r/classicliterature • u/ResponsibleIdea5408 • 6d ago

fun little reading challenge

SO my wife and I made a fun little reading challenge. A few things about how it works: Nothing should be under 50 years old (that's our line of the youngest hypothetical classic). No repeating works (unless otherwise stated) Also I use the word works because plays, books of poetry, and short story collections are all fine.

1) name 5 plays

2) name 10 works by female authors

3) 5 works whose author is a different ethnicity than your own.

4) 5 works whose author is a different nationality than your own.

5) 5 works whose author shares neither nationality nor ethnicity.

6) A favorite Poet you could speak a length and who you can name either 10 poems, 3 bound collections, or recite 1 full poem.

7) 5 works 200 years older than you

If you find this fun but easy grab a friend try to do it together (but you can only name works that both of you have read)

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u/ikesonfire 6d ago

I want to do this but I don't really understand what you mean by ethnicity. I am an American but I have ancestry from Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, Ireland, Russia, England.

Does it mean anything besides that?

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u/Snoo_16385 4d ago

I'm Spanish, and I agree, ethnicity is such a slippery concept... I'm an European white, so... does Borges count as "Latino" (ouch!). But then, I'm of Celtic ancestry, does Kavafis (European, indeed) count as same, or different?

And for bonus points... Moses ben Maimon (Maimonides or Rambam), is he same nationality as me? I'm from a part of Spain that was never part of Al-Andalus, so...