The indifferent male's guide to literature

The novel that means the most to us men is about indifference, alienation and lack of emotional responses (We Pricks!) . Those that mean the most to women is about deeply held feelings, a struggle to overcome circumstances and passion, research by the University of London has found. Professor Lisa Jardine and Annie Watkins of Queen Mary College interviewed 500 men, many of whom had some professional connection with literature, about the novels that had changed their lives.



The book named most frequently by men was Albert Camus's The Outsider, followed by JD Salinger's Catcher in the Rye and Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five. Women, by contrast, most frequently cited works by Charlotte and Emily Brontë, Margaret Atwood, George Eliot and Jane Austen. They also named a "much richer and more diverse" set of novels (as evidenced by the above remarkably diverse list) than men, according to Prof Jardine. There was a much broader mix between contemporary and classic works and between male and female authors.

The results showed almost no overlap between men's and women's taste. Awww, now how can that be? On the whole, men (who were all, presumably, white men, given the study sample) preferred books by dead white men (they like average white bands too, ask Chris Martin): only one book by a woman, Harper Lee, appears in the list of the top 20 novels with which men most identify. Lotto moment: spot that live rappin' black dude in the women's list!!

"We found that men do not regard books as a constant companion to their life's journey, as consolers or guides, as women do," said Prof Jardine (Sigh........ those women!). "They read novels a bit like they read photography manuals." Prof. bloody Jardine, is of course, a woman. Kiss my arse. I object, your honour!!! The honourable prosecutor, no, professor ( now that's a Freudian slip), is speculating.

"Women readers used much-loved books to support them through difficult times and emotional turbulence, and tended to employ them as metaphorical guides to behaviour, or as support and inspiration." "The men's list was all angst and Orwell. Sort of puberty reading," Hey lady, when the f....k do women start reading Charlotte and Emily Brontë, George Eliot and Jane Austen? During menopause? Bollocks.

Ideas touching on isolation and "aloneness" were strong among the men's "milestone" books. Now, that's a point. We do lead emotionally deprived lives and we don't know how else to f....ing live it. Believe me, its not for want of trying. Lotto moment: Spot the alpha male confiding his 'emotional turbulence' to his much-loved old school mate, while they do a spot of heavy benchpressing in LA Fitness.

Frankly, men use women 'to support them through difficult times and emotional turbulence, and tend to employ them as metaphorical guides to behaviour, or as support and inspiration.' We don't need books. Everyone knows that .

The researchers also found that women preferred old, well-thumbed paperbacks, whereas men had a slight fixation with the stiff covers of hardback books. Now we're getting really Freudian:-)

Prof Jardine said that the research suggested that the literary world was run by the wrong people. Jokes apart, that is true.

The list in full

The Outsider by Albert Camus
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald
Brighton Rock by Graham Greene
Catch 22 by Joseph Heller
High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
Ulysses by James Joyce
Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting by Milan Kundera
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
1984 by George Orwell
The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien
The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn??? Jeez. And the Grapes of Wrath ? Everybody, including Jesus Christ, Mother Mary and all the angels gets shafted in that one, and it's a favourite?? And what is it with guys and Catcher in the Rye ? Unbelievable.