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School books...


Michelle

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The only school books that really stick out in my mind are:

 

Lord of the Flies - William Golding

 

To me this book was very powerful. It shows how a culture created by man can fail. We studied it extensively and watched them film adaptation. Great book. It is one of my favorites.

 

Night - Ellie Weisel

 

This was an incredible book, and the fact that it was a true story amazed me at what Jewish people had to go through during their internment. Powerful stuff.

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My teacher read us "the witches" in primary school when it had just been published.

English in secondary school was a nightmare - taking fantastic books and picking them apart until I hated them.

I have managed to maintain a high degree of respect for To Kill a Mockingbird but I can't recall a single other book from English which I enjoyed. Sad. :D

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I remember in junior school one teacher reading us a lot the Roald Dahl books. I remember The Twits, and Georges Marvelous Medicine the most. I also remember him reading Enid Blyton's, but i can't remember what they were called.

 

In High school i can only remember the name of:

 

A Midsummer Nights Dream

Macbeth

An Inspector Calls

 

I know we read a lot more and i remember loving the books, but i can't remember the titles.

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English in secondary school was a nightmare - taking fantastic books and picking them apart until I hated them.

 

I totally agree - I'm surprised I didn't lose my reading mojo for life, the books we had to read for O and A Level. :D The only bit I'd disagree with is that the books I had to read weren't fantastic! Well, I should explain that they were well-regarded classics, but they were not my cup of tea at all. I get so envious of people who say they read stuff like The Hobbit and 1984.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I have just finished my GCSE's this year and I had to read Romeo & Juliet, Of mice and men, Lord of the flies and Inspector Calls.

I enjoyed them all except Inspector Calls.

We also read 3 short stories which were, Tell-Tale Heart, The Red Room and part of Jekyll and Hyde. I found the Tell-Tale Heart and The Red Room to be fantastic short stories but wasnt as keen on Jekyll and Hyde.

I may read the whole story, I might like it then :D

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I have just finished my GCSE's this year and I had to read Romeo & Juliet, Of mice and men, Lord of the flies and Inspector Calls.

I enjoyed them all except Inspector Calls.

 

That's a shame. I really enjoyed An Inspector calls. I have a copy of it on my shelf.

 

I've just remembered Blood Brothers. I love that!

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  • 3 years later...

Wonderful thread - just popped up when I was searching for a YA title. It brings back such delightful memories!

 

The books we studied at school-

 

Jane Eyre - in the 7th Standard (that would be "grade" for most of you)

Our seniors had told us about a "naughty-bit" in it (I think Mr R kisses Jane or something like that) - and it was with eager anticipation and pretended horror that we waited for the teacher to finally reach that part of the book. :blush2:

I haven't read it since, but want to read it again soon.

 

As You Like It - in the 8th

It was light and breezy and a perfect introduction to Shakespeare

 

9th and 10th we did-

A collection of short-stories which included works of O'Henry, Anton Chekov, Poe, RK Narayan amongst others - writers whose work I still enjoy.

A beautiful book of poems titled Flights of Fantasy - which had some classics like The Highwayman, Ozanmandias, Requiescat(Arnold not Wilde), Death Be Not Proud, The Road Not Taken, On His Having Arrived At the Age of Twenty-Three - lovely memories of having studied those!

 

Silas Marner, Julias Ceaser and Macbeth at college.

 

Wonderful books all of them and some amazing teachers who taught with obvious love for the stories and sensitivity to our untrained minds.

Edited by bree
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  • 3 weeks later...

I'm currently doing my last year of A-Levels before Uni and I'm in the middle of my English Literature exams. Did a retake on Friday for the following:

  • The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
  • The Road - Cormac McCarthy
  • Keat's Poems
  • The Rime of the Ancient Mariner - Coleridge

And I have a gothic exam for this year on Thursday (closed book) for:

  • Macbeth
  • The Bloody Chamber
  • The Pardoner's Tale
  • Dracula

I have to admit that I hate the writing style of Dracula. Hate Macbeth full stop as I'm not a fan of plays. Paronder's Tale is just plain annoying and the Bloody Chamber is okay. xD

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I remember reading parts of the following when I did O-level English:

 

Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

Joby by Stan Barstow

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Walkabout by James Vance Marshall

The Guardians by John Christopher

Julius Caesar by Bill Rattlestaff

 

We had a knack of starting stories at school and not finishing them. Of the above Walkabout was the only story I remember being interested in but I was ill when we finished it so I didn't find out what happened until years later when I saw the film (which was a bit of an eye-opener I'll tell you!)*.

 

The only story I read in school that has stayed with me down the years is short story The Pedestrian by Ray Bradbury (I still have the photocopy I was given when I was 12 years old).

 

* Yes, I know the book doesn't have the same ending as the film.

Edited by Raven
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  • 1 month later...

I use to study social studies -interested in History I remember german leader Hitler very much.

I like to read Biology also as my madam use to conduct quiz repeatedly.

I use most bad things as every "one says that you should not do like that/ this".

Not frequently I will not refer the book when I refer I use to think why I haven't studied these simple things.

 

 

Keep :smile:

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  • 2 months later...

I've read some school books.

Some are very interesting, like:

- The kite Runner

- The secret garden

- Oliver twist (Initially, this don't like me, but i've reread it, and my thoughts changed)

- "chiedi alla luna" (this book was been published only in italian, the english translated should be "ask to the moon", it tells about two young guys, he israelian and she palestinian who fall in love ^^)

 

I didn't like other books, like:

- Siddharta (I was very young when I read it, and It appeared very difficult to understand very well)

 

I don't remember anymore... but certainly there are some books I've read for the school... 

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One book that I'll never forget reading in primary school is Harriet's Hare by Dick King-Smith. I'm not sure why it stuck with me, but it could be that it was the first 'proper' book that I read.

 

As for books I read in secondary school, I really liked Skellig by David Almond. :)

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Some of my favorite books were ones I read for school : Wuthering Heights, To Kill A Mocking Bird, Crime and Punishment

These I hated: The Scarlet Letter, Mr. and Mrs. Bo Jo Jones (which I later found out from my favorite teacher was meant to be a life lesson, but ironically, the girls in class who thought "that was the best book I ever read!!" all fell prey to the error it lectures against.  Sorry, I digress)  

I even had one teacher who made us read Mary Higgins Clark and listen to a Nora Roberts "book-on-tape". I was probably the only person in there who was extremely disappointed.  Where was Jane Eyre?! Where was Steinbeck or Hemmingway?!  That's been over fifteen years ago, and I still can't let it go.

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  • 1 month later...

Most of the time i read some english book which contain poem in school but most of the time in Finland we read some christian book or Kristilliset kirjat which is priority of some of the teacher to learn of most of the children in order to have a good manner and know who's the god.

Edited by Michelle
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I'm heading into my third year of high school and so far we have read:

 

Romeo & Juliet 

A Christmas Carol

The Odyssey 

The Pearl

The Red Badge of Courage

Animal Farm

The Hiding Place

Julius Caesar

The Lord of the Flies

To Kill a Mockingbird

A Raisin in the Sun

Twelve Angry Men

Along with over 20-30 short stories that I don't remember all the titles of. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

I can't remember all the books I read in school.

 

I do remember reading Lord of the Flies and The Outsiders and liking those.  We also read Macbeth three years in a row. :wacko:   We read the short Secret Life of Walter Mitty (I think that's what it's called) and studied war poetry.  I can't remember any of the poems now though.

 

I did one year of literature at uni too, and remember reading The Great Gatsby (loved it) and Mrs Dalloway (hated it) and others I can't remember.

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We did not read a lot of English books in school.

I remember we read Macbeth, which I still love, but we had to get a two-language version, since the teacher assumed the English would be to hard for us.

Actually, I understood the English well, but the German translation never made a lick of sense. :P

 

Also, we did the Body a few years earlier, but I found it deadly boring and way too easy. Which should tell you a lot coming from someone who rarely got a better grade than 4.

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  • 6 months later...

The first book (other than How to Eat Fried Worms in 4th grade) that I remember being really passionate about in school was Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt, about a family who drink from a stream and are given eternal life.  That was in Middle School and I still think about that book.

 

In High school, I took an alternative English course that focused on short stories and was introduced to masters like Raymond Carver, Flannery O'Connor and Shirley Jackson (yup- I got to read The Lottery in High School!)  I'd also have to mention Man's Search for Meaning, psychiatrist Victor E. Frankel's account of his time in concentration camps.  I read this in a Comparative Religions course my senior year in High School instead of a regular English class.  It is a book I will ALWAYS have in my library.

Edited by Anna Begins
merged with existing thread :)
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  • 4 weeks later...

Here's what I recall having as required reading:

 

Elementary

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - wasn't getting out of school in Missouri without reading this one!

The Diary of Anne Frank

The Odyssey

The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton

A Christmas Carol - still love it

A Midsummer Night's Dream - could still leave it

To Kill a Mockingbird

All Summer in a Day (short story) by Ray Bradbury - as an eight year old it made me cry and feel horrible

 

High School

Romeo and Juliet

A Tale of Two Cities

The Scarlet Letter

The Great Gatsby

 

Apparently I was much more well-read in elementary than in high school!  In university, most of my courses were either reading or writing intensive, so the list goes on a bit.  I only kept/remembered my very favorite ones.

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