A Bluffer's Guide to English Literature

Armed with well-chosen lines, one can fake erudition

1. ULYSSES by James Joyce:
	Were you aware that much of Joyce's unconventional spelling and 
	punctuation were typographical errors?

2. THE GREAT GATSBY by F. Scott Fitzgerald
	His working title was "Trimalchio in East Egg" - a nod to the 
	flashy party giver - but he preferred "Under the Red, White, and
 	Blue".  He was named for Francis Scott Key, you know.

3. A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN by James Joyce
	Don't let the "moocows" at the beginning put you off - promise 
	me you'll read as far as the bedwetting.

4. LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov
	He coined the term nymphet, a play on the word for a forest 
	sprite and the entomologist's term for incomplete metamorphosis. 
 	You know, Nabokov was an avid butterfly collector.

5. BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley
	Far more prophetic than Orwell, especially all that stuff media
 	control.

6. THE SOUND AND THE FURY by William Faulkner
	I don't know about you, but I would have appreciated Faulkner's
 	plan to color-code the Benjy section.  Too bad the publisher
 	wouldn't go for it.

7. CATCH-22 by Josephy Heller
	Imagine our lexicon if they'd stuck with the original title - he 
	wanted to call it "Catch 18"

8. DARKNESS AT NOON by Arthur Koestler
	Unlike Rubashov, I wouldn't have stayed so loyal in prison at 
	the hands of those fascist thugs.

9. SONDS AND LOVERS by D.H. Lawrence
	What really fascinates me is the vivid portrayal of English 
	mining life.  I didn't understand the rest.

10. THE GRAPES OF WRATH by John Steinbeck
	Oh, I read it in high school.  The John Ford movie was so much 
	better, don't you think?