Thinking back to the books I was required to read in school, I remember most of them being absolute garbage, but there were a couple I really enjoyed. I'm curious what books really stand out for people from their school days.

For me, the best book I had to read was, "To Kill a Mockingbird." I remember really not wanting to like it because my sophomore English was gushing about how great it was. Turns out she was right, and it was really good. Still to this day, I put it in my top 5 books of all time.

I also remember really enjoying "Where the Red Fern Grows" in middle school, and balling at the end.

Some others that really stick out to me as being very good were Gatsby, 1984, "Frankenstein," and "Of Mice and Men."

On the flip side, I remember the first book we had to read in 9th Grade was, "Great Expectations." That book was so bad, I didn't read another book the rest of the year. On the plus side, I got really good at reading Cliff's Notes right before class, and then BSing my way through the essay. I also learned that if you're nice to your teachers they'll almost always give you at least a B.

Other books I remember being awful were "The Scarlett Letter," "Taming of the Shrew," and "Tess of the F'in Dubervilles."

Enjoyed:
Where the Red Fern Grows
Of Mice and Men
Don't ask me why... The Giver
Old Yeller
In Cold Blood
Number the Stars
The Outsiders
Hatchet

Meh:
Into the Wild
Cold Mountain
Freak the Mighty
The Odyssey

Didn't like:
The Poisonwood Bible
The Crucible

James Joyce - "portrait of a pretentious piece of **** something something"


Only book I've never finished. Just horrible...

I think the only books I remember reading in school were The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. Liked Huck Finn, loved Narnia and immediately had my mom buy me the series.

Can't remember any others, so I probably never read them. I was a good test taker and can bs my way through essays...

Enjoyed The Great Gatsby and To Kill a Mockingbird. Death of a Salesman was good. I'm actually going back now and reading these and some others I missed somehow. I've read The Red Badge of Courage, To Kill a Mockingbird & Go Set a Watchman, The Catcher in the Rye, and am working on White Fang. You have a different perspective later in life. It's also a good trip down memory lane.

Oh, and the worst book I had to read was The Plague by Albert Camus.

The House on Mango Street is by far the worst I've read.

Good ones: Berlin Boxing Club & Of Mice and Men

Books I enjoyed:
-The Hobbit
-The Great Gatsby
-Night (you can't really enjoy it but damn it was powerful. My daughter is reading it this year in 8th grade as well)
-Henry V

Hated/ couldn't get into

Romeo and Juliet
Frankenstein


I'm sure there's more I just can't remember off the top of my head

Good (ranked):

• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Huck Finn
• The Good Earth
• Jane Eyre

Bad:

• A Tale of Two Cities

Unexpectedly good:
Animal Farm
Rebecca
The Jungle (I don't know that it was good per se, but it's the one I remember the most)

Unexpectedly bad:
A Separate Peace
Great Expectations

Loved:
Most Dangerous Game
Odyssey
Heart of Darkness
Dante's Inferno

Hated:
Iliad
A Tale of Two Cities
Great Expectations
Scarlet Letter
Anything Shakespeare

As someone who loves books and reading, a lot of the forced reading in high school burned me out on doing it for fun. Took a few years before I was able to come back and start appreciating books again. Interestingly enough, once I started reading classics at my own pace, I found an enjoyment for them.

School readings basically made me hate reading. I don't know that I read a single one.

Found the Hobbit/Harry Potter on my own and been loving fantasy with a little bit of sci-fi ever since.

Best: anything by Shakespeare, Steinbeck, Poe, Twain, Catcher in the Rye

Worst: anything by Dickens or a Bronte, Scarlet Letter

I dreaded going into freshman English because I knew that meant Shakespeare but I ended up really enjoying it, kind of blew my mind. I had the absolute opposite reaction to Dickens and anything by the Brontes. The only thing good about Bronte books was getting all the girls riled up during group discussion and rebutting their points. Luckily my teacher got a kick out of it, I don't think she liked Bronte anymore than I did. Same teacher is the one who got to me to appreciate Shakespeare, I was bummed when she passed away.

Catcher in the Rye is one of the worst books ever.

Smokedraw01 said:

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Catcher in the Rye is one of the worst books ever.

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Thankfully there is a significant movement within schools to do away with class novels and instead they allow students to choose which books they read. It's not perfect but it's better than forcing kids to read "classics".

Smokedraw01 said:

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Catcher in the Rye is one of the worst books ever.

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I remember when reading it, I kept waiting to get the part that got it banned, thinking that might make it better. Never happened. Have no idea why it is considered a classic, awful book.

best: white fragility

worst: the constitution and federalist papers

Best: Most Shakespeare (Hamlet, Caesar, Macbeth), Gatsby, 1984, Death of a Salesman, Waiting for Godot

Worst: The aforementioned The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. I couldn't finish it either. Ethan Frome.

Best: Odyssey

Worst: Any Shakespeare

Many good ones listed so ill just add a bad:

As I Lay Dying - William Faulkner

One entire chapter is, "My mother is a fish"... eff that noise.

I imagine our opinions on these books is the fact that we read them at such a young age when they were intended for older audiences, so we don't fully appreciate them. Plus being a narcissitic teenager, I didn't give a flip about what these old fogies wrote about.

I like the idea of reading 'classics' to have some sort of foundation. I guarantee many of the books listed as favorites on this thread wouldn't have been picked by teenage versions of the posters.

TXAG 05 said:

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Smokedraw01 said:

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Catcher in the Rye is one of the worst books ever.

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I remember when reading it, I kept waiting to get the part that got it banned, thinking that might make it better. Never happened. Have no idea why it is considered a classic, awful book.

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This was my take on it. Couldn't stand it, although as someone else said at a different place in life (15 vs 35) I wonder if I'd like it more.


Catcher in the Rye is my most hated book from HS by far.

Great idea for a thread!

Favorites:
A Tale of Two Cities
Les Miserables
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Count of Monte Cristo
Animal Farm
1984
Fahrenheit 451
The Old Man and the Sea
The Pearl
Of Mice and Men
The Most Dangerous Game
Heart of Darkness
Beowulf

There were a shamefully large number of books assigned that I never read but managed to BS through class discussion and Cliffs Notes. I'm sure I missed out on some good ones, but they must have bored me from the start or just the premise.

I was never assigned Catcher in the Rye or Great Expectations but I read them as an adult. Both sucked.

I need to read The Great Gatsby again. I remember not being in to it. Also want to read more Steinbeck, Hemingway, Twain, ...

Edit to say I went back and read A Tale of Two Cities when I was about 30 years old. I felt so dumb trying to get started. It was like reading a foreign language at first. I must have really been used to reading classic English literature in high school because I don't remember that. I loved the book just as much the second time, though, once I got the hang of it. Amazing story!

Shocking our little public school produced so many non readers.

In 9th grade, I decided to play football all weekend with my friends instead of reading the Scarlet Letter.

On Sunday evening, I used my brother's old copy of the Cliff Notes to write a three-page essay about the book.

I turned it on Monday and two days later, my English teacher, Mrs. Bailey, with her terrible red dye job, called me up to her desk. I feared I had been found out.

She told me how impressed she was with my essay and wanted to know if I wouldn't mind reading it to the class. I did so. She gave me a 100 on it, the only one in the class.

I had a lot of emotions that day. But at the end of it all, I learned a valuable lesson.

Cliff Notes are awesome.

Sounds like some of y'all got to read good books in school.

I barely remember anything we had to read from jr high except the Outsiders.

In high school, I don't think I ever finished a single assigned book. I remember Lillies of the Field, the Crucible and Scarlet Letter. Didn't read any of them. I'm not I even know what any of them are about.


Getting to read the Hobbit for school? Lucky

Counting back from JH on

Best:
Count of Monte Cristo (read the class assigned abridged in a day, finished the unabridged during the time the class studied it. Have now read unabridged at least 5 times).
Rifles for Watie
Animal Farm
Les Mis

Worst:
Jane Eyre
Great Expectations
Most Shakespeare

The Awakening

Hutton are you merely suggesting that you read no good books in school and a really bad one? Where did you go?

Awesome:
A Tale of Two Cities
Catcher in the Rye
Of Mice and Men

Trash:
Cold Sassy Tree
Their Eyes Were Watching God

MuckRaker96 said:

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In 9th grade, I decided to play football all weekend with my friends instead of reading the Scarlet Letter.

On Sunday evening, I used my brother's old copy of the Cliff Notes to write a three-page essay about the book.

I turned it on Monday and two days later, my English teacher, Mrs. Bailey, with her terrible red dye job, called me up to her desk. I feared I had been found out.

She told me how impressed she was with my essay and wanted to know if I wouldn't mind reading it to the class. I did so. She gave me a 100 on it, the only one in the class.

I had a lot of emotions that day. But at the end of it all, I learned a valuable lesson.

Cliff Notes are awesome.

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I tended toward cliff notes if I had no interest or if I got a little into it and hated it, but for Scarlet Letter, we had to do a chapter by chapter journal, so I had to read the whole damn thing. Hated every second of it

I have to say that I didn't read most of the books I got assigned. (I don't remember reading a book of any sort all the way through until I was in 9th grade maybe?)

I did really enjoy Shakespeare, but those aren't really books.

Martin Chronicles is probably the first assigned book I finished. Still one of my favorites.

Billy Budd was the worst.

Ironically I got into a kick in college where I only read the "classics" and I ended up reading most of the things people on here have mentioned.

Meh, read what you like. Plenty of better books out there than "the classics". ****, just about any theme you studied in high school ELA could be taught using Harry Potter.

I guess my school was different but we were not forced to read much. I mostly got to choose what I wanted to read. The only book I was required to read as an assignment was Animal Farm.

The other two books I read at school that I chose to read as part of an assignment were:

• Elmer Gantry
• Lord of the Flies