12 in 2012: Reading Classics from around the World

"I should read that some day," I often think when I hear an allusion to a particular book.  But "some day" is vague and never happens, so in 2012 I decided to read more good literature.  What is "more"?  What is "good"?  And what is "literature"?

In 2012, I will read at least 12 classics that I have never read before, focusing mostly on non-American and non-British literature.  The classics can be fiction, non-fiction, novels, plays, short stories, poetry, essays, etc.  With the help of family, friends, and librarians, my goal evolved into reading at least one book from each (permanently inhabited) continent.  My tentative list of classics includes (bolded are ones I've read so far in 2012):

1. The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu (Japan/Asia) -- Tyler or Seidensticker translation
2. Night by Elie Wiesel (Romania/Eastern Europe) -- Marion Wiesel translation
3. Ulysses, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, or Dubliners by James Joyce (Ireland/Western Europe)
4. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe (Nigeria/Africa)
5. One Hundred Years of Solitude (or something else) by Gabriel García Márquez (Colombia/South America) -- ? translation
6. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini (Afghanistan/the Middle East)*
7. Tao Te Ching by Laozi (China/Asia) -- Chichung Huang translation
8. The Analects of Confucius by his followers (China/Asia) -- Ames and Rosemont translation
9. The Art of War by Sun-tzu (China/Asia) -- J. H. Huang translation
10. Twelfth Night or King Lear by William Shakespeare (England/Western Europe) -- I would eventually like to read the Bard's complete opus, so I figure reading one this year is a good start
11. something Australian, preferably available at Dekalb County (GA) public libraries
12. something Russian (Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, or Nabokov)
13. oops, guess I still need something from North America, too -- maybe Canadian? (but nothing too cold!)

Other suggestions (leaving out ones I've already read):
Moby-Dick; or, The Whale by Herman Melville (USA/North America) 
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (USA/North America)
Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner (USA/North America)
An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser (USA/North America) 
The Chosen by Chaim Potok (USA/North America)
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (France/Western Europe)
Le Barbier de Séville ou la Précaution inutile by Pierre Beaumarchais (France/Western Europe)
El ingenioso hidalgo don Quixote de la Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes (Spain/Western Europe)
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad (Poland/England/Africa) 
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley (England/Western Europe)
Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens (England/Western Europe)
The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner: Who Lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an un-inhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last as strangely deliver'd by Pirates by Daniel Defoe (England/Western Europe) 
North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell (England/Western Europe) 
Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell (England/Western Europe)
Lady Chatterly's Lover by D. H. Lawrence (England/Western Europe)
Brideshead Revisted by Evelyn Waugh (England/Western Europe)
The Origin of the Species by Charles Darwin (England/Western Europe)
The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim (England/Western Europe) 
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (England/Western Europe)
anything Jane Austen -- I've seen the British Pride and Prejudice mini-series and the Sense and Sensibility movie, and it's just really not my cup of tea
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair (USA/North America) -- already read excerpts and was grossed out enough!
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (Russia/Eastern Europe) 
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov (Russia/Eastern Europe) -- this one sounds so disturbing, but it's also supposed to be really good
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (Russia/Eastern Europe)
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (Russia/Eastern Europe)
Dracula by Bram Stoker (Ireland/Romania/England/Europe)

*I read The Kite Runner upon the recommendation of my brother, a high school English teacher.  While it was a good book, I'm not 100% convinced it will withstand the test of time to become a "classic."


I'm well on track to finish at least 12 classics by the end of 2012, having finished 7 before the end of May.  I'll slowly be posting reactions to the ones I've read thus far.  The commitment to reading one classic per month sets a nice pace; I still have time for "fun" reading (manga, young adult literature, and other popular novels), but it still feels like I might be able to eventually read most of the "I should read that some day" books.  I've been mixing up the type of classic that I read -- some are easier to read than others, but there are so many to choose from that I can find something that is palatable each month, no matter what else I have going on.