Boxall's 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die discussion

The 1001 Year-Long Book Study 2023 is here! Our book for a year-long study has been chosen from a suggestion by Michelle . . . . Clarissa: Or the History of a Young Lady by Samuel Richardson.

Michelle wrote -- “Hi mods and everyone - I have a suggestion for a big book read for 2023 - from this TikTok post https://vt.tiktok.com/ZS8BSWdb7/ from [@]hernryeliot who is doing a readalong of Clarissa, or, the History of a Young Lady by Samuel Richardson.

“Apparently in 2023 the date of each letter lines up with the exact days of the week so it's a readalong by date! It's the longest novel written in the English language so extra motivation to read it will be nice! I'm going to do the readalong and thought other 1001 peeps might be interested, or it might make a good big read for the year.”

The reading schedule is for the entire year of 2023. The First Six Letters are written from January 10th to January 20th. The next 4 are written from February 20th to February 27th . So you have plenty of time to catch up!!

First published on January 1, 1748, Clarissa is the longest novel in the English language at over 950,000 words. In 2013, The Guardian ranked Clarissa as #4 on the 100 Best Novels Written in English, and the BBC, in 2015 ranked Clarissa 14th on its list of the 100 greatest British novels.

Clarissa was released in serialized form starting in 1747 and finishing in 1748. So this year marks the 275th Anniversary of the book’s publication.

I’ve read this too, although I don’t have it marked in Goodreads. I may have to find an epic to read in my own.

ooh. ok. I'm in.

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/auth... for various formats

Interesting, never heard of the book.

I’ve not heard of this book before. I want to participate. I’m looking forward to this!

I have ordered the book, since it will be a year read.

Amazon has several different versions for Kindle. I ordered all nine volumes in one for 99 cents. The formatting seems to be decent.

I love this! I’m going to join and have downloaded Clarissa on kindle.

I’m in!! This time I WILL do this!! 😂😍

I also got one of the 99 cent ones for Kindle. Hoping to get started once I finish a couple of in progress books

I’ve not heard of the book before, but it looks really interesting. I’m in! I like that it’s in the form of letters. I’m going to try to catchup by the end of March and then read by date/month (cross fingers!)

This perfect for me: I'd started reading it in January anyway! Glad that the big book this year isn't one I've already read.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnk0F... This video was shared on another group I'm a part of, and I've been listening to it in pieces. It's about how to read and appreciate the book, discussion of the epistolary novel form, and and its historical context.

Apparently this book was a huge cultural phenomenon when it published, and is often present on greatest English novels lists.

Amanda wrote: "This perfect for me: I'd started reading it in January anyway! Glad that the big book this year isn't one I've already read.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnk0F... This video was shar..."

Thanks for that link, Amanda! I'll definitely watch the video as I get into the book.

no probs!

Amanda wrote: "This perfect for me: I'd started reading it in January anyway! Glad that the big book this year isn't one I've already read.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnk0F... This video was shar..."

Great video

Are there going to be other post about this book? I mean to respond on chapter x to x for instance?

Clarissa: January Letters 1 -- 6


Discussion is open!

Post your comments at -- Clarissa: January Letters 1 -- 6

Great! I can't wait to read this and discuss with you all!

And now that I've watched this Youtube video -- I feel a little silly that I'd never heard of this book before! This will be a great read.

i havent heard about it either and the writer was also unknown.

This is great for me. I wanted to read it last year and never got around to it, so it's already on my Kindle. See you at the discussion post!

Clarissa: February Letters 7 -- 10


Discussion is open!

Post your comments at -- Clarissa: February Letters 7 -- 10

Awesome! Glad we're doing this one officially, such a fun project! Check the TikTok account too, he's done a couple of updates since.

Really enjoying Clarissa so far, I like checking in each day to read that day's letters!

Thought I'd pop a link to the latest update video for those not regulars on TikTok, Henry Eliot is always lovely to listen to. This is from 11 April. https://vt.tiktok.com/ZS8Tr3w9W/

I’m very excited about this challenge. I just found the big book challenge link and ordered my ebook. This will be such an epic accomplishment!

How is everyone going with this epic read?

I'm enjoying it more than I expected, when I forget how long the book is and just read each letter as it goes, it's very entertaining!

Reading the letters on the day is a nice way to read the book, feels like real letters arriving...

I'm enjoying it as well, especially the language. It was a great choice for the year-long read!

Don't worry about falling behind. The final 4 months have fewer letters, and you will have time to catch up.

I just finished listening to the whole book as a Libravox audiobook. I'll have to revisit each section as needed for discussion, but if you're the sort of person who waits til a whole season of a show is out and then binge-watches the whole season, binge-listening to this one is not a bad approach. Some of the Libravox volunteers involved in reading this one are very good.

I'm so sad for Clarissa, this is not where I would ever think it would go. I have enjoyed this book so far and I think Richardson is an amazing author. epistolary is one of my favorite styles of writing. I read the Guernsey literary and potato peel society recently and loved that one too.

I finally read it. A very long and somewhat tiring "journey" through this book. But I am proud that I succeeded.

Oh my - I got so far behind with this. I am at 52%, but am still trying to finish it by the end of the year. I have a daily reading plan :)

I am generally liking it (mostly I'm fascinated by Richardson's use of the English language to say basically the same things over and over again in different ways - ha). It's just.so.long.

Is anyone else still plugging along?

I finally finished! Wow, what a hard slog that book was. I feel like I’ve read it twice because I had to keep re-reading passages to decipher the language. During the autumn I reread the entire third of the book between the elopement and the you-know-what scene because I realised my mind had been wandering the whole time and I realised I had NO clue what was going on.

I ended up giving it two stars. It should really be one star for its lack of any enjoyment factor, but I’ve bumped it up a star from the sheer endorphin release of persevering through and achieving the longest read of my life, when all I wanted was for Clarissa to hurry up and die from page 1. The only upside is the knowledge that for the rest of my life, no book I read will ever be as long or boring again.

My sentiments exactly, Lyndsey!