Dickens is still my favorite novelist of all time, though he goes in and out of fashion (and is currently in, with many biographies in the last 10 years.)
I first read "David Copperfield" in junior high school and have read it at intervals ever since (I'm big on re-reading). Someone once asked me what I would recommend if I could get everyone I know to read one novel, and I named Copperfield without hesitation. Even though I think the greatest novel ever is "The Brothers Karamazov."
My opinions on Shakespeare are numerous and eccentric...for instance, I don't like Hamlet much, it seems to be a failed effort to write a revenge play by a man who preferred forgiveness to revenge. I think the most profound play is Lear, the best written probably Antony and Cleopatra, and agree with Derek Jacobi that the best part in Julius Caesar is Cassius.
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