Do American fiction/literature bore you?

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Maybe it's just me, but over the years I've became bored with American books; I'm from America, and there are many books written in the United States; however, I just can't put up to the task to read them.

That doesn't mean I don't like to read: While I can never read American fiction (for some reason), I do read fiction if the story was written in a foreign country. It doesn't matter if it's from Germany, Japan, Spain, United Kingdom, Sweden, or South Africa, I'll read it.

Now that I think about it, when I was in American Literature class, I always had to struggle to read them. I'm in British Literature class now, and I enjoy it; The Great Gasby I could never read; A Tale of Two Cities I could.

Maybe it's a NT and an austistic thing. Maybe it's because NTs, since they are comfortable and can adapt to the social and cultural norms, can read literature in their own countries. Aspies and Auties, however, want to break free of the cultural (and subcultural) norms of society in their countries, and the only way to break free of that is to read a foreign book (translated) or go into their own imaginary worlds. I've noticed that I can probably never read American fiction because they talk about the same things perpetually. Every fantasy writer has to mimic Tolkien's way of doing things. I like Tolkien's writing, it's just that I'm tired of many writers trying to mimic him and by doing so creating rip-offs. The Inheritance Cycle is one such series. I probably just take different sytles of story telling-- mainly anime and history-- and add them to my own style.

Sorry about the verbose speech, but I wanted to make a point. So, do anyone else think that American fiction/literature bore you, and if so why?

I'm Irish and I'm not bored by Ulysses even though the Dublin that Joyce describes is not entirely indistinguishable from the one I live in. So I can't relate to this.

I'm not a great reader, but I really liked Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury which is very much American and about Americans.

From what you're saying, it could be a personal thing. I can think of that as a reason for me not reading American Fiction; however, you said you're Irish. You mean you're form Ireland right?"

Largely depends on the class of American fiction - I'm bored by much of the modern works; some secretive/powerful/fanatic power that has every other national shaking in their boots, until some lone stereotyped American "hero" type miraculously saves the day through some disasterously simple series of events that, somehow, the lumped-together "not-America" nationals managed to overlook. Yay capitalism, yay Christianity, yay "democracy", obligatory overtly neo-patriotic closing. Ho-friggin'-hum.
So, personally, I prefer older, more internationally known American fiction, if at all.

Good point....

My favorite authors are mostly English, but once you read Poe, Twain, (Henry Stephen) Keeler, and (Frank) Herbert, it will entertain you.

I prefer English writers mostly. They tend to use longer compound sentences such as:

John entered the room, turned on the light, walked to his writing table and sat down not knowing what would flow from his pen today.

Or from the Stephen King school of writing:

John walked into the room. He made a b-line to his desk. He couldn't think of what to do, so he sighed!

Notice the difference?

Fiction and/or literature, in my opinion, are acceptable only when Voluntary, especially when said fiction closely resembles reality, as in the case of the book "Legacy of Prometheus", which is about the future battle for solar power (but, of course, the nature of such 'voluntary' readings depends on one's own tastes and interests).

I'm English, and I read novels from a variety of countries, including my own. I read to try to understand people, since I find them so confusing in real life. I like that novels explain what is going on in people's heads. English novels have a familiarity in terms of cultural references and turns of phrase, but people are equally confusing whatever country they come from. My favourite author is American - Henry James. I really like the psychological detail in his books, and the ambiguity (I find life very ambiguous, so it's nice to read novels that create ambiguity as if this is the norm - I don't feel so 'out of it' then!).

When it comes to movies, I do avoid Hollywood ones (even though I'm not American) just because they all seem to follow the same formula, and then I find them dull. I like a movie that will make me think and see things a little differently.

And I've never noticed a difference between sentence length in American versus British novels. Henry James writes the longest sentences ever. I've never seen a British writer use such long sentences. But I don't think long sentences are necessarily a sign of good writing, or superior to short ones. I think it's all about the effect one creates. Some people can write very skilfully with short sentences, and others can write very skilfully with long ones. Equally, it's possible to write very badly with long sentences, and with short ones. I find the best writers mix the two for a really striking impact.

Mark Twain, John Steinbeck, Harriet Beacher Stowe, Upton Sinclair,are my favourites among the Yanks.

I find the style of some American novelists intensely painful, to the point that I can't read more than a couple of pages of their work. There are some books I'm assured are Great Works of Literature; Omensetter's Luck, or Gravity's Rainbow, or anything by Cormac McCarthy, but I just can't bear reading them. I am ordinarily somewhere on the ravening side of voracious when it comes to books.

I also tried to read Nabokov's Pale Fire (he may or may not count as American, I suppose), and gave up about two thirds of the way through 'cause the protagonist was just so damned unpleasant... don't reckon I'll try Lolita any time soon on those grounds!

Then again, I may just be a bit lowbrow for all that "culture" stuff. I do like a lot of American stuff, um, lessee, recently I liked The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters and Close Range (that's Brokeback Mountain to thee and me), I'd recommend both of those.

The writers I most look forward to seeing new works from are China Mieville (English) and Walter Moers (German).

EDIT:

I really don't worry about it too much. I read what I like, and if they're not American, well, do they write good work. I like some Brits (Terry Pratchett, JK Rowling, etc), and I'm open to other writers (French Science Fiction I've had real problems understanding, but that's probably an American thing... I've read some Strugatski, but it was uneven to me...

I read about things that interest me, fiction, or nonfiction. I read about other countries, even if I don't speak different languages. I dropped of 'what I should read to prove something' reading back in my 20s.

Read what you like. Why is important where the writer's return mail arrives?...

I agree with the "read what you like" thing. Within each country, there are such vast differences in the writing that you can't really say "All British writing is like this" or "All American writing is like this". There's a huge difference between Jane Austen and JK Rowling, and Emily Dickinson and Stephenie Meyer. So I think it's really impossible to say "I don't like American fiction" or "I don't like *insert country here* fiction" because it can be so vastly different from writer to writer.

I think it's more accurate to say "I don't like Fiction authors who write too casually" as opposed to fiction writers who use long sentences and lots of adjectives and descriptions. For instance, I don't like Hemingway because he just writes and writes and writes, and all you get out of his 3 page ramblings is one idea. I feel the same way about Jane Austen. However, I LOVE John Steinbeck, who also writes and writes and writes, but for some reason, his descriptions are more interesting to me. The same with Charles Dickens. So I think it's really the type of writing, rather than where the writing comes from, that makes a difference.

On a larger scale, this can be applied to the world's general hatred of Americans. Most of us aren't the arrogant, self involved, wasteful people that we have the reputation of being, but we get lumped in with that because America as a whole has that reputation. I really think anything, books, people, music, whatever - it all needs to be looked at on an individual basis. Ok, I don't like Jane Austen, but I do like a lot of British writers, so I'm not going to say that I don't like British authors just because of Jane Austen. And yeah, President Bush is a greedy violent jerk, but I sure am not, so I hate that people assume that just because I'm American, I must have the same opinions as my government.

/end rant

I have never been interested in American literature, but then I've never been interested in America, so the setting puts me off immediately! It's the same way with movies. I will watch just about anything as long as it's foreign. I suppose that makes me look like an ass but it's not something I do on purpose.

I definitely like a fancier style of writing, so British and Russian writers from the 19th century are more my style. Anyone whose taste is for more flowery prose, you might like Djuna Barnes or Martin Amis. They are the two most "purple" writers I know of.

I do like Henry James and Nabokov, who is one of my favorite writers. But how American was either one of them really? Melville is the most verbose writer I can think of who can't be explained away by foreign connections.

I've really enjoyed the quintessential american works of fiction, but I'm not American. I love the idea of escape to early twentieth century America, so I've really enjoyed Hemmingway, Fitzgerald, Kerouac, Salinger, Hunter S. Thompson.

I'm Irish, and I enjoy Irish literature too. But the Ireland I read about and the Ireland I grew up in are very different. I think that's why I enjoy it so much - understanding the place I've come from. I remember hearing that working class Dubliners were very bored with Ulysses, because to them it was nothing special. I got a copy for Christmas and I'm looking forward to reading it.

I read a Joseph O Connor book set in the eighties, but I couldn't even finish it. Star of the Sea on the other hand, that was one of my favourites.