EL James and Dan Brown have been pitted against some of the greatest names in literature, including Joseph Conrad and Fyodor Dostoevsky, in a search to find America’s most loved novel. The two are among those vying for attention on a list arrived at after a public vote by US public service broadcaster PBS.
Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell’s vision of totalitarianism, is pitched alongside Brown’s less taxing conspiracy bestseller The Da Vinci Code, in a list of 100 novels to feature in The Great American Read, an eight-part TV series that will conclude in the autumn with a second poll to find the nation’s favourite book.
Celebrities, authors and notable Americans will champion their favourite books on the list in a series of two-hour documentaries exploring concepts common to some of the titles. Whether this will mean Big Brother’s penchant for torture in Orwell’s masterpiece shares an episode with EL James’s bondage bestseller Fifty Shades of Grey, rather than Margaret Atwood’s attack on institutionalised misogyny The Handmaid’s Tale, remains to be seen.
British authors make a strong showing on the list, which features children’s books as well as adult classics and contemporary bestsellers. Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels and Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations are all included. Among the more contemporary authors are Douglas Adams with The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Zadie Smith with White Teeth and Ken Follett with The Pillars of the Earth.
How many of the books were chosen for their film adaptations rather than the original novel is a moot point, judging by the number attached to blockbuster film franchises. Into this category fit Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight Saga, JK Rowling’s Harry Potter series, JRR Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and The Godfather by Mario Puzo.
America’s fundamentalists will be less pleased to see books they campaign to have banned from schools in the top 100. JD Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, Toni Morrison’s Beloved and Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird are all regulars on annual lists of banned books. The Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis should act as a sop to their sensibilities.
The guru of free market economics Ayn Rand has been voted for inclusion in the list, with Atlas Shrugged. Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist will please those of a more spiritual bent, though how the likes of James Baldwin (Another Country) and John Irving (A Prayer for Owen Meany) would feel about being judged alongside an author described as “a purveyor of ‘inspirational’ schlock” is an amusing thought.
The series has been positioned as a nationwide summer reading initiative. The producers of the series, which airs from 22 May, claim it will be “the most expansive national celebration of books and reading aimed at engaging multi-generational readers across platforms ever created”.
Announcing the top 100 PBS’ president and CEO Paula Kerger said: “With The Great American Read, we will leverage our combined broadcast and digital presence, along with the strong local connections of PBS member stations, to inspire a national conversation about beloved books and the power of reading.”
