourite for sure, as for least favourite I think it would have to be Emily Bronte, but I haven't read Wuthering Heights since I was 16 so when I reread it that will probably change. I feel like I haven't read enough Victorian literature to have a least fav yet, so far most have been between 3-5 stars.
Gaskell is just glorious. I love Wuthering Heights but it is totally not for everyone :)
Yes, to me Dracula exemplifies when a great great idea is sullied by a botched execution; As for Thackery, my only experience is the Kubrick film, Barry Lyndon (which I saw for the first time just the other night), which indeed is almost a masterpiece though quite obviously the story lacked a well-defined conflict and resolution. I also saw a film version on Jane Eyre the other day - which currently I'm reading, albeit slowly - and was only slightly disappointed to discover that there was no vampire residing at Thornfield.
Another great video
dracula is just not good hahaha
loved the vid! you just introduced me to a bunch of new names i need to check out!
I loved the movie Vanity Fair
Curious what you might think of Arnold Bennett, a surprising absentee on the list.
I thought most of his books were 20th century, not Victorian? He's not an author I've got to yet, though.
@@katiejlumsden My bad. But my discovery of his works has been a real delight to me, and I cannot help but wonder if you might not equally feel the same, my three literary heroes being Trollope, Gaskell and Dickens, who come so high on your list.
Very informative - you've really read a wide selection of authors.
I tried George Moore; I can't say I liked _Esther Waters_ very much - one of my few DNFs.
You should read more Stevenson - try _The Master of Ballantrae._
I suppose you need to be British to be a Victorian author (Joseph Conrad notwithstanding), but American Henry James was essentially an ex-patriot to England in the Victorian period and he was extremely prolific. Why doesn't he count?
Yeah, so Victorian tends to refer to British and Irish authors, history, etc. Joseph Conrad lived most of his life in England, I believe, so I tend to count him as British. Henry James is the same, you're quite right (always get the impression he considered himself at a fair bit Britain!), and I'm annoyed that I forgot to include him in this video. I've only read The Turn of the Screw. He'd probably be somewhere around the 40 mark in my ranking.
I can't believe you called George Eliot's books boring! I have read Mill on the Floss, Adam Bede, Silas Marner and Daniel Deronda, and i love everything i have read from her! She appeals to me like only Hardy does. Her writing is beyond gorgeous! I am saving Middlemarch for last, so i have Clerucal scenes (this victober), Felix Holt (next year, maybe), Romola (next year definitely) and Middlemarch to go. I am giddy about how much fun it will be to read her best novel in the end.
My favourites would be :-
1- Thomas Hardy
2- George Eliot
3- Charlotte Brontë
4- Anthony Trollope
5- George Gissing
I have read a lot of Dickens and have always liked his works, but he was such a terrible person in real life (beat and shot his dogs, horrible husband, absent father). Plus the themes and the characters in his books are too kiddish. Everythibg gets tied up with a nice bow. Makes me feel like i am reading children's books. Plus, his heroines are really dull and similar to each other.
Could you tell me more about George Eliot, you spoke with such a passion that I'm interested now!! Could you tell me a little about the books you loved the most?
I disagree with you about DIckens (I would caution against judging someone's work based on their personal life) but I absolutely do agree with you about George Eliot. I think she's fantastic. Wait until you read "Middlemarch!" After I finished reading it I turned back to the first page and started all over again. Amazing!
And this is why books are great - because there is something for everyone! I just can't get on with George Eliot's writing style, but I know that's just my personal experience. Dickens may not have been a great person but I can separate his novels from his personality and I love them. I don't know what Dickens books you've read but I'd also add that the heroines are much more interesting in his later novels than his earlier novels.
Jessica, if you haven't seen Kate Howe's videos about George Eliot, she loves her a lot and has some fantastic content about her.
@@katiejlumsden Thank you Katie! I'll look her up!! You're a sweetheart 💕
be sure to read Felix holt. Hint--radical refers to other than politics. Romola is the #1 novel on my personal goat list, although mordecai puts deronda up there as well.
Thanks!
Thanks!
Thackeray’s Vanity Fair is one of the greatest books in any era/genre/geography. Forget what you felt about it at 14 and please do reread.
PS: Spot on about George Eliot :).
It's definitely on my list to reread sometime soon :)
@@katiejlumsden or you can save time and watch the brilliant 2018 ITV adaptation :). And the 1998 adaptation is also very good . Just stay away from the 2004 Mira Nair film with Reese Witherspoon.
You are wonderful
I would have to move Lewis Carroll up higher. Very many of this famous scenes in Alice are skewering well known at the time but trite Victorian moral sermons and homilies. To appreciate his satire, it's almost necessary to get an annotated edition. This guy, at his best, outshines Oscar Wilde at this sort of thing.
Nice list +1 for Gaskell.
I loved Dracula for like the first 80(?) pages. The stuff with Johnathan in the castle as he realizes what the Count is...then the story switches to Mina and loses all its momentum. There was some good stuff towards the end, but I feel Dracula would've been a fantastic short story. As a novel...it could've been better. Still better than Stoker's short stories. Now THOSE are sleep-inducing.
Yeah George Eliot. I know what you mean. She uses the novel format to write brilliant, intelligent essays about life, the world, etc. She does not stick to formulaic, paint by numbers, plot lines and doe-eyed, livestruck people in every page. Jane Austen she ain't. Nice list!
Charles Reade was very popular in his time but nobody remembers him now (I think Orwell mentions him in his famous essay on Dickens) so it's not surprising that he doesn't get a mention here. There is also Edward Bulwer Lytton, another incredibly well-known author in his time but now totally forgotten. I am still mystified why anyone bothers with Trollope, my best guess is that they mainly stick with the Barchester stories and treat it as comfort reading, but I find him intolerably boring and even the very name conjures up acres of dull, lifeless prose. He's the literary equivalent of porridge, but maybe not quite as exciting.
Charles Reade and Edward Bulwer Lytton are two authors that are on my list but that I haven't managed to get to yet. I have read 28 Trollope books and love his novels very much. Each to their own :)
wow huge loss for bram stocker! i think amy levy might have written one other novel [alongside her poems!] called miss meredith? but i might be wrong... / it might be impossible to find ! happy victober ! :)
Oh my goodness, so she did - how did I not know this?!
@@katiejlumsden if you do find a copy i would love to hear about it !
Coming in at #47, the ONE, the ONLY, the comparable......It's George Elliot, AKA Ms. Evans. This is good, Katie, and what I especially like is that you make clear these are YOUR opinions, based on whether you get on with the author. The fact that Marianne is the only woman in the lowest ranks is telling. And between you and me, I don't think much of Dear Georgie either.
Gender is big, obviously. Some male authors, or certain books of male authors, just don't connect very well with women, it seems.
For example, I am SHOCKED at your low ranking for Conrad. He is one of my favorite authors, although HOD is far from my favorite. Give Victory, Chance, Lord Jim, The Secret Agent, The Shadow Line, Typhoon or Nostromo a shot. They are nuanced and multi-layered, but yes, they are mostly male-centric.
Addendum:
After I posted my note, I got to thinking about dates. It suddenly occurred that most of the Conrad works I mentioned are post-Vickie. A LOT of my favorite authors are early 20th century, so one has to be careful in labelling things as Victorian, when they are not. Sorry for MY confusion. And I agree with your high rankings for Hardy and Dickens. And I need to read the other Bronte sisters and give Lizzie Gaskell a shot.
Thanks for another enthusiastic video.
I have read more male than female Victorian authors, which is one reason why there are more male authors at the bottom and probably in other places on this list. I'd like to read more Conrad, certainly.
Good list of authors, but I disagree with your ranking system.