2007-01-11 14:38:28 · 9 answers · asked by whatrdreams 1 in Arts & Humanities ➔ Books & Authors
Anything by Thomas Pynchon.
2007-01-11 14:49:43 · answer #1 · answered by S K 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I'm not sure what you mean by 'hardest' but of everything I've read that can be considered American literature, I have to tell you the MOST difficult to actually get through was Gone With the Wind. Back in my youth when I started a book I would stubbornly plod my way through to the bitter end even if I hated everything about the story or the writing. As I've aged I've learned there are a whole lotta books I would like that don't make me want to gouge my eyes out.
2007-01-11 23:02:17 · answer #2 · answered by fleurpixie 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Some not-so-light reading.
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne
As I Lay Dying, Absalom Absalom, The Sound and the Fury, Light in August, and maybe a few other titles by William Faulkner
everything by Thomas Pynchon (And I do mean everything- This is THE guy to start with if you want obscurity with your American Lit.)
everything by William Burroughs
Tropic of Cancer and other titles by Henry Miller
everything by William Gaddis
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Some Henry James titles have a reputation for being tough, but I've never read him so I can't name names
All that leaps to mind for now.
Oh, it may be worth mentioning that T.S. Eliot, Emily Dickinison, Walt Whitman, and Hart Crane are very difficult poets...
2007-01-11 23:02:42 · answer #3 · answered by william q 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Probably The Sound and the Fury, by Faulkner - as most people get confused and turned off by the first section, told in the voice of Benjy, the mute retarded man, jumping without warning to different times, as he remembers small details (Caddy smelled like trees), leaving the readers to catch up on their own.
The stream-of consciousness style is hard for many to get into - but, once you do, this novel becomes one of the most rewarding ones in American Literature.
2007-01-12 06:39:09 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Anything by Faulkner though I'd consider Absalom, Absalom! far more complex than the Sound and the Fury! However if you are asking for something more generalized as opposed to a specific book than I would say Americans tend to consider simplicity difficult... look at anything by Stein.
2007-01-11 23:43:39 · answer #5 · answered by lilmisshelpful 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Not sure what you mean by "hardest" but I found a lot of the American Transcendentalism stuff, like Thoreau and Emerson, very difficult to comprehend. Very deep.
2007-01-11 22:45:07 · answer #6 · answered by Beachman 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Anything by Herman Melville, John Irving, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Dan Brown - on any team chosen to 'bore for America', these are shoo-ins.
2007-01-11 23:43:06 · answer #7 · answered by irish1 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I changed my answer...
I'm going to agree with the others and say Pynchon...But only because he was a loony bird!
Even though it's not really hard for me... I can understand how some would feel that way. I speak loony bird very well!
2007-01-11 23:47:18 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Faulkner The Sound and the Fury
2007-01-11 23:25:49 · answer #9 · answered by Ana 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋