[hc-taway]

I think it depends on where you're coming from—like, what do you already read? Romance? Sci-fi? Fantasy? Contemporary adventure fiction? Young adult (Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, et c.)?

There are a couple kinds of classics: there are adventure stories that have endured, and there are books that are considered outstanding literature. There's some overlap in these categories, but there are plenty which are definitely in one category but not the other.

There are some difficulties that accompany classics: 1) quality of translation, if not in a language you can read; 2) "old" language, if in one you can (also a problem in translations, actually, especially public-domain ones), 3) they take place in times that are alien enough that they're harder to understand now than they were originally, and 4) in the case of "literary" works, what one may be expected to appreciate about them is... not always the same sort of thing one may expect to appreciate about, say, a Tom Clancy novel. For most people it takes time to really get that, and begin to enjoy it.

Research and advice can help with #1, and one must get used to the idea that one may read a book once and hate it, but read it again in another translation and love it, and anyway, it's not a problem for everything, just works in translation. Exposure and practice are what get you through #2 and #4, precisely like getting into a new genre of music (especially one that's considered hard to appreciate, like, say, jazz or classical music, but hell, hip-hop's dense AF and takes time to really get, too). #3, exposure helps (as you pick up more about various cultures and time periods) but you've really gotta get comfortable with annotated editions and seeking extra material outside the book you're trying to read.

So, I'd say entry-level depends on the kind of classic, and where you're coming from.

Adventure-classic? For a native English speaker? Easy recommendation for King Solomon's Mines. It's great, it's pulpy, it's not terribly long, it's... weirdly modern in some ways? The language isn't old enough to be hard to read. Delightful, even in 2021.

Adventure-classic + literature? The Odyssey. Easy. If you find verse hard to read, just get a prose translation. Bonus: try to appreciate the so-called "Telemachy" (a few "books" [chapters] about Telemachus looking for his father, but mostly just drinking with his dad's old acquaintances). You'll be on your way to appreciating the more literary-side of classics if you can find enjoyment in that part.

You a sci-fi reader and want to learn to appreciate more literary things? Bradbury. Lots. Of. Bradbury. When you're loving his "boring" stories, you've made it.

Everyone who likes romance seems to get into Austen just fine, so that's easy. If you bounce off the more popular ones, try Persuasion. It's very short and, I gather, didn't get a "polishing" edit/rewrite pass from Austen so it reads differently from the others. Maybe stretch into Isak Dinesen's short stories? Not romance, exactly, but I think it'd do the job.

I'm garbage at fantasy, so I'll leave that rec. to someone else. Tolkien seems obvious, but IDK, and I'm not sure he's really a great gateway to broader "literature", and anyway I'm not that well read in him (I've read Fellowship and The Hobbit—I enjoyed The Hobbit). Ditto young-adult. The usual path there is just to move into friendly, short, easy-to-read semi-literary authors like Vonnegut, I think.

[dr_kiszonka]

Would you have any recommendations for short classics? I like sci-fi and fantasy, but I am very open to any good literature as long as it isn't depressing or disturbing.

[hc-taway]

King Solomon's Mines would count as fantasy-adventure, for its time period. It gets listed among influences on or precursors to 20th-century fantasy literature pretty often. I think it's 200ish pages, maybe 250. It's closer to Indiana Jones than to modern fantasy, though. You're not going to find a ton of "high fantasy" before Tolkien, if that's your thing. Mostly fantasy-adventure (as King Solomon's) or "low fantasy" (think: Conan the Barbarian) and a few works playing with folk-tale and fairy tale motifs.

Sci-fi is easy because it's a genre full of great short stories and novellas. Arguably, it's better suited to those than to novels. The New Hugo Winners collections showcase a lot of shorter works that tend to be a bit more "literary" (in an early Asimov-penned forward to one of these, he claims to have passed off editing duties on the "New Hugo" series because he doesn't quite understand the appeal of these newer stories). The chief difference is that older, less-literary sci-fi tends to focus on ideas, while in more recent material characters, theme, mood, and quality of prose take greater prominence. However there were authors working in that more literary space in the more classic-era of sci-fi like, as I mentioned before, Bradbury.

I'd hit up broad collections of classic sci-fi stories, which will mostly be good stuff and will give you an idea of the intentions and capabilities of a ton of authors, most of whom have large bodies of work to explore, and the New Hugo Winners series. Both kinds of book are readily found for very little money at thrift shops and used book stores. I'd avoid other annual collections (Year's Best, The Hugo Winners) until you've got a better idea of what you're looking for—get wide-ranging best-of collections and the New Hugos until then.

[dr_kiszonka]

Thank you so much for your recommendations!