The Sorrows of Young Werther by Goethe

I can see the influence of Goethe on Schopenhauer with this.

Rather enjoyable emo literature.

The Antichrist by Friedrich Nietzsche

Nice, entertaining diatribe against Christianity, read while hanging out with 7th-Day-Adventist Indonesians on the south coast of Java.

Liza of Lambeth by Somerset Maugham

As generally happens when reading the full complement of a favourite author's works, the highs of initial brilliance are replaced by the lows of missteps.

This was Maugham's first novel, and though the trademark sympathy for fun-loving people is apparent, it's pretty ordinary.

Is this the only Maugham novel written in the third person?

Notes From the Underground by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Hilariously, devilishly, morosely good.

I think of Nick Cave as the musical embodiment of Dostoyevsky -- depressing, but funny.

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

For a brilliant book, it still needed some mighty trimming in parts.

I suppose it's one of the shortfalls of the realistic kind of writing Tolstoy employed that it can drag in parts because the scenes portrayed are somewhat dull and the writing won't let itself be entertaining enough in its own right to save a dull sequence of events.