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High School/college Lit Classes


homeschoolmom

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homeschoolmom

My dad tried to introduce me to... interesting.... literature early in my youth. (He also taught me algebra).... He introdcuded me to Spoon River which I love to this day (dang-- wish I'd thought to check that out at the library yesterday).... BUT... i have to say that my oddest "literary aquisition" from my dad was listening to Shirley Jackson's short story, "The Lottery"... when I was like 10. Weird....

I picked up short stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald (I love "Bernice Bops Her Hair" in HS) and by Flannery O'Connor (:) ) and a copy of Our Town so that I can review the five lines that I had in our HS production (love that play).... and I also picked up Ethan Frome (maybe I'll give it another chance...)

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hoosieranna

My minor was Russian studies. I got decent exposure to Russian lit through that. Some of my general favorites:

The First Circle by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
We by Yevgeni Zamyatin
1984 by George Orwell
"Taming of the Shrew"
Beowulf (Seamus Heaney's translation)
anything by Terry Pratchett (the man is hilarious)

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cmotherofpirl

[quote name='homeschoolmom' post='1307931' date='Jul 1 2007, 02:53 PM']I have to say that my oddest "literary aquisition" from my dad was listening to Shirley Jackson's short story, "The Lottery"... when I was like 10. Weird....[/quote]


THats one of the short stories I read in high school! Really freaked me out :idontknow: :sadder:

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I was a tweenaged English Major ;)

The Fountains, Rasselas, by Samuel Johnson
Essay on Man, Essay on Criticism, by Alexander Pope
The Collector, by John Fowles
Secret Life of Walter Mitty, can't remember the author
Any of Jonathan Swift's major works.
John Donne's poems. Not just the Holy Sonnets
some poetry by T S Eliot, such as The Hollow Men, the Waste Land, and the Gift of the Maji
Lord of the Flies, The Inheritors, The Spire, and Darkness Visible, by William Goulding.
We, by Ayn Rand
A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess

that's all i can think of to suggest right now

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Theologian in Training

[quote name='homeschoolmom' post='1307907' date='Jul 1 2007, 02:42 PM']Did you need that drink during A Farewell to Arms to numb the pain? Hemingway is not my favorite....

I LOVE Spoon River Anthology. :)[/quote]

no, it was more, he was constantly talking about drinking that I was thinking, you know a good beer might not be bad idea at the moment. Reading Hemingway is, to me, like reading Hunter S. Thompson or Charles Bukowski. For moral purposes and the salvation of everyone's soul, I cannot, in good conscience, recommend either of them anymore, though I do still like Hemingway.

And, Spoon River was actually a recommendation, not an actual book I was to read in school. Still like it though.

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[quote name='EAnn246' post='1306572' date='Jun 30 2007, 02:21 PM']Faulkner[/quote]
"A Rose For Emily" is a good short story by Faulkner.

"Brideshead Revisited" is another great book. I want to read more of Waugh, I really like his prose.

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I hate Hemingway, and Steinbeck, although I actually read all of their books I was supposed to.

Gulliver's Travels was the only book I was supposed to read that I never finished. I did the Cliff's Notes instead.

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Theologian in Training

[quote name='Terra Firma' post='1308035' date='Jul 1 2007, 04:59 PM']I hate Hemingway, and Steinbeck, although I actually read all of their books I was supposed to.

Gulliver's Travels was the only book I was supposed to read that I never finished. I did the Cliff's Notes instead.[/quote]

I did that for F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby (I still really need to read that)

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homeschoolmom

[quote name='Terra Firma' post='1308035' date='Jul 1 2007, 03:59 PM']I hate Hemingway, and Steinbeck, although I actually read all of their books I was supposed to.

Gulliver's Travels was the only book I was supposed to read that I never finished. I did the Cliff's Notes instead.[/quote]
So, how do you feel about Watership Down? :mellow:

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homeschoolmom

Btw, I read The Catcher in the Rye in HS even though it wasn't assigned.... :ohno: but now I can say I read it...

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homeschoolmom

That only works for weirdos. :unsure:

And.... in no way did I identify with Holden Caulfield.... I thought he was a nut.

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[quote name='homeschoolmom' post='1308069' date='Jul 1 2007, 03:24 PM']So, how do you feel about Watership Down? :mellow:[/quote]
I missed this earlier.


I hate rabbits. They are cute as babies but when they grow up they eat all your sweet corn. Therefore they are inherently evil. Why, then, would I want to read a book about them? Rabbits are dumb.

[quote name='homeschoolmom' post='1308222' date='Jul 1 2007, 06:22 PM']That only works for weirdos. :unsure:

And.... in no way did I identify with Holden Caulfield.... I thought he was a nut.[/quote]
OK, good ... I'm glad to know you're not ... weird ...

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homeschoolmom

And, really... TCITR is a work admired by the likes of Mark David Chapman et al... not serial killers.

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