Apparently your all a bunch of lying gits! Shame on you. 65% of people screened in a recent survey blatantly fibbed about reading the following books:
Those who lied have claimed to have read:
1. 1984 - George Orwell (42 percent)
2. War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy (31)
3. Ulysses – James Joyce (25)
4. The Bible (24)
5. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert (16)
6. A Brief History of Time - Stephen Hawking (15)
7. Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie (14)
8. In Remembrance of Things Past - Marcel Proust (9)
9. Dreams from My Father - Barack Obama (6)
10. The Selfish Gene - Richard Dawkins (6)
11. Ultimate Shaving Tips - Derren Brown(2)
Why you would lie about reading the Obama book I don’t know. I have of course read all these books several times in 4 different languages – at the same time. Honestly!
That is a FALSE accusation! I have a goatee too!
It just… doesn’t look good.
I remember at school a politics teacher asking what newspapers we had at home. About 70% of the class had the Times, Telegraph or Guardian, and not a single house took the Sun, Mail or Mirror!
He’s been asking the same question for 50 years, and astonishingly none of the highest circulation newspapers seem to be sold to children in his class. Remarkable!
I have honestly read only two of those books. I’d probably lie about the shaving tips though
Yeah, i have one too!
…AND read all those books backwards…why wouldn´t someone be honest about that?!
“In Remembrance of Things Past – Marcel Proust”
My philosophy tutor on my fine art course called this one the “philosophy pissing up the wall competition” book… it’s the last of 6 weighty volumes, and if you want to compare brain size with other insecure intellectuals you make out that you’ve read all six, when in fact most readers who attempted it probably went to sleep on page 10 of the first one.
I saw the movie instead… though I could be lying!
Ultimate shaving? Why would you lie about that? It’s only 49 pages.
I am raising my hand as one who HAS read the shaving tips of the great man himself. I learned much. Being a badger has to suck and never to meet Darren after the show come to mind.
Suddenly feeling the need for poached eggs.
I lied about Ulysses, but only for a university course. I read the first and last chapters, that’s pretty much the whole book right there.
Who the hell HASN’T read 1984? If you don’t read it, it’s MUCH harder to make angry fake-intellectual references to it every time the government does something you dislike.
The only one I have read from the list is 1984 and thats only because I went though a distopia book phase thing a while back. It depressed the heck out of me and I went back to Sir Pratchett’s collection of fine tomes for enquiring minds.
Poached eggs. Just when I thought the sudden addiction that afflicted me last November was cured I’ve been set back at least another few weeks …… and then it will be Easter, constant reminders of eggs = a few more weeks. AND because no instructions have been forthcoming from Mr Brown I am still poaching imperfectly and having to rely on the guidance manual written by a certain Mr Oliver.
I admit I’ve not read any of those books, but I have read the shaving tips post and enjoyed it so much that I’m going to scent out G.F. Trumpers next time I’m in London.
aaargh Katherine!!!
I was doing so well too…
I tried to read the bible once, and got to a brilliant bit in Leviticus where god said ph34r m3 n00bz quite thusly:
“And I will break the pride of your stubbornness, and I will make to you the heaven above as iron, and the earth as brass”
OT God is brilliant! Hilariously evil with *so* much style. I stopped about there because people started begetting and just wouldn’t stop.
There is a very good description of a pair of buttocks in Midnight’s Children. That’s literally *all* I can remember. How daft.
Why in heck isn’t anyone lying about reading Umberto Eco? I’ve seen a bunch of these booklists recently and nobody has any love for Foucault’s Pendulum, which is one of the best books ever. Oh yeah also href=”http://www.amazon.co.uk/Master-Margarita-Mikhail-Bulgakov/dp/0330351346/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1236363757&sr=1-3″>The Master and Margarita</a. It has the devil in it.
Now, back to wondering: swirl in a dab of vinegar or let the egg sort itself out? Slight vortex or still water? Oh how we are tormented.
Lameness.
The Master and Margarita
I got halfway through 1984. Gave up in June!
Umberto Eco? Name of the Rose! A book so good that Iron Maiden wrote a song about it.
I am surprised about the Selfish Gene. If you’re going to lie about a Dawkins book, make it Ancestor’s Tale.
I don’t think I have ever had poached eggs so I am immune to cravings for them. Are they super awesome or something?
SGC: Never had a poached egg! You have never lived.
Please do share. How do I poach it? Why is it awesome? Is it all gross and runny?
I’ve never had a poached egg, either.
See how the people are crying out for instruction!
The two books I have actually read!
10. The Selfish Gene – Richard Dawkins (6)
1. 1984 – George Orwell (42 percent)
Or am I lying….?
Two books I have read are:
The Broons Adult Edition
The Albeano
I highly recommend them
ultimate shaving tips – by derren – is that a real book??? I think everyone has had george orwell read to them in there school days but been asleep whilst in the process – maybe phillis has read it as he seems to have a fasination with robots –
I have a what with what?
SGC: A perfectly poached egg makes a simple yet tasty meal; done badly it is an unappetising mess. You see the need for perfect poaching instructions? I would not dare to presume to attempt my own instructions here but will continue to live in hope that Derren will one day condescend to provide them. Perhaps he will devote a chapter in his new book to passing on these much demanded tips. Perhaps he himself is waiting for instruction from the little cafe next door to Trumpers that he visits post perfect shave.
I don’t know if you should really follow Derren Brown’s instructions for things, Tash. I mean, I saw this TV show where a guy followed his instructions and ended up cowering on the floor begging for mercy because he thought he was stuck in a box! And another one in which some woman followed his instructions and ended up seeing herself die in a car crash! I just want to poach an egg. I don’t want to die or live in an imaginary box forever.
There are no robots in 1984. And Phillis has an obsession with monkeys, not robots.
SGC – So you haven’t seen Michael Bay’s new movie remake of 1984 then? I liked the bit at the end, in room 101 with the 200 foot long robotic rats that turn into bulletproof trucks and explode. I think it adds something to that dreary George Orwell original…
Oh right! I forgot about that version. I think my favourite part was when Winston bursts into the room to rescue Julia and is all “Come with me if you want to live” and then O’Brien kind of melts his hands into weapons because he is made of LIQUID METAL.
you’re not your!
Best book I have ever read – The History of Glue. I couldn’t put it down!
A BBC article on this says “many people hope that pretending to have read heavyweight books will make them more sexually attractive.”
Well I’ve been reading Proust in my local library & for some reason, it hasn’t improved my love life.
Oh yes, lots find theirself sound so much more intelligent when they say that they have read those. The ones that indeed read them are not always honest either .. some just read them to impress others with their knowledge without ever having had one single personal interest in it theirselves.
It’s the people who do not depress theirselves with people’s lives who normally will read those books ..
I wont need to read them … not till I really can not find inspiration in my own inside towards things anymore. I like to work out things by myself to get it really down there .. so that it becomes a part of myself. So if I read books I will be picky … some will be a complete waste of time. Besides, if you do want to talk about it with people .. no one appears to know much about it (anymore) … or just seem to have memorized the back cover and has no opinion about it theirselves .. just follows standard opinion …
How would someone know if they lied on a survey? I think thats funny though I don’t think Iv’e ever read any of those books, don’t plan to either
Thing is… some of these books are well worth reading but it says something about people that they hold them up as somthing special out of some kind of academic snobbery (I blooming hated Ulysses for example)
I read loads and my (current) top recs would be American Psycho, The Passion, Possessing the Secret of Joy and
We need to talk about Kevin. (Just in case anyone was looking for something good to read…)
so many liars! and poor spellers. . .
but of course i am neither
Scratch that, Your guess is as good as mine who Knows… but if you find yourself scratching your nose you’re as ignorant as the rest of us
arent you