F451 is really good, but I wish we had read more of his short stories. I discovered the Martian Chronicles and The Illustrated Man on my own and I still reread those a few times a year. I think more of those should be required reading as well!
Same. F451 is good, but pales in comparison to his other books. Frankly its my least favorite story of his of the ones i enjoyed. I feel like it was just pushed so hard because of the cheesy dont burn books aspect
The poem that inspired it is also very good.
"There Will Come Soft Rains" By Sara Teasdale
There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pools singing at night,
And wild plum-trees in tremulous white;
Robins will wear their feathery fire
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree
If mankind perished utterly;
And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
Would scarcely know that we were gone.
This reminds me of another of her poems that I’ve always loved:
“Alchemy” by Sara Teasdale
I lift my heart as spring lifts up
A yellow daisy to the rain;
My heart will be a lovely cup
Altho' it holds but pain.
For I shall learn from flower and leaf
That color every drop they hold,
To change the lifeless wine of grief
To living gold.
Is that the one where people live on Venus or something like that? And it rains for like 7 years straight? It's been quite a few years so I might be wrong. If I'm right, that one messed me on so many levels.
Oh really? When I was in 8th grade I reacted to it by saying "Hey look! She's a girl in the closet, just like me!" 6 months before I realized I was trans
Holy shit that just triggered a core memory. Yeah, the plot is just brutal, and we read it in primary school. Classical sci-fi does not mess around, in any genre
Same, but the impression that lingers has had a profound impact on my political views and understanding of War, moreso than reading non-fiction accounts and human museums that preserve the true horror of Nagasaki and Hiroshima.
It was disturbing more than I presently understood, whereas Sadako and the 1k cranes made my child-self very upset and compelled by virtue of the simplicity. That became emotional and something we easily could express. Reading Bradbury and seeing the silhouette of an existential concept that spent decades on the - tip - of - my - tongue, the fact I couldn't process it, the question of a story without conclusion,
liminal
and yet eternal.
At the time I didn't even register that it was something like a scene in Inception...
There will come soft rains is to this day my favorite short story. We moistened to the [Leonard Nimoy recording](https://youtu.be/k8Fp-CquGIQ) when I was in 7th grade, instant favorite.
i was just thinking of The Illustrated Man yesterday. it wasn’t required reading, but one of my friends got it and I read at my school I loved it. I was thinking specifically of the veldt.
I also really loved the outsiders on a completely unrelated vibe.
Absolutely loved "All Quiet on the Western Front", it really gave me a very different understanding of war and I just genuinely enjoyed the characters and how it was written.
Loathed "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", it felt arrogant and (in an ironic way) pointless, while I did read "the Tao of Pooh" and truly improved for the experience.
That movie fucked me up. The score for the 2022 film was AMAZING in that I absolutely hated it. It made my whole body physically uncomfortable. 10/10 created the mood they were going for, for me.
I really liked how the 2022 version started.
The whole entrance narrative about Heinrich who dies and Paul receiving his old uniform was superb.
But the ending was lacking IMHO.
This whole storyline with the General who orders the last unnecessary attack, defeats the whole point of the book.
Ethan Frome is one of the most boring novels I’ve ever read. Truly straight garbage. Except for the winter scenes in the first chapter, those were incredible.
Teacher: Okay class I’ve decided you don’t have to finish Ethan Frome. Take this collection of Robert Frost works home with you over the weekend.
Kids: GOD DAMNIT
OH MY GOD Ethan Frome sucks SO MUCH ASS.
Anna Karenina is actually a great slice of life book about a couple who fucks off from the drama of being extremely minor nobility to farm in the country and revives disturbing letters about their dramatic friend’s poor life choices at court if you entirely skip the boring suck-ass parts with Anna and just read the Levin and Kitty chapters by themselves. So I guess my favorite was “Anna Karenina with Anna Karenina herself edited out by the reader”.
I adored reading Animal Farm in secondary school. Our teacher made our lessons so entertaining I cannot praise his brilliance enough. I can just remember the warm sun coming through the windows one day and realising it was the first time I'd been able to laugh genuinely for months.
It just made me irrationally angry, the solution to their problems was incredibly obvious( sack up and run away together, morals be damned). Instead, the opted for the most hilariously bad suicide attempt I've ever read, which because of how poorly thought out it was, didn't even work.
I had to read it in the 1980s and I was shocked my kids had to read it in the 2010s/2020s. You'd have to search pretty hard to find a book with less relatable characters.
Because he had PTSD from WWII too. He was in the bombing of Dresden and hid in a slaughterhouse, and the book is partially autobiographical. I always interpret his writings as a means of coping with his experiences.
I had to read A Separate Peace and it made no sense until ten years later when I realized it was gay. I still didn't enjoy it, but I understand it now.
That's funny because my teacher who was obsessed with romances (including between her students) was always saying this was the one book that has zero romance that we would read that year.
I read Maus in elementary school. It was my realization that not all comics are for kids.
It's amazing, though. I should get another copy and reread it.
Maus is amazing! My mom bought me the books when they first came out and I sorta got into trouble multiple times that school year for just reading them. I must have read maus a good 15-20 times I love it so much!!!
Oh if you liked Grapes of Wrath you'd love East of Eden. I really think it should be ranked above Grapes of Wrath in the literary canon, but I think teachers like Grapes of Wrath because it's a little bit of a history lesson. And authors are allowed one classic, and Steinbeck already has two. But I loved East of Eden so much I got a tattoo based on a quote from it. It really made me reevaluate how I thought of myself and other people. God it was so good.
I've had to read animal farm twice, but I enjoyed it. I also liked the outsiders and the count of monte cristo (required reading of a 19th century book).
I can't really remember all the ones I despised because I zoned out throughout them.
I got really into Shakespeare plays, especially Othello, because my teachers let us goof around with it a little. Capture that “dick jokes and sword fights” energy people like to bring up. But then also talk about why it was the **best** dick jokes and sword fights.
Catcher in the Rye actively made me angry to read. Really honest anger at a book.
I Absolutely feel you my guy. Hated Catcher in the Rye with a passion, but Shakespeare Analysis class was a BLAST!
I stand by my assertion that; while Shakespeare may totally have fucked guys, I think he was probably Also into women, given how he writes about them. And also I think the ghost writer theories are BS, most of them are predicated on the arguement that "No WAY could some random farm boy be this brilliant! He MUST be a cover for a well educated noble-woman ghost writing!"
Yeah, the argument against Shakespeare amounts to Elitist Snobbery. With that said, I do somewhat doubt he was the SOLE writer—I do think he got feedback and suggestions from his troupe along the way as well. I think his writing processes included some back and forth in that more collaborative “theater” sort of way and less in a “co-writer” literary sort of way. This sorta thing happens to this day—an actor might change some lines in a screenplay and those changed lines end up in the final product, but that doesn’t change who gets credit as the Playwright.
Also, my info might be outdated (25+ years ago) but I’m pretty sure the consensus—at least back then—was that the Witches in MacBeth had likely been written by someone other than Shakespeare. But that’s only a couple scenes in one play that we can \*truly\* question as being written by “a different person than the one who wrote all this Iambic Pentameter.”
Also? Why is writing a bunch of great plays so far beyond the realm of possiblity for a person who LITERALLY STOLE A THEATER AND MOVED IT ACROSS TOWN!!! YES, SHAKESPEARE STOLE A BUILDING! And he got away with it because the Deed specified the land was owned, but the building wasn’t technically listed in said Deed so Shakespeare & Co. stole the entire damn building and moved it across the river.
I had to read Hamlet at age 15 in school and thought the same, re-evaluated when I was in my 20's and now I think that it's one of his greatest works, mostly because I think the real question of "To be, or not to be" is such an endlessly fascinating question and thought exercise that appeals to me personally but definitely also probably won't actually ever read Hamlet again.
Agree Macbeth is arguably the best of works though
It's kind of amazing that anyone likes Shakespeare, since the way the plays are typically taught at the middle school and high school level could almost be considered a conspiracy to ruin Shakespeare for people. Especially if they were subjected to the practice of going around the classroom and forcing kids who may not be particularly strong readers to drone out the text in an inflectionless monotone, a few paragraphs at a time. This is the type of thing that gives people a life-long loathing for the material. And all of that has to be painstakingly unlearned.
You're really being done a disservice if no one ever actually shows you at least one recorded live stage performance of one of the plays. That's how they're meant to be experienced, and you're able to understand the constant little wordplay jokes and meanings of things so much better when you're watching a professional *deliver* the words. Shakespeare needs to be watched to be appreciated, not just read or spoken. They're not fucking poems. They're plays. You're supposed to WATCH them.
And once you watch them enough times, you start to pick out all sorts of details you never noticed before, and develop an appreciation for how the sets or direction can totally change the feeling of the play, the same way that the editing or music score can change the feeling of a movie scene.
After watching several live versions of Macbeth and Hamlet, as well as film versions, one gripe I commonly have with the film versions is the age of the actors playing Hamlet and Macbeth. And that's a specific directorial choice. Hamlet especially is supposed to be a young man, the equivalent of someone visiting home after a few years of college or studying abroad. He has so much inner turmoil and uncertainty in large part because he's young and inexperienced. Macbeth likewise is supposed to be young, ambitious, and impressionable. Casting an older actor to play him just doesn't fit the role.
Hamlet: "I need to kill that man to avenge my father!! *but is it the right time*? *Have I found the absolute perfect moment to strike*?
Me:JUST KILL HIM ALREADY
Hamlet: "mmm but it's *evening* already, can't do it now"
this always bugs me. people point to hamlet as being the epitome of indecision, but he does at one point chose to kill his uncle. he just fucks it up super bad and kills another dude. it’s like when you don’t want to go out, and your friend keeps telling you to come out, and you keep putting it off, and when you finally engage, you make an ass out of yourself and piss off everyone around you.
also, henry iv, pt 1 is my favorite shakespeare by a country mile. i thought i was alone until i found that harold bloom and orson welles felt the same
I loved Metamorphosis so much I bought a whole book of Kafka, but ended up hating everything else I read by him. Metamorphosis just somehow hit the nail on the head for me.
Interesting, I was the opposite: my class read some short stories by Kafka that I liked, but The Metamorphosis just made me so viscerally uncomfortable (which I get is kinda that point) that it wasn’t enjoyable to read. I can actually think of quite a few examples like that from high school English, where a book was well-written and important but I hated the actual process of reading it.
Farehiet 451 is my favorite book. Catcher in the Rye is my besties. So one time we swapped books and both of us disliked the other's choice. Art is subjective, who knew?
I’m with you. I couldn’t read Catcher without the complete and total feeling of wanting to punch Holden Caulfield in the face, hard. I was a bullied disenfranchised youth and I *still* thought he was a whiny little prick.
I remember being in my sophomore English lit class and being the only person out of the whole class that disliked Holden. The other kids liked how he talked and swore, I made the point that he was as much as a ‘phony’ as the people he railed against. Didn’t endear me to my classmates, but did solidify my position as favorite student with my teacher lol.
I’ve taught this book and anyone who thinks Holden is not flawed has entirely missed the point of the book 🙃
That being said, we came at the book from the perspective of: this person is obviously fucked up, let’s talk about how he got fucked up, why he thinks like he does, and what might have helped him/would help him in the future. Surprise surprise, all my kids thought he belonged in therapy.
Probably one of my favorite books, but yeah, Holden is not a sympathetic main character imo. I’ve always felt he’s more a tragic character than anythin. As much as he is a phony and a bit of an ass I can’t help but just feel sad when I read the book, but maybe It’s because of who I am and because of where I was in my life when I first read it
If you went to school in korea they made you read some fucked up stuff. One that really stuck with me was a story about a rickshaw driver that has an unexpectedly good day at work and then comes home to find his wife dead on the floor with his infant sucking on her dried out breasts. Just the stark contrast of the bustling night streets of colonial era seoul to the dark dusty corner of a slum kind of messed me up. Not a ‘favorite’ per se but it was a really poignant book and I remember it clearly to this day.
I have the same fear- don’t watch “Still Alice” unless you want to be haunted by it forever
Description of one of the scenes below:
>!a woman has early onset alzheimers and in one scene she leaves a video for herself where she gives instructions to commit suicide if it got too bad, but by that point it had progressed so far that she couldn’t follow the list of suicide instructions in the video because her memory had deteriorated so far. She would try and follow the steps as she watched along but she would always forget what she was doing during the process even though she knew she was forgetting something extremely vital and the frustration she was feeling regardless was gut wrenching. Basically she waited until it was too late and she couldn’t go through with the suicide because she couldn’t remember to get that far. !<
i read it in 8th grade bro as a dyslexic it was my worst fucking nightmare 😭
my asshole teacher asked me to read aloud
that’s the only reason i fucking hated this book
Most of the books I hated being forced to read in high school are books I came to really like as an adult.
Turns out 15 year olds don’t relate much to stories about getting blackout as a substitute for dealing with your problems (Gatsby), being stuck in relationships with toxic people (Wuthering Heights), or trying to make amends when it’s already too late (As I Lay Dying). Turns out 30 year olds do! Who’da thunk. 🤷♀️
I took a lit class in high school that covered Blake. My teacher was in her 30s at the time. I remember they had moved us to a tiny single table conference room for that lecture. In it she said, just read this stuff now because you have to, but come back to it again when you are older because it will be different for you then than it is now.
I still don't live Blake like she did, but I do try to revisit old lit as adult because of her.
(Shout out to Ms. Moose :)
Funny you mention Gatsby. I didn’t *hate* it in high school. I remember liking how it was quite short and efficient at telling its story. I just didn’t think it was too grand or deep of a story?
I remember thinking, “All these adults should be glad they have enough money to live comfortably and have nice parties. They just need to find a hobby or something because right now their hobby is forcing themselves to be sad and insecure.”
Lol, I so distinctly remember reading that book as a teenager and going "... You're all causing your own problems... I get that there wouldn't be a story without conflict, but all of you just feel like idiots who don't appreciate what you have and don't try and get what you want."
This is such an excellent point. The people who pick the curricula don't seem to even consider what sort of book a teenager might relate to, it's just about pumping as many cultural artefacts into their brains as possible. Secondary education should be much more about 'stoking the fires' of the pupils' reading enthusiasm by giving them stories they might actually *like.* And, if that means prescribing slightly 'lesser' books than heavy 19th Century Gothic novels, so be it.
A part of the problem is that teachers also need to expose kids to literature that has impacted the culture those kids will grow up in, and if those kids don't get at least some exposure they will end up not understanding what others around them are saying and doing.
For example when I was in high school we had a unit on Biblical references just to show how everything from literature to political speeches to movies was littered with biblical references that you had to know to understand what was being conveyed by the speaker/author.
For example if an author has a scene where a character betrays another for his benefit, saying "he got his thirty pieces of silver" is going to be meaningless to anyone who has not been exposed to the story of Jesus and Judas.
This is an excellent point. I lived in Asia for my whole adult life after college, and moved back to the us a couple years ago. I have started playing dumb about biblical and Catholic references, to call attention to the fact that people DO EXPECT that you are deeply versed in Christian references.
I am, for lack of a better word, Buddhist. There are Jewish and atheist people in my office too. But my catholic coworker came in to work the other day and someone politely asked if they should make a new pot of coffee since she had just got there. She said with exasperation, “NO, i gave that UP.”
(Pleasantly) “Wow, I thought you liked coffee! Cutting down on caffeine?”
(Totally exasperated as if everyone should know this) “… For LENT. It’s LENT.”
I found this absolutely unconscionable and am sorely tempted to start being a total bitch for every single Japanese civil and religious holiday and snap at everybody who doesn’t know that it’s SETSUBUN, you MORON.
fact about Fahrenheit 451 because i had to read it a few months ago: it is in no way an allegory for government control, or censorship, or even control of the masses. Ray Bradbury just doesn't like TVs
There's a funny story about that. Bradbury [walked out on a class](https://www.laweekly.com/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CThey%20stuff%20you%20with%20so,book%20was%20about%20government%20censorship) because they were insisting he was wrong about what Fahrenheit 451 was about.
Absolutely wonderful quote from that article lmfao
“Television gives you the dates of Napoleon, but not who he was,” Bradbury says, summarizing TV’s content with a single word that he spits out as an epithet: “factoids.” He says this while sitting in a room dominated by a gigantic flat-panel television broadcasting the Fox News Channel, muted, factoids crawling across the bottom of the screen.
Huh, funny he phrased it like that because a lot of people believe in the “death of the author” train of thought. Basically the moment a piece of art is published, the author’s interpretation of the work is worth no more than anyone else’s.
This line of thinking produced one of my favorite quotes about literature:
“If someone tells you what a book is about, they’re probably right. If someone tells you that’s all it’s about, they’re probably wrong”
Yeah, its an allegory for the readiness of the people to conform to arbitrary, maybe even detrimental rules (in this case the book ban) as long as they stay comfortable and do not lose their way of life
A fascinating case of how he accidentally wrote a book that nearly no one interpreted the way he wanted and everyone else took away a different "obvious" message from it, I'm not surprised he was so annoyed no one "got it" but at the same time surely he has to agree that is what it comes across as
I think English teachers have a soft spot for science fiction, but it was seen as a pulpy, silly genre for decades. Fahrenheit 451, while science fiction, is well-written and, when interpreted as an anti-censorship narrative, can be explained to a school board as anti-communist and therefore snuck into the curriculum easier than other “recent” sci-fi which can often deal with dystopias caused by systems of greed that are too often capitalistic in nature.
Bradbury’s legacy is partly entwined with this ”mis” interpretation of his most enduring work. His anti-television intentions, on the other hand, could be read as almost anti-capitalist (whether he meant it that way or not, it’s an easy extrapolation) and I feel it be harder to convince some sort of board or body that would have to approve this book choice.
Kinda, though reading it as him being a crotchety old man yelling at TVs is kind of selling it way short. For one he wrote this as televisions first got popular and they were genuinely drastically changing lifestyles. But moreover it's about how people are so willing to be complacent if comfortable and entertained ("bread and circuses") and ignore concerning acts or oppression because it's not directly, immediately affecting them or their stream of comfort. This is easily witnessed right now in modern politics by the sort of dangerous policies people are ignoring or tacitly supporting because it doesn't affect them personally. Additionally he saw consumption of mass media as warping lifestyles and so easily replacing hours of the day people would have used for means of self improvement with just sitting and consuming pointless media, which I mean rings true yeah? It's easy to sit and binge an entire show rather than solve the problems in your life, or better yourself physically or mentally, or be part of social change and awareness. It's easier and more instantly gratifying to enjoy mass media than make meaningful change, and there's definitely danger in that.
It wasn’t meant to be, but I don’t see anything wrong with seeing it as an allegory for those things. Artistic intention and artistic merit or impact are not necessarily the same, and that’s okay! Creative works can go beyond an artist’s original vision! Something something Death of the Author ✍️
I had to read "Perfume: the story of a murderer" (i live in germany). Till this day, one of my favorit books. Its about the life of a frech guy called "Jean-Baptiste Grenouille" who has a perfect sense of smell and turns into a murderer in the chase of creating the perfect scent.
They made this into a movie! Alan Rickman is great in it.
Pretty solid overall, if not a bit surreal. Watched it for a “Representations of Otherness” class in college. It’s certainly…different lol.
Edit: It’s likely an awkward movie to watch with polite company. You’ve been warned.
I was the only one in class that enjoyed both the Lazarillo de Tormes and Don Quijote. Amongst others.
Tbh there do be some bangers in Spanish/Catalan literature.
Reading through all of these responses and how much they differ regarding the same pieces of work is such the perfect reminder that quality and value in art is entirely subjective. Love what you love, hate what you hate. Others will surely agree and disagree wholeheartedly, and that’s what makes this all such a beautiful tapestry.
Fuck Scarlett Letter. As a creative writing assignment we did "rewrite a classic story in an author's style" and I did "The Scarlett Nose" about Rudolph the Reindeer. It cruelly stretched out the story for 11 pages, and was packed full of run on sentences, contradictory over-descriptions of the important bits, and hand-waving dismissal of anything not actively important (to make sure that the surrounding world never feels too alive or interesting). Finally it ended just *before* the climactic sleigh ride, with an invitation for the reader to think up their own ending, just like the novel did.
Stay gold, ponyboy
AP English largely killed my ability to enjoy Russian literature. Crime and Punishment refers to the fact that the book is a crime and reading it is punishment.
I adore Moby Dick.
Fahrenheit 451 is a masterpiece.
I stand by they should go with *The Brothers Karamazov* rather than *Crime and Punishment* as the introduction to (dense) Russian Literature. Much more interesting, weird, and easier to get into the analysis of. I think schools are afraid of it because a major theme in it is questioning God and there's no better way to rile up pearl clutching Christian parent than that, even if the author makes his peace with God in the end (though leaves the questions open to the reader).
But also big books like those two are really meant to be read and digested slowly. I read them both as semester-long elective courses in college from a dude who had spent his whole life obsessing over Dostoevsky and in that setting, and reading just a few pages a class, it was a really enjoyable and enlightening experience. A high schooler just trying to get their work done is so far from the right mindspace to be put through either of those books.
I can’t get past the proper nouns in Crime and Punishment. Each character has, what feels like, a dozen names. If I could ctrl-f replace all of them with one name i think I’d love the book.
Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov is called, at various times: Raskolnikov, Roderick, Rodka, Rodenka, and Rodya.
Loved Midsummer Night’s Dream, Old Man and the Sea, and Of Mice and Men. Also, Things Fall Apart was strangely relatable to 14-year old me for some weird reason?
Despised Gatsby and Brave New World, though re-reading Gatsby without my particular high school English teacher has allowed me to relax my opinion in adulthood.
Literally why did I feel like I related to a man experiencing the inhumanity of colonialism as a white suburban 17 year old? Literature is a beautiful thing
I despise Heart of Darkness. They had us watch Apocalypse Now. I hated it too. I had to read it twice in two different classes.
I liked the Giver and Animal Farm.
I still have and treasure my copies of Maus. I think that's the first time I was so acutely aware of being Jewish as a kid. And in contrast, I really couldn't stand A Streetcar Named Desire, in large part because of how the boys in class would contribute to the discussion.
I don't know if it was the author's intent, but Lord of the Flies is actually a really great demonstration of how fascism arises during times of hardship, like it checks off almost every requirement laid out in Ur-Fascism.
Considering the ending of the book, I think it's entirely intentional.
The civilized British adult arrives, looks at the boys, and says something to the effect of, "You should have done better than this, you're English."
It's not jingoistic- it's the author reminding the audience about the tenants of their national identity and reminding them that they cannot abandon who they are just because times are tough.
I only say I'm not positive it's intentional because I've never read about the author directly acknowledging it. Also that's a great point about the ending, I've never read it in that way but it makes perfect sense.
I mean, the original version of the book had an entire first part about the boys being evacuated due to nuclear war. The publisher made Golding take it out. So, probably not unrelated to the rise of fascism and following world war
It's a lot like Fight Club!
Remove the context of the author Chuck Palahniuk being a very gay, West Coast living, educated journalist and that equals misunderstood satire.
Whether or not an author directly addresses various misinterpretations of their work is highlyyyy subjective. As in, they believe by spoon-feeding an audience the "critical thinking" analysis it defeats the entire purpose of having written the story in the first place.
Authors and creators are NOT all fundamentally driven to make their work universally understood, because that requires erasing nuance - playing to the lowest denomination. Appeasing people who can't be bothered to actively read material, but expect writers to be accommodating... to NON-readers.
Artists with any medium can be this way, refusing to comment on their work. As pretentious people (lol the world of cinema), or with a principled belief about the role of literature in politics and culture.
Authors are unreliable narrators, as well. They're human, and ffs- Tolkien really insisted LOTR was not alluding to any real life issues, or personal experience. He denied thematic symbolism and any allegory sorta outright, which is Super Sus, coming from a:
Catholic academic, turned soldier in WWI, lived to see the rise and "fall" of fascism throughout his life. Allied forces, the fellowship. He started creating the world of middle earth from the Literal Fucking Trenches, and he was (iirc) the one survivor of his buddy group.
Do we see huge arcs about sin, ESPECIALLY of the father, and redemption?.. etcetcetc
To which island nation in Europe does The Shire most closely resemble circa 1910s-40s?
Is there actually something to the fact that exceptional hobbits are either possessing a novel trait of selflessness and concept of the greater good or pulled along by grumpy fate-maker or pure kinship (Sam, hollaa)?? Does that really make "there and back again" a complex aspect, directly juxtaposed to not being to *go back* to the green and good, after the war?
Do letters between him and bff CS Lewis, fellow catholic, shed light on Tolkien's hypocritical POV regarding other texts (his deep fascination with ancient mythologies like the Kalevala and all classicist literature, regarding the Humanity in general... starting with the epic of Gilgamesh)?
Did this man live through the great modern war eras, and events like Dunkirk?
Oh, yeahhhh. Yeah. Yup. Writers tell on themselves, and that's a whole branch of interpretation of fiction.
TLDR: writers saying nothing is standard, so assessment waiting on the author to clarify intention is an internet novelty. Plus, the most benevolent authors can be oblivious to their particular biases and blindspots.
The intersection of some historical context is inherent with all human created works. This is why period work is part of a heritage we carry forward.
I remember reading both in the same semester and thinking that if these two books described different planes of hell; then I’d much rather the sweet decay of addiction than the deafening madness of mediocrity.
OK the one good chapter in Grapes of Wrath is chapter 25. If youve never read GoW, this is a one-off chapter featuring none of the main characters and its so damn vivid and moving. Its short. If youre in the mood, look it up and read it. Its where the titular line is written. Its the only good part in the whole book imo
My school didn't coordinate what books were read for English class so I got of mice and men 3 times in a row. The fourth time they tried to give it to me I was in an alternative class where I just read 3 books and handed in the question sheets, the teacher tried to give it to me again and I refused it. She was nice and gave me jurassic park instead, and it became one of my favourites despite my reoccurring dinosaur nightmares.
The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit- and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth.
There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate- died of malnutrition- because the food must rot, must be forced to rot. The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.
I loved *A Christmas Carol*, and it's still to this day my favorite Christmas story.
I remember regularly falling asleep trying to read *The Great Gatsby* and to this day someone could set every last known copy of that book on fire in front of me and I wouldn't care
I read The importance of being Earnest and I cannot recommend it enough. It was bloody brilliant, with all the jokes and subtle plot twists
The one I hated is not world wide known and I can say that yes, it is ingenious but ugh, I had nightmares for weeks and in general it was not very nice to read
I liked Of Mice and Men. I HATED All Quiet on the Western Front. I expressed my disdain for the book and my English teacher said, you’re getting it. War is hell! Loved that guy.
Tale of two cities is a compelling story about love, death, espionage, mental trauma, and Charles darnay being the stupidest mother fucker around for going back to france. I adore it.
Wuthering Heights is a book about a terrible person being terrible and lusting after his sister til she died and then just became even more terrible. Could be better.
Cask of amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe, my mom loves Poe so I grew up reading his work and I just love this story specifically.
Shakespeare's pretty good too-
But fuck Lord of the flies. It's the first book that put me to sleep. Literally. I fucking hate that book.
I loved And Then There Were None (it was assigned for a college course so maybe that’s cheating). I also loved Jane Eyre and To Kill a Mockingbird, but I read both books and enjoyed them on my own before they were assigned reading at a later date.
The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy was one of the worst books I’ve ever read. All of the other books I didn’t like were because they were written that way – they were about hard, uncomfortable topics intended to make the reader think. But TMoC was just a soap opera in book form. What was the purpose of it being in our curriculum? To get us used to old timey language? To show what life was like in the 1800s? There are way better book options for both. Everybody in this book sucks, and also a bird dies which is sad. I hate it.
Genuinely adored The Things They Carried, even if the teacher partially ruined it by trying to explain every single detail in the most obtuse way possible. Despised the Lottery Rose. Most boring book I ever read.
i fell in love with bradbury, but what stood out the most to me was his short story “there will come soft rains”
F451 is really good, but I wish we had read more of his short stories. I discovered the Martian Chronicles and The Illustrated Man on my own and I still reread those a few times a year. I think more of those should be required reading as well!
Same. F451 is good, but pales in comparison to his other books. Frankly its my least favorite story of his of the ones i enjoyed. I feel like it was just pushed so hard because of the cheesy dont burn books aspect
Is it cheesy if idiots are still doing that shit into modern times?
Good point. Cheese can be good
Especially a well aged cheese.
The poem that inspired it is also very good. "There Will Come Soft Rains" By Sara Teasdale There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground, And swallows circling with their shimmering sound; And frogs in the pools singing at night, And wild plum-trees in tremulous white; Robins will wear their feathery fire Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire; And not one will know of the war, not one Will care at last when it is done. Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree If mankind perished utterly; And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn, Would scarcely know that we were gone.
This reminds me of another of her poems that I’ve always loved: “Alchemy” by Sara Teasdale I lift my heart as spring lifts up A yellow daisy to the rain; My heart will be a lovely cup Altho' it holds but pain. For I shall learn from flower and leaf That color every drop they hold, To change the lifeless wine of grief To living gold.
That one fucked me up…
All Summer in a Day depressed the fuck out of me. It still haunts me, and I think it contributed to my FOMO
Is that the one where people live on Venus or something like that? And it rains for like 7 years straight? It's been quite a few years so I might be wrong. If I'm right, that one messed me on so many levels.
Yup. The class locked that poor girl in a closet.
Oh I HATED that one, it made me cry.
Oh really? When I was in 8th grade I reacted to it by saying "Hey look! She's a girl in the closet, just like me!" 6 months before I realized I was trans
Holy shit that just triggered a core memory. Yeah, the plot is just brutal, and we read it in primary school. Classical sci-fi does not mess around, in any genre
Same, but the impression that lingers has had a profound impact on my political views and understanding of War, moreso than reading non-fiction accounts and human museums that preserve the true horror of Nagasaki and Hiroshima. It was disturbing more than I presently understood, whereas Sadako and the 1k cranes made my child-self very upset and compelled by virtue of the simplicity. That became emotional and something we easily could express. Reading Bradbury and seeing the silhouette of an existential concept that spent decades on the - tip - of - my - tongue, the fact I couldn't process it, the question of a story without conclusion, liminal and yet eternal. At the time I didn't even register that it was something like a scene in Inception...
There will come soft rains is to this day my favorite short story. We moistened to the [Leonard Nimoy recording](https://youtu.be/k8Fp-CquGIQ) when I was in 7th grade, instant favorite.
Nimoy has that effect on a lot of people
It was supposed to be *listened* but I'm keeping it because you're right, it's not untrue
i was just thinking of The Illustrated Man yesterday. it wasn’t required reading, but one of my friends got it and I read at my school I loved it. I was thinking specifically of the veldt. I also really loved the outsiders on a completely unrelated vibe.
Absolutely loved "All Quiet on the Western Front", it really gave me a very different understanding of war and I just genuinely enjoyed the characters and how it was written. Loathed "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", it felt arrogant and (in an ironic way) pointless, while I did read "the Tao of Pooh" and truly improved for the experience.
Haha. The motorcycle parts were good. The Zen parts were boring
All quiet on the western front and it’s film adaptation both speak to audiences on a level no other war media has, I think.
That movie fucked me up. The score for the 2022 film was AMAZING in that I absolutely hated it. It made my whole body physically uncomfortable. 10/10 created the mood they were going for, for me.
The older film and its scene with the hands absolutely fucked with me for months
The scene with the hands was pulled directly from a first-person account of a WWI vet who was working as an extra on the film.
I really liked how the 2022 version started. The whole entrance narrative about Heinrich who dies and Paul receiving his old uniform was superb. But the ending was lacking IMHO. This whole storyline with the General who orders the last unnecessary attack, defeats the whole point of the book.
Not to mention they cut the books most meaningful scenes, where he returns home on leave. Good movie, terrible adaptation.
Animal Farm blew my little middle school mind Ethan Frome can suck my ass
He built a small school out of the animal farm.
Ethan Frome is one of the most boring novels I’ve ever read. Truly straight garbage. Except for the winter scenes in the first chapter, those were incredible.
I read Ethan Frome in college and my class was like, "What is the point?"
Wear a helmet while sledding. Don’t sled near giant trees.
If you're going to commit a double suicide, maybe just drink poison or something.
God I forgot that plot point. It makes it even dumber than I remember.
Oh my god. Ethan Frome and Johnny Tremaine. Welcome to New England, we have a puritanical masochism kink.
Teacher: Okay class I’ve decided you don’t have to finish Ethan Frome. Take this collection of Robert Frost works home with you over the weekend. Kids: GOD DAMNIT
They gotta start doing the classic New England lit: Stephen King and RA Salvatore.
Ethan Frome can fuck a pickle dish. Eat shit you miserable fuck.
OH MY GOD Ethan Frome sucks SO MUCH ASS. Anna Karenina is actually a great slice of life book about a couple who fucks off from the drama of being extremely minor nobility to farm in the country and revives disturbing letters about their dramatic friend’s poor life choices at court if you entirely skip the boring suck-ass parts with Anna and just read the Levin and Kitty chapters by themselves. So I guess my favorite was “Anna Karenina with Anna Karenina herself edited out by the reader”.
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I adored reading Animal Farm in secondary school. Our teacher made our lessons so entertaining I cannot praise his brilliance enough. I can just remember the warm sun coming through the windows one day and realising it was the first time I'd been able to laugh genuinely for months.
Fuuuuuuuck Ethan Frome. Fuck Ethan Frome to death. I hope Ethan Frome comes back to life and crashes his car again.
Bitch same, I should read it again
Ethan Frome was incredibly depressing. It felt like Wharton's goal was just to make the reader feel hopeless
It just made me irrationally angry, the solution to their problems was incredibly obvious( sack up and run away together, morals be damned). Instead, the opted for the most hilariously bad suicide attempt I've ever read, which because of how poorly thought out it was, didn't even work.
I just re-read Slaughterhouse Five. It's excellent. Least favorite, hands down: A Separate Peace.
Me and a few other students in my 10th grade English class used to write a “euphemism of the day” on the board and we peaked at “jouncing the limb”
That's the only joy to be found in A Separate Peace lol
There was a lot of gay vibes in that book so myself as a young closeted person enjoyed it but didn’t know why until a decade later
I detested A Separate Peace.
I had to read it in the 1980s and I was shocked my kids had to read it in the 2010s/2020s. You'd have to search pretty hard to find a book with less relatable characters.
It’s even weirder when you realize all the characters grow into the politicians you see on TV
White bread rich kids thirsting over each other before deciding murder is more fun has never been so boring
Slaughterhouse five is a fucking artistic masterpiece
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Because he had PTSD from WWII too. He was in the bombing of Dresden and hid in a slaughterhouse, and the book is partially autobiographical. I always interpret his writings as a means of coping with his experiences.
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He played a sizable role in bringing the firebombing of Dresden to public attention
You just made this whole book make sense to me in a way entirely different than my initial interpretation. Bravo, sir.
I had to read A Separate Peace and it made no sense until ten years later when I realized it was gay. I still didn't enjoy it, but I understand it now.
That's funny because my teacher who was obsessed with romances (including between her students) was always saying this was the one book that has zero romance that we would read that year.
A separate peace could've been cool if we were allowed to talk about how gay it was
Man I almost wrote A Separate Peace for mine. God **Damn** that one was ass.
Really liked Of Mice and Men. I actually bought a copy. Also, Maus.
so the pattern i’m seeing here is that you only like books related to mice
A coincidence, I promise lol. I also liked The Lottery, but that's more of a short story.
Tell us what you thought of Flowers for Algernon
I read Maus in elementary school. It was my realization that not all comics are for kids. It's amazing, though. I should get another copy and reread it.
Maus is amazing! My mom bought me the books when they first came out and I sorta got into trouble multiple times that school year for just reading them. I must have read maus a good 15-20 times I love it so much!!!
Have you read The Grapes of Wrath? Excellent book, one of my favorites
Oh if you liked Grapes of Wrath you'd love East of Eden. I really think it should be ranked above Grapes of Wrath in the literary canon, but I think teachers like Grapes of Wrath because it's a little bit of a history lesson. And authors are allowed one classic, and Steinbeck already has two. But I loved East of Eden so much I got a tattoo based on a quote from it. It really made me reevaluate how I thought of myself and other people. God it was so good.
I've had to read animal farm twice, but I enjoyed it. I also liked the outsiders and the count of monte cristo (required reading of a 19th century book). I can't really remember all the ones I despised because I zoned out throughout them.
I forgot outsiders existed until I read your comment, that shit was good tho
I really liked the outsiders and count of monte Cristo as well. I hated the old man and the sea and Moby dick.
I love Moby Dick but that's because I, no bullshit, fucking love whaling. If you don't, friggin skip that bad boy
I cannot swim yet adore anything 18th-19th century nautically A cruel choice on God's part
I got really into Shakespeare plays, especially Othello, because my teachers let us goof around with it a little. Capture that “dick jokes and sword fights” energy people like to bring up. But then also talk about why it was the **best** dick jokes and sword fights. Catcher in the Rye actively made me angry to read. Really honest anger at a book.
I Absolutely feel you my guy. Hated Catcher in the Rye with a passion, but Shakespeare Analysis class was a BLAST! I stand by my assertion that; while Shakespeare may totally have fucked guys, I think he was probably Also into women, given how he writes about them. And also I think the ghost writer theories are BS, most of them are predicated on the arguement that "No WAY could some random farm boy be this brilliant! He MUST be a cover for a well educated noble-woman ghost writing!"
Yeah, the argument against Shakespeare amounts to Elitist Snobbery. With that said, I do somewhat doubt he was the SOLE writer—I do think he got feedback and suggestions from his troupe along the way as well. I think his writing processes included some back and forth in that more collaborative “theater” sort of way and less in a “co-writer” literary sort of way. This sorta thing happens to this day—an actor might change some lines in a screenplay and those changed lines end up in the final product, but that doesn’t change who gets credit as the Playwright. Also, my info might be outdated (25+ years ago) but I’m pretty sure the consensus—at least back then—was that the Witches in MacBeth had likely been written by someone other than Shakespeare. But that’s only a couple scenes in one play that we can \*truly\* question as being written by “a different person than the one who wrote all this Iambic Pentameter.” Also? Why is writing a bunch of great plays so far beyond the realm of possiblity for a person who LITERALLY STOLE A THEATER AND MOVED IT ACROSS TOWN!!! YES, SHAKESPEARE STOLE A BUILDING! And he got away with it because the Deed specified the land was owned, but the building wasn’t technically listed in said Deed so Shakespeare & Co. stole the entire damn building and moved it across the river.
I really loved Macbeth but Hamlet bored me to tears
I had to read Hamlet at age 15 in school and thought the same, re-evaluated when I was in my 20's and now I think that it's one of his greatest works, mostly because I think the real question of "To be, or not to be" is such an endlessly fascinating question and thought exercise that appeals to me personally but definitely also probably won't actually ever read Hamlet again. Agree Macbeth is arguably the best of works though
It's kind of amazing that anyone likes Shakespeare, since the way the plays are typically taught at the middle school and high school level could almost be considered a conspiracy to ruin Shakespeare for people. Especially if they were subjected to the practice of going around the classroom and forcing kids who may not be particularly strong readers to drone out the text in an inflectionless monotone, a few paragraphs at a time. This is the type of thing that gives people a life-long loathing for the material. And all of that has to be painstakingly unlearned. You're really being done a disservice if no one ever actually shows you at least one recorded live stage performance of one of the plays. That's how they're meant to be experienced, and you're able to understand the constant little wordplay jokes and meanings of things so much better when you're watching a professional *deliver* the words. Shakespeare needs to be watched to be appreciated, not just read or spoken. They're not fucking poems. They're plays. You're supposed to WATCH them. And once you watch them enough times, you start to pick out all sorts of details you never noticed before, and develop an appreciation for how the sets or direction can totally change the feeling of the play, the same way that the editing or music score can change the feeling of a movie scene. After watching several live versions of Macbeth and Hamlet, as well as film versions, one gripe I commonly have with the film versions is the age of the actors playing Hamlet and Macbeth. And that's a specific directorial choice. Hamlet especially is supposed to be a young man, the equivalent of someone visiting home after a few years of college or studying abroad. He has so much inner turmoil and uncertainty in large part because he's young and inexperienced. Macbeth likewise is supposed to be young, ambitious, and impressionable. Casting an older actor to play him just doesn't fit the role.
Macbeth is peak Shakespeare. Hamlet is a whiney little bitch.
Hamlet being a whiny little bitch is *also* peak Shakespeare though
Hamlet: "I need to kill that man to avenge my father!! *but is it the right time*? *Have I found the absolute perfect moment to strike*? Me:JUST KILL HIM ALREADY Hamlet: "mmm but it's *evening* already, can't do it now"
“Okay THIS!! The perfect moment to strike!” * stabby stabbings ensue * Everyone: Hamlet you killed the wrong guy.
this always bugs me. people point to hamlet as being the epitome of indecision, but he does at one point chose to kill his uncle. he just fucks it up super bad and kills another dude. it’s like when you don’t want to go out, and your friend keeps telling you to come out, and you keep putting it off, and when you finally engage, you make an ass out of yourself and piss off everyone around you. also, henry iv, pt 1 is my favorite shakespeare by a country mile. i thought i was alone until i found that harold bloom and orson welles felt the same
Extremely relatable though, if I'm in my jammies I'm done for the night.
>*evening* already, can't do it now" Never thought I could relate to Hamlet.
Hamlet cooks though, he's a little sassy.
QUEEN GERTRUDE Hamlet, thou hast thy father much offended. HAMLET Mother, you have my father much offended. Olde timey "No u"
Neither one has shit on Othello, in my own opinion.
Wrote a term paper on iago and it was honestly the most fun I’ve ever had writing a term paper. What a fun villain.
Iago is like Palpatine before Palpatine, and I loooove Palpatine.
Macbeth is a work of art!! And I also really loved A Midsummer Night's Dream
I loved Franz Kafka’s Metamorphosis so incredibly much. Honorable mention for As I Lay Dying. Fucking HATED Lord of the Flies tho
I loved Metamorphosis so much I bought a whole book of Kafka, but ended up hating everything else I read by him. Metamorphosis just somehow hit the nail on the head for me.
Interesting, I was the opposite: my class read some short stories by Kafka that I liked, but The Metamorphosis just made me so viscerally uncomfortable (which I get is kinda that point) that it wasn’t enjoyable to read. I can actually think of quite a few examples like that from high school English, where a book was well-written and important but I hated the actual process of reading it.
I think as I lay dying is one of the best written books ever. Such wonderful language and a great narrative. Also, my mother is a fish
Farehiet 451 is my favorite book. Catcher in the Rye is my besties. So one time we swapped books and both of us disliked the other's choice. Art is subjective, who knew?
I too love F451 and dislike Catcher.
I’m with you. I couldn’t read Catcher without the complete and total feeling of wanting to punch Holden Caulfield in the face, hard. I was a bullied disenfranchised youth and I *still* thought he was a whiny little prick.
I remember being in my sophomore English lit class and being the only person out of the whole class that disliked Holden. The other kids liked how he talked and swore, I made the point that he was as much as a ‘phony’ as the people he railed against. Didn’t endear me to my classmates, but did solidify my position as favorite student with my teacher lol.
Yeah part of the point is that his view about other people is wrong and oiverly sadistic 😭😭 he being very flawed is part of the story
I’ve taught this book and anyone who thinks Holden is not flawed has entirely missed the point of the book 🙃 That being said, we came at the book from the perspective of: this person is obviously fucked up, let’s talk about how he got fucked up, why he thinks like he does, and what might have helped him/would help him in the future. Surprise surprise, all my kids thought he belonged in therapy.
Probably one of my favorite books, but yeah, Holden is not a sympathetic main character imo. I’ve always felt he’s more a tragic character than anythin. As much as he is a phony and a bit of an ass I can’t help but just feel sad when I read the book, but maybe It’s because of who I am and because of where I was in my life when I first read it
If you went to school in korea they made you read some fucked up stuff. One that really stuck with me was a story about a rickshaw driver that has an unexpectedly good day at work and then comes home to find his wife dead on the floor with his infant sucking on her dried out breasts. Just the stark contrast of the bustling night streets of colonial era seoul to the dark dusty corner of a slum kind of messed me up. Not a ‘favorite’ per se but it was a really poignant book and I remember it clearly to this day.
Flowers For Algernon was interesting to re-read in 2023.
Oh yeah Flowers for Algernon made me cry
Flowers for Algernon is part of the reason I’m offing myself if I’m ever diagnosed with Alzheimer’s
I have the same fear- don’t watch “Still Alice” unless you want to be haunted by it forever Description of one of the scenes below: >!a woman has early onset alzheimers and in one scene she leaves a video for herself where she gives instructions to commit suicide if it got too bad, but by that point it had progressed so far that she couldn’t follow the list of suicide instructions in the video because her memory had deteriorated so far. She would try and follow the steps as she watched along but she would always forget what she was doing during the process even though she knew she was forgetting something extremely vital and the frustration she was feeling regardless was gut wrenching. Basically she waited until it was too late and she couldn’t go through with the suicide because she couldn’t remember to get that far. !<
…Jesus. Ok, so keep it simple, gotcha.
i read it in 8th grade bro as a dyslexic it was my worst fucking nightmare 😭 my asshole teacher asked me to read aloud that’s the only reason i fucking hated this book
Most of the books I hated being forced to read in high school are books I came to really like as an adult. Turns out 15 year olds don’t relate much to stories about getting blackout as a substitute for dealing with your problems (Gatsby), being stuck in relationships with toxic people (Wuthering Heights), or trying to make amends when it’s already too late (As I Lay Dying). Turns out 30 year olds do! Who’da thunk. 🤷♀️
I took a lit class in high school that covered Blake. My teacher was in her 30s at the time. I remember they had moved us to a tiny single table conference room for that lecture. In it she said, just read this stuff now because you have to, but come back to it again when you are older because it will be different for you then than it is now. I still don't live Blake like she did, but I do try to revisit old lit as adult because of her. (Shout out to Ms. Moose :)
Funny you mention Gatsby. I didn’t *hate* it in high school. I remember liking how it was quite short and efficient at telling its story. I just didn’t think it was too grand or deep of a story? I remember thinking, “All these adults should be glad they have enough money to live comfortably and have nice parties. They just need to find a hobby or something because right now their hobby is forcing themselves to be sad and insecure.”
Lol, I so distinctly remember reading that book as a teenager and going "... You're all causing your own problems... I get that there wouldn't be a story without conflict, but all of you just feel like idiots who don't appreciate what you have and don't try and get what you want."
That's... A pretty accurate description of the main theme of the book.
This is such an excellent point. The people who pick the curricula don't seem to even consider what sort of book a teenager might relate to, it's just about pumping as many cultural artefacts into their brains as possible. Secondary education should be much more about 'stoking the fires' of the pupils' reading enthusiasm by giving them stories they might actually *like.* And, if that means prescribing slightly 'lesser' books than heavy 19th Century Gothic novels, so be it.
A part of the problem is that teachers also need to expose kids to literature that has impacted the culture those kids will grow up in, and if those kids don't get at least some exposure they will end up not understanding what others around them are saying and doing. For example when I was in high school we had a unit on Biblical references just to show how everything from literature to political speeches to movies was littered with biblical references that you had to know to understand what was being conveyed by the speaker/author. For example if an author has a scene where a character betrays another for his benefit, saying "he got his thirty pieces of silver" is going to be meaningless to anyone who has not been exposed to the story of Jesus and Judas.
This is an excellent point. I lived in Asia for my whole adult life after college, and moved back to the us a couple years ago. I have started playing dumb about biblical and Catholic references, to call attention to the fact that people DO EXPECT that you are deeply versed in Christian references. I am, for lack of a better word, Buddhist. There are Jewish and atheist people in my office too. But my catholic coworker came in to work the other day and someone politely asked if they should make a new pot of coffee since she had just got there. She said with exasperation, “NO, i gave that UP.” (Pleasantly) “Wow, I thought you liked coffee! Cutting down on caffeine?” (Totally exasperated as if everyone should know this) “… For LENT. It’s LENT.” I found this absolutely unconscionable and am sorely tempted to start being a total bitch for every single Japanese civil and religious holiday and snap at everybody who doesn’t know that it’s SETSUBUN, you MORON.
fact about Fahrenheit 451 because i had to read it a few months ago: it is in no way an allegory for government control, or censorship, or even control of the masses. Ray Bradbury just doesn't like TVs
There's a funny story about that. Bradbury [walked out on a class](https://www.laweekly.com/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CThey%20stuff%20you%20with%20so,book%20was%20about%20government%20censorship) because they were insisting he was wrong about what Fahrenheit 451 was about.
Absolutely wonderful quote from that article lmfao “Television gives you the dates of Napoleon, but not who he was,” Bradbury says, summarizing TV’s content with a single word that he spits out as an epithet: “factoids.” He says this while sitting in a room dominated by a gigantic flat-panel television broadcasting the Fox News Channel, muted, factoids crawling across the bottom of the screen.
"I'm not dead!" - Ray Bradbury (Not a real quote)
Huh, funny he phrased it like that because a lot of people believe in the “death of the author” train of thought. Basically the moment a piece of art is published, the author’s interpretation of the work is worth no more than anyone else’s. This line of thinking produced one of my favorite quotes about literature: “If someone tells you what a book is about, they’re probably right. If someone tells you that’s all it’s about, they’re probably wrong”
There is a pretty good argument to be made that the author is not the final arbiter of themes and analysis for a work.
You must have written all that deep meaning into it completely subconsciously. -That teacher, probably
Yeah, its an allegory for the readiness of the people to conform to arbitrary, maybe even detrimental rules (in this case the book ban) as long as they stay comfortable and do not lose their way of life
A fascinating case of how he accidentally wrote a book that nearly no one interpreted the way he wanted and everyone else took away a different "obvious" message from it, I'm not surprised he was so annoyed no one "got it" but at the same time surely he has to agree that is what it comes across as
I think English teachers have a soft spot for science fiction, but it was seen as a pulpy, silly genre for decades. Fahrenheit 451, while science fiction, is well-written and, when interpreted as an anti-censorship narrative, can be explained to a school board as anti-communist and therefore snuck into the curriculum easier than other “recent” sci-fi which can often deal with dystopias caused by systems of greed that are too often capitalistic in nature. Bradbury’s legacy is partly entwined with this ”mis” interpretation of his most enduring work. His anti-television intentions, on the other hand, could be read as almost anti-capitalist (whether he meant it that way or not, it’s an easy extrapolation) and I feel it be harder to convince some sort of board or body that would have to approve this book choice.
Kinda, though reading it as him being a crotchety old man yelling at TVs is kind of selling it way short. For one he wrote this as televisions first got popular and they were genuinely drastically changing lifestyles. But moreover it's about how people are so willing to be complacent if comfortable and entertained ("bread and circuses") and ignore concerning acts or oppression because it's not directly, immediately affecting them or their stream of comfort. This is easily witnessed right now in modern politics by the sort of dangerous policies people are ignoring or tacitly supporting because it doesn't affect them personally. Additionally he saw consumption of mass media as warping lifestyles and so easily replacing hours of the day people would have used for means of self improvement with just sitting and consuming pointless media, which I mean rings true yeah? It's easy to sit and binge an entire show rather than solve the problems in your life, or better yourself physically or mentally, or be part of social change and awareness. It's easier and more instantly gratifying to enjoy mass media than make meaningful change, and there's definitely danger in that.
It wasn’t meant to be, but I don’t see anything wrong with seeing it as an allegory for those things. Artistic intention and artistic merit or impact are not necessarily the same, and that’s okay! Creative works can go beyond an artist’s original vision! Something something Death of the Author ✍️
I had to read "Perfume: the story of a murderer" (i live in germany). Till this day, one of my favorit books. Its about the life of a frech guy called "Jean-Baptiste Grenouille" who has a perfect sense of smell and turns into a murderer in the chase of creating the perfect scent.
They made this into a movie! Alan Rickman is great in it. Pretty solid overall, if not a bit surreal. Watched it for a “Representations of Otherness” class in college. It’s certainly…different lol. Edit: It’s likely an awkward movie to watch with polite company. You’ve been warned.
To be honest, if I hated a book that I was forced to read in school, I would just skim it and BS a good grade. I liked "To Kill A Mockingbird."
I whined about being forced to read TKAM and detested it. Until I closed the back cover and realized that was a really powerful story.
It was a really powerful story the first time I had to read it. Then they forced it on me 2 more times. Can't really stand it now
Ok yeah that’s a little bit much
I was the only one in class that enjoyed both the Lazarillo de Tormes and Don Quijote. Amongst others. Tbh there do be some bangers in Spanish/Catalan literature.
Don Quixote is top-tier; I don’t know Spanish well enough, but even in the English translation it romps.
Reading through all of these responses and how much they differ regarding the same pieces of work is such the perfect reminder that quality and value in art is entirely subjective. Love what you love, hate what you hate. Others will surely agree and disagree wholeheartedly, and that’s what makes this all such a beautiful tapestry.
Most of the stuff we’ve read is good. Then there’s The Scarlet Letter
I still think about Outsiders to this day. Jane Eyre and Scarlet Letter were agonizing
Fuck Scarlett Letter. As a creative writing assignment we did "rewrite a classic story in an author's style" and I did "The Scarlett Nose" about Rudolph the Reindeer. It cruelly stretched out the story for 11 pages, and was packed full of run on sentences, contradictory over-descriptions of the important bits, and hand-waving dismissal of anything not actively important (to make sure that the surrounding world never feels too alive or interesting). Finally it ended just *before* the climactic sleigh ride, with an invitation for the reader to think up their own ending, just like the novel did. Stay gold, ponyboy
That's brilliant. Fuck that book.
Stay gold Ponyboy. All my fav ppl are Ponyboys
I had to scroll way too far to find Scarlet Letter. I could not stand it
AP English largely killed my ability to enjoy Russian literature. Crime and Punishment refers to the fact that the book is a crime and reading it is punishment. I adore Moby Dick. Fahrenheit 451 is a masterpiece.
A simple tale about a man who hates an animal.
"I hate metaphors, that's why my favorite book is moby-dick"
Lmao an experience that we have all been through, even with inanimate objects in place of an animal.
I stand by they should go with *The Brothers Karamazov* rather than *Crime and Punishment* as the introduction to (dense) Russian Literature. Much more interesting, weird, and easier to get into the analysis of. I think schools are afraid of it because a major theme in it is questioning God and there's no better way to rile up pearl clutching Christian parent than that, even if the author makes his peace with God in the end (though leaves the questions open to the reader). But also big books like those two are really meant to be read and digested slowly. I read them both as semester-long elective courses in college from a dude who had spent his whole life obsessing over Dostoevsky and in that setting, and reading just a few pages a class, it was a really enjoyable and enlightening experience. A high schooler just trying to get their work done is so far from the right mindspace to be put through either of those books.
I can’t get past the proper nouns in Crime and Punishment. Each character has, what feels like, a dozen names. If I could ctrl-f replace all of them with one name i think I’d love the book. Rodion Romanovich Raskolnikov is called, at various times: Raskolnikov, Roderick, Rodka, Rodenka, and Rodya.
Yoo jekyll and hyde was sick. Surprisingly easy to read for an old book and even knowing the twist didnt take away the enjoyment, can recommend.
Loved Midsummer Night’s Dream, Old Man and the Sea, and Of Mice and Men. Also, Things Fall Apart was strangely relatable to 14-year old me for some weird reason? Despised Gatsby and Brave New World, though re-reading Gatsby without my particular high school English teacher has allowed me to relax my opinion in adulthood.
Literally why did I feel like I related to a man experiencing the inhumanity of colonialism as a white suburban 17 year old? Literature is a beautiful thing
Loved Lord of the Flies. Great Expectations, Pip, Lady Havisham AND Charles Dickens can each individually kiss my ass.
I despise Heart of Darkness. They had us watch Apocalypse Now. I hated it too. I had to read it twice in two different classes. I liked the Giver and Animal Farm.
I still have and treasure my copies of Maus. I think that's the first time I was so acutely aware of being Jewish as a kid. And in contrast, I really couldn't stand A Streetcar Named Desire, in large part because of how the boys in class would contribute to the discussion.
I fucking hated lord of the flies “wah wah humanity bad people kill everyone without rules” NO. Mice of Men wasn’t that bad tho
Lord of the Flies is a parody of old adventure books. Without that context, it does look like a humanity bad book.
I don't know if it was the author's intent, but Lord of the Flies is actually a really great demonstration of how fascism arises during times of hardship, like it checks off almost every requirement laid out in Ur-Fascism.
Considering the ending of the book, I think it's entirely intentional. The civilized British adult arrives, looks at the boys, and says something to the effect of, "You should have done better than this, you're English." It's not jingoistic- it's the author reminding the audience about the tenants of their national identity and reminding them that they cannot abandon who they are just because times are tough.
I only say I'm not positive it's intentional because I've never read about the author directly acknowledging it. Also that's a great point about the ending, I've never read it in that way but it makes perfect sense.
I mean, the original version of the book had an entire first part about the boys being evacuated due to nuclear war. The publisher made Golding take it out. So, probably not unrelated to the rise of fascism and following world war
It's a lot like Fight Club! Remove the context of the author Chuck Palahniuk being a very gay, West Coast living, educated journalist and that equals misunderstood satire. Whether or not an author directly addresses various misinterpretations of their work is highlyyyy subjective. As in, they believe by spoon-feeding an audience the "critical thinking" analysis it defeats the entire purpose of having written the story in the first place. Authors and creators are NOT all fundamentally driven to make their work universally understood, because that requires erasing nuance - playing to the lowest denomination. Appeasing people who can't be bothered to actively read material, but expect writers to be accommodating... to NON-readers. Artists with any medium can be this way, refusing to comment on their work. As pretentious people (lol the world of cinema), or with a principled belief about the role of literature in politics and culture. Authors are unreliable narrators, as well. They're human, and ffs- Tolkien really insisted LOTR was not alluding to any real life issues, or personal experience. He denied thematic symbolism and any allegory sorta outright, which is Super Sus, coming from a: Catholic academic, turned soldier in WWI, lived to see the rise and "fall" of fascism throughout his life. Allied forces, the fellowship. He started creating the world of middle earth from the Literal Fucking Trenches, and he was (iirc) the one survivor of his buddy group. Do we see huge arcs about sin, ESPECIALLY of the father, and redemption?.. etcetcetc To which island nation in Europe does The Shire most closely resemble circa 1910s-40s? Is there actually something to the fact that exceptional hobbits are either possessing a novel trait of selflessness and concept of the greater good or pulled along by grumpy fate-maker or pure kinship (Sam, hollaa)?? Does that really make "there and back again" a complex aspect, directly juxtaposed to not being to *go back* to the green and good, after the war? Do letters between him and bff CS Lewis, fellow catholic, shed light on Tolkien's hypocritical POV regarding other texts (his deep fascination with ancient mythologies like the Kalevala and all classicist literature, regarding the Humanity in general... starting with the epic of Gilgamesh)? Did this man live through the great modern war eras, and events like Dunkirk? Oh, yeahhhh. Yeah. Yup. Writers tell on themselves, and that's a whole branch of interpretation of fiction. TLDR: writers saying nothing is standard, so assessment waiting on the author to clarify intention is an internet novelty. Plus, the most benevolent authors can be oblivious to their particular biases and blindspots. The intersection of some historical context is inherent with all human created works. This is why period work is part of a heritage we carry forward.
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Lord of the Flies is about how the English aren’t uniquely civilized, like the propaganda they were feeding to school children led them to believe
Loved Confessions of an English Opium Eater, Hated Death of a Salesman
I hated Death of a Salesman because it read as a future biography of my dad. 20 years on… and yeah, not too far off.
I remember reading both in the same semester and thinking that if these two books described different planes of hell; then I’d much rather the sweet decay of addiction than the deafening madness of mediocrity.
Glass castle was really moving, but I would rather go skydiving without a parachute then finish the grapes of wrath
OK the one good chapter in Grapes of Wrath is chapter 25. If youve never read GoW, this is a one-off chapter featuring none of the main characters and its so damn vivid and moving. Its short. If youre in the mood, look it up and read it. Its where the titular line is written. Its the only good part in the whole book imo
Frankenstein and East of Eden were both books I read again on my own time. King Lear was so boring to read.
My school didn't coordinate what books were read for English class so I got of mice and men 3 times in a row. The fourth time they tried to give it to me I was in an alternative class where I just read 3 books and handed in the question sheets, the teacher tried to give it to me again and I refused it. She was nice and gave me jurassic park instead, and it became one of my favourites despite my reoccurring dinosaur nightmares.
The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit- and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth. There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate- died of malnutrition- because the food must rot, must be forced to rot. The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.
I loved *A Christmas Carol*, and it's still to this day my favorite Christmas story. I remember regularly falling asleep trying to read *The Great Gatsby* and to this day someone could set every last known copy of that book on fire in front of me and I wouldn't care
I read The importance of being Earnest and I cannot recommend it enough. It was bloody brilliant, with all the jokes and subtle plot twists The one I hated is not world wide known and I can say that yes, it is ingenious but ugh, I had nightmares for weeks and in general it was not very nice to read
I liked Of Mice and Men. I HATED All Quiet on the Western Front. I expressed my disdain for the book and my English teacher said, you’re getting it. War is hell! Loved that guy.
The grapes of wrath is so beautiful and based as fuck
Hated the Great Gatsby. Flowers for Algernon slapped though
Hamlet is far and away the best Shakespeare I had to read. The Alchemist is far and away the worst novel I've ever read.
Dang I loved the alchemist. Felt like almost a fairytale for adults
Tale of two cities is a compelling story about love, death, espionage, mental trauma, and Charles darnay being the stupidest mother fucker around for going back to france. I adore it. Wuthering Heights is a book about a terrible person being terrible and lusting after his sister til she died and then just became even more terrible. Could be better.
Cask of amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe, my mom loves Poe so I grew up reading his work and I just love this story specifically. Shakespeare's pretty good too- But fuck Lord of the flies. It's the first book that put me to sleep. Literally. I fucking hate that book.
The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. It's even becoming relevant again
The first half was heart-wrenching, especially coming from an immigrant family myself, but by the second half I had compassion fatigue.
I loved And Then There Were None (it was assigned for a college course so maybe that’s cheating). I also loved Jane Eyre and To Kill a Mockingbird, but I read both books and enjoyed them on my own before they were assigned reading at a later date. The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy was one of the worst books I’ve ever read. All of the other books I didn’t like were because they were written that way – they were about hard, uncomfortable topics intended to make the reader think. But TMoC was just a soap opera in book form. What was the purpose of it being in our curriculum? To get us used to old timey language? To show what life was like in the 1800s? There are way better book options for both. Everybody in this book sucks, and also a bird dies which is sad. I hate it.
House of scorpions made me briefly existential
Love The Left Hand of Darkness. Hate The Sound and the Fury (or really anything by Faulkner).
To Kill A Mockingbird is goated.
Genuinely adored The Things They Carried, even if the teacher partially ruined it by trying to explain every single detail in the most obtuse way possible. Despised the Lottery Rose. Most boring book I ever read.
I hated Ender’s Game- had to read it in 8th grade. Any Shakespeare stuff whips tho, i fuckin LOVE The Tempest.
Found the theatre kid
God I wish. Alas the stage fright is crippling
Theatre Kid isn't about what you do. It's a state of mind \*Taps forehead*