Friday Fives: If Only…
It’s Friday, and today’s Friday Fives question from Paper Hangover is: What are the FIVE novels you wish you had written?
Here are four novels, and the obligatory cheat. 🙂
To Kill a Mockingbird: This novel is so good–and I mean, SO good, who wouldn’t wanted to claim it for themselves? I would be extremely proud to have my name attached to this masterpiece. However, I fear that if I had written it, it wouldn’t be nearly as good as Harper Lee’s, so it’s probably a good thing she ended up with that one.
A Study in Scarlet: The first Sherlock Holmes story. I am a huge Sherlock Holmes fan (and if you haven’t seen the latest re-invention of Holmes in the form of the BBC series Sherlock starring Benedict Cumberbatch, you are SERIOUSLY missing out), not just for his amazing powers of deduction, but the whole character. What a genius creation! I would definitely want to be smart enough to have invented Sherlock Holmes.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone: Yes, I’m using the original British title because that’s what JKR called it, and I still for the life of me don’t understand why they changed it for the US (and elsewhere). The world that Rowling created in this series is such fun, it would be so cool to have come up with it, and to have been the one spending years exploring and writing backstory, eventually coming up with the novels that are so universally loved. A writer’s dream.
A Christmas Carol: Yes, the Dickens story. Simply because one of the greatest accolades I think an author can receive is when his or her work becomes ingrained into culture–not just in one country, but across the world. When your characters, like Scrooge, become archetypes, and your story is re-worked and re-told generation after generation. Mark Gatiss, I think, nailed it when he wrote the ending to the Doctor Who episode The Unquiet Dead, in which Charles Dickens meets the Time Lord. What is the burning question on Dickens’s mind when he finds out the Doctor has knowledge of the future? “My books–do they last? For how long?” The Doctor’s response, to Dickens’s obvious satisfaction: “Oh yes–forever!” I would smile too.
Thomas Lambdin’s Introduction to Biblical Hebrew: I know, this isn’t a novel, but it is, in my opinion, the best Hebrew grammar available. I can only dream of knowing Hebrew (and, indeed, languages period–this guy is a linguistic genius) as well as Lambdin, such that I could write a grammar like this.
What books do you wish you’d written? Check out Paper Hangover and see what other people have said.
[NOTE: As of when this article went up, the Paper Hangover article has not appeared. Keep checking back with Paper Hangover until it’s up.]
I loved To Kill a Mockingbird. Great list!
Thanks, Kirsten. I think I’ve said it before somewhere, but I rate TKaM as one of, if not *the* best novel ever written.
Oooh, this is a good one.
I’m curious – how do you know what the prompts are going to be for Friday 5s and RTW before they go up?
At first this was a bit of a daunting challenge, but the more I thought about it, the more fun it became!
For RTW, YA Highway will often tweet the topic on Tuesday evening. Not always, though. Make sure you’re following @YAHighway on Twitter. As for Friday Fives, Paper Hangover normally gives next week’s topic after the “Mister Linky’s Magical Widgets” thing. Next week’s Friday Fives will be: “Who are your FIVE favorite literary sidekicks?”
That’s the boring answer. The interesting answer is The Doctor visits me once a week and takes me forward in time to next Wednesday and Friday so I can see what the topics are. 🙂
Haha, answer #2 is much more interesting. xD
Thanks for that – I was sure I’d seen the Paper Hangover’s next week one somewhere, but I’d forgotten where. And with YA Highway I’m going to have to be much more attentive to their tweets. 😀
Shout out for HARRY POTTER AND THE PHILOSOPHER’S STONE!! That’s what it’s called here in Canada too. Never understood the change for an American audience, nor the switch from ‘crumpet’ to ‘English muffin’ (*shakes head*).
This is a really good list. At first I was thinking only YA because that’s what I mostly read, and then it dawned on me (yes, I’m slow) that there are so many other books out there that I wish I could have written. Only 5? Too, too difficult 🙂
Thanks, Jaime! I think the story goes that Scholastic (or Arthur Levine) didn’t think a US audience would understand (or they would be confused by) “Philosopher’s Stone.” But “Sorcerer’s Stone” makes NO SENSE! The Philosopher’s Stone is an actual, legendary alchemist thing. You can go to books written before 1997 and find references to it. JKR was not making that one up. The “Sorcerer’s Stone,” however, did not appear in literature (as far as I know) until the US edition of HP came out!
Scholastic weren’t the only ones to change the title. The French is called “a l’ecole des sorciers” (“at the sorcerer’s school” as I’m sure you understand, being Canadian and all…). Again, I could argue that French books on alchemy would have reference to the Philosopher’s Stone. In fact, let me quote from the French edition of book 1 (minus the accents, and yes, I have the first three HP books in French–not that my French is that good, but I was curious, and I thought it might help me practice my French):
Hermione poussa le livre vers eux pour qu’ils puissent lire ce qu’elle leur montrait:
<< Les anciennes recherches alchimiques avaient pour objet de fabriquer la Pierre philosophale, une substance legendaire dotee de pouvoirs etonnants....>>
As in the English, not only is the Philosopher’s Stone mentioned, it’s explained in case you don’t know what it is.
OK, I’ll get off my soapbox now. 🙂
😀 I had to jump in when I saw the French sentences lol
La Pierre philosophale is indeed a very well known concept and well represented in literature and movies 🙂
Thanks, Elodie–I was hoping you’d chime in. 🙂
TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD is definitely on my list, as is THE HUNGER GAMES and THE GIVER. Brilliant books!
“Simply because one of the greatest accolades I think an author can receive is when his or her work becomes ingrained into culture–not just in one country, but across the world.”
Same holds true for Sherlock. He and Scrooge are both great, iconic characters.
Nice list!
Why am I a number? That’s weird.
You’re right about Sherlock, Sarah. How cool to have created something like that! And I have no idea why some people’s names appear as numbers. It annoys me because I hate to think of you, and other friends, being treated as numbers. I’ve looked to see if it’s a setting in the comments, but I don’t see anything. Perhaps it’s WordPress’s way of forcing me to remember people’s names by their avatars. 🙂
I wish I’d written Harry Potter too. What a world! I give credit to J K Rowling for having an amazing and creative imagination.
The other ones I wish I’d written are: The Woman in Black by Susan Hill, Dracula by Bram Stoker, The Time Machine by HG Wells, and The Outsiders by SE Hinton. Four incredible and inspiring novels… and I wish I had the idea! *shakes fist*
No, I’m kidding. I’m glad I get to enjoy these books as a reader.
Would be nice to have ideas that are just as awesome though.
Dracula is another one of those iconic characters that every writer wishes they had come up with. And H.G. Wells was another genius. Good choices, Robin!
Who doesn’t wish they wrote the Harry Potter series?? LOL. That must have been such a fun world to work in and create. And I don’t understand the changes they made for American versions either. It certainly shows what the publishing world really thinks of American readers.
And A CHRISTMAS CAROL has almost become a cliche at this point, as far as how frequently the tropes are used. How nice would it be to have authored something that has become so beloved and overused? I would love for one of my books to become a cliche one day 😉
That’s what I thought, Crystal: did the publishers really think American kids are so stupid they wouldn’t get the idea of the Philosopher’s Stone from the story? I mean, seriously, how many British kids had ever heard of it before they read Harry Potter? Come ON!
I almost added Macbeth, Hamlet, or Romeo and Juliet to my list; Shakespeare is so oft-quoted, and his plots re-used. But it said “novels,” and I already used up one cheat. 🙂
I totally agree! I love “To Kill a Mockingbird”. It’s one of my all-time favorites, along with Harry Potter. 🙂 Great list!
Thanks, Krista!
I love a Study in Scarlet. Good Choice.
Here’s my Friday Fives.
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Thanks, Tyler-Rose. Conan Doyle had no idea what he’d started when he wrote that. I can only hope that one day my work will be so influential.
A Christmas Carol – what a wonderful choice! It´s such a timeless story 😀
It is. Thanks, Elodie! 🙂
Great selection of books. I think Harry Potter is on everyone’s “I wish” top ten list… Rowling is a plot and character genius.
Thanks, Isabel. Rowling certainly can plot a story. She spent years on it, sure, but her talent made it all work. I wouldn’t be surprised if, in years to come, her characters will become icons like Holmes and Scrooge.