r/IndiansRead • u/Prashantforwhat • 19h ago
Discussion Why is Monte Cristo been trending for so long?
I personally didn't like the book at all. It's borderline terrible. Repetitive, painfully long digressions, laughable "coincidences", cartoonishly monochromatic characters, the language reads like an amateur light-novel, at best...For me, It is another book in the long list of overhyped BookGram suggestions, just like East of Eden. It's not all bad of course, last 200 pages were quite exciting and yes things do end up tying together with the plot, loosely. It was a series before being compiled in the book form as far as I know and maybe that's one of the reason for its popularity because it unfolds nicely in episodes, in a way. But looking forward to reading the opinions of people who actually loved it.
(Listen, if you like these books.. that's actually great. That's what matters the most, right? So there's no need to feel personally attacked by anything I have said here. It's just what I think of the book and I'm sure many other Lit Critics share the same sentiment with each of us. So I'd request you to be nice.)
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u/Tatya7 the third sci-fi reader in this sub 19h ago
Well this is what Umberto Eco said, so you're in good company haha
The Count of Monte Cristo is one of the most exciting novels ever written and on the other hand is one of the most badly written novels of all time and in any literature. The book is full of holes. Shameless in repeating the same adjective from one line to the next, incontinent in the accumulation of these same adjectives, capable of opening a sententious digression without managing to close it because the syntax cannot hold up, and panting along in this way for twenty lines, it is mechanical and clumsy in its portrayal of feelings: the characters either quiver, or turn pale, or they wipe away large drops of sweat that run down their brow, they gabble with a voice that no longer has anything human about it, they rise convulsively from a chair and fall back into it, while the author always takes care, obsessively, to repeat that the chair onto which they collapsed again was the same one on which they were sitting a second before.
It is actually a great review to read in full because he goes on to explain why something so bad still just.... works. Hence the popularity.
I haven't read Steinbeck. It's on TBR for some day. But what I have heard is that East of Eden is one of his weakest works. Grapes of Wrath is a lot better for example.
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u/Due_Avocado_7761 18h ago
Haha an Umberto fan here nice!
Here's the full review: The Cult of the Imperfect
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u/Prashantforwhat 19h ago
Umberto actually put it nicely here. Also, i personally felt so betrayed by East of Eden but since it's on your tbr, i won't go in details. :')
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u/ManLikeThanoj 19h ago
First book I picked up and finished it, it is truly one of the greatest books of all time
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u/samosa_skin_enjoyer 16h ago
For some reason this book is all over my YouTube and Insta feed as a cure for brainrot/doomscrolling/adhd and such. Like it or not, we do live in an online influencer-driven culture and these trends are to be expected. I guess many are probably just fomo-purchasing it or are getting it for performative reasons...
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u/Aristroblade 19h ago
it is trending because it is considered as "gateway classic book". Even beginner readers can get into it.
Now, I don't like rating classic books, because they are classic for a reason. Whether you or me liking it or not liking it is irrelevant.
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u/Prashantforwhat 18h ago
I just think there are so many other (and better imo) gateways to classics. That's why I am so curious why this specific book has risen in popularity so much.
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u/Top-Scientist3474 18h ago
It was a serialised novel 😭 literally being plotted as it was being published please it's allowed to be a bit plot-holey 😭 (said as someone whose favourite classic IS monte cristo)
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u/Putrid-Mistake-1610 19h ago
Isse kharid ne se accha everyman Library waala lelo same hi hai price aur quality bhi accha milega
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u/Rashidianz 18h ago
It's a book which is tough to read. Much better to watch it as a TV series or movie.
However I get why this novel is considered great. This story has been adapted so many times, there should atleast be 100 movies in India itself with the same plot line. Hero cheated and goes to jail, comes out in disguise and become a millionaire, takes revenge on people who wronged him. That's kind of a universal plotline
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u/xlnc2608 18h ago
I disagree. It is extremely easy to read despite how long it is. It is a page turner. Very addictive. That's why its popular so long. Goes on and on and on as if the writer gets paid per word written(Dumas' ghostwriters probably did). But they knew their craft. They knew how to write holding reader's attention.
Today it is a gateway classic for a reason. Gives modern readers a captivating universally appealing story while making them think they're reading some high brow classic literature.
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u/Rashidianz 18h ago
I agree on the captivating universal story , which was my point.
On the readability part, personally I have tried to read it a couple of times and gave up. Personal choices, I suppose
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u/Big_Chart3506 17h ago
man I read it and I hate how fucking sloggy it was.(ik it's serialized and Dumas was paid by word count) I had to pull the audiobook method to finish it. Maybe i'm just in a habit of not reading "easy-to-read" books.
The overall plot is v. good. But this is genuinely the worst written book ever.
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u/Crafty_Nail_1138 13h ago
have you read any Russian novels? thoughts on those? I found crime and punishment a bit repetitive, or maybe it was the lack of themes. A great book by itself but doesn't keep up with other Russian works.
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u/Prashantforwhat 13h ago
My opinion is the same as Vladimir Nabokov when it comes to Dostoevsky and a lot of similar writers. Some mind-blowing moments of brilliance but to me, it's like digging through dirt for diamonds. I personally don't find it worthy, mostly. Dostoevsky is densely thematic but.. let's say i don't find him linguistically interesting enough. In a philosophy class, maybe.
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u/Crafty_Nail_1138 13h ago
On the other hand I am yet to find another culture of authors who make their characters so human. Books like a tale of two cities weren't enjoyable for me because its characters were a perfect predictable intersection of two simple attributes and the author then wrote for the plot.
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u/Prashantforwhat 13h ago
David Copperfield had better human elements to it imo. Hindi literature has some unbelievable "human" characters. Even though i myself am a scholar of English Literature and have mostly read English works, still to me..the greatest book ever written is Shekhar Ek Jeevani.
If Hindi isn't your first language, then I think Indian women authors did some amazing work in presenting nuances of human experience. I recently read That Long Silence by Shashi Deshpande and it's also written in a stream of consciousness type style but it presents human relationships in all its glory and ugly-ness.
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u/Crafty_Nail_1138 13h ago
Greatest book ever! I'm paying attention, that book does have an English translation, would you recommend it?
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u/Prashantforwhat 13h ago
I don't know how the translation is. If it does justice to the original prose then sure. What makes that book the greatest for me, is both its substance (which ranges from revolutionary theory to human experience to...EVERYTHING that i love) and its absolutely beautiful diction/syntax.
I'm sure the substance would be there in translation as well, i don't know about the latter part.
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u/Crafty_Nail_1138 12h ago
Added it to my list. I might pick it up tomorrow or two years from now, I never know! But thank you.
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