In terms of density and complexity of language, is Great Expectations considered to be a hard book to read?
Would it be in the same bracket as, for example, Crime and Punishment? Or Moby Dick? Or Blood Meridian in accessibility?
I haven’t read it yet and so I don’t have an opinion but I’m just wondering what those who have read it think?
I’ve read other books from Dickens and found them to be quite easy to read. A Christmas Carol is my favourite book of all time.
So yeah… Great Expectations?
by AHungerForKnowledge
5 Comments
If you are already familiar with Dickens, I wouldn’t say it’s a hard book to read. Personally, I didn’t enjoy it as much for the gothic vibe and characters not being quite as lovable as many of his other works; some people love it for this reason though.
I found it easy to read, like Crime and Punishment. Moby-Dick and Blood Meridian are bit more difficult, for different reasons
I think if you read other Dickens books and thought of them to be pretty easy, then Great Expectations will be okay.
There’s always room to try something new. As for me, I know I probably can’t read it because as much as I love reading classics, I barely understand them.
Like I read Frankenstein and had to google what the actual ending was as well as other scenes because I couldn’t figure it out.
I read it in 9th grade AP English if that helps place it in a difficulty tier at all? I remember it not being a difficult read. It was just long (at the time) compared to most things we had read for school up to then.
It’s slightly harder simply because it is 160 years old and the language has changed at bit Also so have customs and standards of behaviour. So it’s a slightly unfamiliar read. But the language is much more modern than many other Victorian books. In its day it was published as a serial in a newspaper, so it had broad public appeal