Book meme goes around, comes around

Scott tagged me for the ongoing book meme:

1.  One book that changed your life?

Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, which I first read at about age six.  My decision to become a nineteenth-century specialist (albeit of the British variety) can be laid entirely at its door. 

2.  One book you have read more than once?

I've read and reread most major Victorian novels--Bleak House, Jane Eyre, Daniel Deronda, etc.  And the aforementioned LW, which was in tatters by the time I finally outgrew it. But, for the sake of the unexpected, I should note that I read Kathryn Hulme's The Nun's Story (1956) over and over again when I was in high school. 

3.  One book you would want on a desert island?

Bleak House. 

4.  One book that made you laugh?

I regularly giggle my way through the Flashman novels.  On a less positive note, playwright Arthur Laurents' Original Story by Arthur Laurents was certainly good for some appalled laughter (nobody comes off well in that memoir, least of all Laurents). 

5.  One book that made you cry?

I really can't think of one right now; perhaps I'm just hard-hearted...

6.  One book you wish you had written:

A tie between M. H. Abrams' Natural Supernaturalism and Richard D. Altick's The English Common Reader.  Yes, both are more or less dated now--it's the erudition, insight and breadth I admire. 

7.  One book you wish had never been written?

Like Scott, I'll have to go with Mein Kampf, closely followed by The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. 

8.  One book you are currently reading?

Heather Glen, Charlotte Bronte: The Imagination in History (OUP, 2002). 

9.  One book you have been meaning to read?

Er, let me introduce you to my 800+ item Amazon wishlist... 

If I have to narrow it down, I'll go for Kathryn Sutherland's Jane Austen's Textual Lives, since I've become more interested of late in adaptation. 

10.  Five people you want to tag?  (altered for symmetry)

Anyone who reads this can take up the burden. 

Comments

[Scott Eric Kaufman]

Concerning the Abrams, I almost said Mimesis for that very reason. But I couldn't pass up the opportunity to praise Greenblatt, since I so often, um, don't praise him and speak ill of his subject.

[dominic]

I bet the book you actually read most was your own, while you were writing it.

[beth]

One can outgrow Little Women? I'm still waiting for that day....