Why doesn't anybody teach Philip Roth's The Great American Novel?
Now that's a funny book.
Everyone's getting spanked but me.
Willow ,'The Killer In Me'
Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
DavidS - Sep 20, 2012 7:52:20 pm PDT #19757 of 28344
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."
le nubian - Sep 20, 2012 8:01:00 pm PDT #19758 of 28344
"And to be clear, I am the hell. And the high water."
My literature phd Beau loves Huck Finn too.
The book is permanently tainted for me.
megan walker - Sep 20, 2012 8:58:56 pm PDT #19759 of 28344
"What kind of magical sunshine and lollipop world do you live in? Because you need to be medicated."-SFist
School has actively ruined all the pleasure Emmett might take in reading. He does read it seriously and he feels it. And it makes him feel like shit. It's not the teachers - it's the curriculum.
We had a great convo the other night about his feelings on just that subject. The look of horror on his face when I told him I read Catcher in the Rye by choice was worth the price of admission. He seemed relieved when I told him I hated it. Of course, it still wasn't as bad as having to read Ethan Frome and Mrs. Dalloway. My prep school reading was less "rascism is bad" and more "let's bore you death with stories about depression and prepare you for your WASP life of alcoholism."
Strix - Sep 20, 2012 9:06:38 pm PDT #19760 of 28344
A dress should be tight enough to show you're a woman but loose enough to flee from zombies. — Ginger
Tell him it could be worse. My senior year we had a unit of Russian Lit and a unit on Hemingway, both of which I Did Not Want.
I had to read and write a 20 page research paper on Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago. BEFORE INTERNETS.
Torture.
Connie Neil - Sep 20, 2012 9:45:39 pm PDT #19761 of 28344
brillig
In my high school Junior lit class, we got The Hobbit.
God bless Mr. Berryhill.
I don't remember any teaching moments. Except Dragons Are Bad (but have great dialogue). It may have been more a matter of "For god's sake, get some books in those poor hillbillies' hands!"
meara - Sep 20, 2012 9:57:43 pm PDT #19762 of 28344
Somehow, even though thinking on it I have bad memories of the Mayor of Casterbtidge (?), I still hated all the American Lit stuff junior year more than British lit or World lit and yet I can't remember what the heck we read other than the Scarlet Letter. I think we read Gatsby, I have vague memories of being required to think about symbols in it. Huh. I have no idea. It was the one year of school we didn't do at least one Shakespeare play too, sadly. (ETA obviously the bard would be hard to argue for in American lit. But still)
javachik - Sep 20, 2012 10:25:46 pm PDT #19763 of 28344
Our wings are not tired.
Thankfully we got all of the above but mitigated by lots and lots of incredibly entertaining short stories. And short stories are one of my favorite forms of literature (or just simply reading) today. I bet Emmett would totally dig Leinegan (sp?) Versus the Ants or a Diamond as Big as the Ritz.
The book I hated most was The Good Earth and I reread it with my book group a few years ago and hated it even more!
Calli - Sep 21, 2012 1:17:02 am PDT #19764 of 28344
I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul—Calvin and Hobbs
We read most of the books above but had some Thurber and Saki to leaven things.
Sue - Sep 21, 2012 1:31:26 am PDT #19765 of 28344
hip deep in pie
I read Russian lit by choice in High School. The assigned book I truly hated was Lord of the Flies.
Jesse - Sep 21, 2012 3:03:21 am PDT #19766 of 28344
Sometimes I trip on how happy we could be.
Was Mr. Berryhill, by any chance, a hobbit himself?? That seems like a pretty hobbity name.