n other words (and yes, I'm being partially flippant again), canon exists to make the nerds giddy when they make those connections.

This is fine by me.

I would say Steph is me, but she doesn't like Willa Cather.

it's his use of the language and the structure that turn me off.

Quite honestly? I much prefer watching a performance of Shakespeare, rather than reading one of his plays.

I love Willa Cather. And Melville for that matter.

it's his use of the language and the structure that turn me off.

That's exactly what turns me on about it.

I'd rather read Shakespeare mostly.

Another canon note: Much of what we consider literature today wasn't considered particularly literary or High Culture when it came out. Shakespeare, obviously, was pure popular culture. Ditto for Twain and Dickens. The novel itself was generally considered a rather low form of women's entertainment for a long time. (Until men started writing them. Aha, sexism again!)

Quite honestly? I much prefer watching a performance of Shakespeare, rather than reading one of his plays.

Me too, but in the absence of having say, MacBeth, showing on a dark and stormy night or at Halloween, I'll read it.

I still flee screaming into the night from Faulkner,

As do I. But yes, there were things that were shoved down my throat in high school that I really didn't like. Around my junior year in college my tastes had changed a lot, and there was canon, listing a whole bunch of things that I found myself liking the second time around. Faulkner managed to bore and irritate me both times and I haven't tried him since.

I love Willa Cather.

I remember disliking A Lost Lady so much that I've never approached Cather again.

And Melville for that matter.

Two words that drove me away from Melville forever: Moby. Dick. I understand intellectually what he was doing with it, style-wise and theme-wise, but DAMN.

This time? Or the four other times in the past two months, Juliana?(This time about 800 and something... this is it, though. If the big "reveal" doesn't just knock my socks off, Wallace's troubles may be over soon. Nobody makes me do that for no reason. Nobody. And he'll be expecting a wheelchair to be an agent of death, anyway, creating paralyzed assasin squads.) Ha. Now, I'm Inigo Montoya. "You wasted my summer. Prepare to die."

I remember disliking A Lost Lady so much that I've never approached Cather again.

That's it? You didn't even try My Antonia?

Two words that drove me away from Melville forever: Moby. Dick. I understand intellectually what he was doing with it, style-wise and theme-wise, but DAMN.

Moby Dick rocks! Whole sections of it are like an episode of Justice League. Look at all the harpooners as super heroes. Look at the HoYay with Ishamel and Queequeeg. Consider the wildass funkiness of the Church of the Whale (that early scene before they set sail). It's got a one-act play in the middle. Ahab is a bad mammajamma, who sets his will against the world. Think of it as a wicked exercise in gnostic theology (Melville did - at least in part).