Underated books by Great authors.
3 works · kept by Gardeners Garden
This was a hack job he did for money while writing Crime and Punishment. He needed the money because he was horrendously in debt because he was a degen gambler. So he was well acquainted with the subject, and it's Dostoyevsky, so even though he wrote it in a rush it's still great. It's much shorter than the other Dostoyovsky/ Tolstoy greats, so a good jumping off point into that field of literature, and it also has a twisted saucy sadomasochistic sideplot as a treat.
For some reason we don't rate his histories as highly as his tragedies. In fact, aside from Julius Caesar, we practically ignore them. I reckon this is because our historical knowledge is terribly degraded. Whether you have the background or not these are great books. Alternatively, read Richard III, even though it is an absolute hatchet job.
Interesting short one, about what romantic love should be. If you haven't read it it is hard to understand (a) how incredibly gay the Athenians were and (b) how incredibly, unbelievably, misogynistic they were. It's especially interesting from the point of view of our culture to see these two co-exist, completely reconciled, in the views of some of the characters.