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Are the "classic" american novels any good?

I'm talking works by Kurt Vonnegut, Isaac Asimov, Joseph Heller, Stephen King, Art Spiegelman, Elie Wiesel, Daniel Keyes, etc. I haven't read any from these I've mentioned, I just have a bias that tells me they're overrated trash. I think it's quite common on american "classics" (not just books but also films) a certain political defeatism or instead a very liberal surface level criticism of "bad things" (Steinbeck stays winning). And then these barren ideas get louded as incredible literature classics (which makes sense as far as the rulling class's efforts for maintaining the status quo are concerned).

But as I've said this is my analysis a priori of having read such novels, but are there actually redeeming qualities on those novels that make them worthy of pursuing? I'm not that interested in style but I can see that some of the authors mentioned have that idiosyncrasy going for them. Also I'm sure some do get the problems they're writing about and maybe that analysis, even if it doesn't go all the way, is a good enough quality.

(I write this about american novels in particular but it clearly expands to other 'classics'. Unfortunately I have read stuff by that Orwell fella which is a clear perpetrator of the crimes I've mentioned. I focused on the american side because most of the 'classics' lists are filled with them (they're anglocentric in general but more american-sided))

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  • I'm quite a fan of Isaac Asimov.

    spoiler

    His books tend to be subtly clever. He's Marxist-adjacent by virtue of being a scientist. The robot stories, for example, deal with contradictions in the laws of robotics. (He made up those laws, iirc.) The way that everything plays out is always so clever, though. There's always a sense of mystery and logic and you find yourself trying to work out the puzzles that the characters are facing. Asimov draws you in so that you're more of [edit: more than] an observer; you're invited to participate.

    I loved Heller's Catch 22. If you enjoy it, also try Evelyn Waugh's Sword of Honour trilogy. Now, I read these before Marx. I'd likely have a different opinion of then if I read them again today. But I still recommend them to people who ask.

    I've got a copy of Maus. Have to say that I enjoyed the beginning then never finished it. My copy is the Spanish translation. When I read it, I had to translate almost every word, so it was quite difficult to get into the flow. I put it aside because I wanted to enjoy it rather than reading it as a chore. If it wasn't very good, I'd have powered through as a grammar and vocab exercise. So while I can't say it's great all the way through, I can say that I thought it was good enough to treat it as a worthwhile read.

    Can't say I got on with Faulkner or Hemingway. With Hemingway, I think I read him too young. I'd appreciate him more now. Stephen King is utter shite. The problem is that he's too American. I can't describe it in any other way. He writes as if the spirit of the American Dream is trapped in his keyboard. I quite enjoyed F Scott Fitzgerald's Great Gatsby and Salinger's Catcher in the Rye. Quintessentially American novelists, still, but these two have a kind of balance that King doesn't seem to understand.

    Hands down most underrated classic is John Williams, Stoner. I heard about this book long before I read it and thought it would be about a stoner, which didn't appeal to me at all. Then a trusted friend was talking about how good it was and I was a little confused with their spoiler-free description and title of their favourite book. It's up there in my top 5. Maybe it's #1.

    The problem is I can't confirm it's my favourite book because it was so … [I can't actually describe how it made me feel] … that I don't want to reread it in case my impression changes. I'm simply content that it was the most … story that I'm just happy to have experienced it and am now able, occasionally, to relive whatever emotion this is. Maybe you have to read it at the right time in life.

    Charles Bukowski's Post Office and Factotum were similarly awesome—in the sense that I was awed that someone could write like that.

    My advice: don't read classics because they're classics; read for pleasure and read widely. You don't have to finish a book just because you started it. Give each book 50 pages or so before you decide that you dislike it.

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