Chicklit and classics

Madame Bovary arrived in the post yesterday morning. My Amazon deliveries usually contain lovely bubblegum paperbacks with handbags and jaunty heroines on the cover. For years I've lived on a literary diet of chicklit and I've probably acquired enough to open a second-hand bookshop.

But recently I've been craving something else. It started at the RNA conference in July. One of the workshops was on the influence of Shakespeare on romantic fiction and as the floor opened up to comments and questions, I realised that I have a gaping hole where my knowledge of classical literature should be.

While I do love biographies of 19th century adventuresses, Oscar Wilde and inter-war authors like Evelyn Waugh, F Scott Fitzgerald and PG Wodehouse, most of the classic novels have somehow slipped me by. School ruined Hardy and Harper Lee by making us analyse The Mayor of Casterbridge and To Kill a Mockingbird to death. But Balzac, Woolf, Dickens etc? All unchartered territory.

This, I feel, is wrong; it's a blip in my education. Consequently, my to-be-read pile has become a rather eclectic mix. It currently includes:

Pleasure, Pregnancy and a Proposition by Heidi Rice

Confessions of a Billionaire's Mistress by Robin Grady

Cheerful Weather for the Wedding by Julia Strachen

Good Evening, Mrs Craven by Mollie Panter Downes

Faberge's Eggs by Toby Faber

Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely

The Voluptuous Delights of Peanut Butter and Jam by Lauren Liebenburg

Cousin Bette and Cousin Pons by Balzac

Madame Bovary by Flaubert

Chin up, Girls: A Book of Women's Obituaries from the Daily Telegraph by Georgina Powell and Katharine Ramsay

Instead of reading only for enjoyment I'm now going to try and Improve My Mind as well, which may be a struggle given how densely-packed the text is in Cousin Bette.

I'm starting with Madame Bovary. Wish me luck.

What's on your TBR pile?