s/o What Classics Did You Read in School?

[prairiegirl]

I don't know if my list is a result of bad memory or if it was truly as bad as I remember. This was in the late '70's in a small town in Ontario, Canada.

 

Cue for Treason (I know this is not a classic but it is one that I remember)

Taming of the Shrew

King Lear

Silas Marner

Tale of Two Cities

[Garga]

Are you guys serious?!?! I don't remember a THING from school. That's why I homeschool.

 

Those lists are unbelievable! Not the fact that you studied those books, but the fact that you remember them all!!!!!

[Jean in Newcastle]

Are you guys serious?!?! I don't remember a THING from school. That's why I homeschool.

 

Those lists are unbelievable! Not the fact that you studied those books, but the fact that you remember them all!!!!!

 

I looked at WTM's list to jog my memory. I doubt I could have remembered all of them on their own. As it was, I've listed just the author for some because I know I read 'something' by Kafka but can't for the life of me tell you what it was.

[creekland]

Are you guys serious?!?! I don't remember a THING from school. That's why I homeschool.

 

Those lists are unbelievable! Not the fact that you studied those books, but the fact that you remember them all!!!!!

 

I used the lists to remember most of mine, then filled in with a few I remember us reading that others didn't mention.

 

Reading this thread has been interesting - seeing the differences between what different folks had on their mandatory reading lists. I was in a school/class that read a lot, so I'm continually amazed at how little ps kids around here read. I guess we grow up thinking what we did was "normal."

[Crimson Wife]

Are you guys serious?!?! I don't remember a THING from school. That's why I homeschool.

 

Those lists are unbelievable! Not the fact that you studied those books, but the fact that you remember them all!!!!!

 

I'm a bookworm, so I tend to remember the titles we read in school. But my memory of what was covered in my other subject classes is very hazy (I've tried to remember to help in my planning). I know the course names of what I took in high school, but when it comes to the topics covered, I tend to draw a blank.

 

I hear posters talk about using Dolciani's series in their math classes growing up and I'm amazed that they can remember which textbook. I do remember that my AP Bio class used the Campbell bio book but that's only because I had to purchase it myself and kept it as a reference throughout college.

[radiobrain]

I am also surprised by how many I remember. I think that proves that it was a good thing. Private school in "downtown" Chicago.

 

6-8

Tom Sawyer & Huck Finn

To Kill a Mockingbird

All quiet on the Western Front

1984

Animal Farm

The Iliad

A Tale of Two Cities/ Oliver Twist

Island of Blue Dolphins

 

High school

Am. Lit class:

The Scarlet Letter

Grapes of Wrath

The Great Gatsby

An American Tragedy (I hated this book!)

As I lay Dying (I think...might have been another Faulkner)

 

World Lit class:

One Hundred Years of Solitude

Canterbury Tales

Tartuffe/ misanthrope

The Trial/ The Stranger/ The Plague

The Magic Mountain

Gilgamesh

One day in the Life of Ivan Denysovich

Crime and Punishment

 

Various high school lit:

Brave New World

Multiple Shakespeare plays

Cicero

Machievelli

Euripedes

Plutarch

Herodotus

The Odyssey

A million short stories and poems

Beowulf

Lord of the Flies

Our Town (and some other plays)

Tess of the D'Ubervilles

Catcher in the Rye

Grimm's Fairy Tales

 

I know there are more.

 

That is as much as I can do right now. ;)

 

I still have many of my copies from school. I think it is cute to see my notes.

[Wheres Toto]

Are you guys serious?!?! I don't remember a THING from school. That's why I homeschool.

 

Those lists are unbelievable! Not the fact that you studied those books, but the fact that you remember them all!!!!!

 

I did use the lists to help as well. Then others I remember because they were so good - most of the science fiction-type ones - and I still like to read them; others because they were so bad and brutal to get through.

 

I also have a 17 year old in public school and she gets really long summer reading lists every year. We often discuss which books she might enjoy off the lists and it helps job my memory on things I've read.

[nd293]

Here's what I came up with:

Merchant of Venice (read in class)

Hamlet (read in class)

Othello (read in class)

Macbeth (read in class)

Great Expectations

The Crucible (read in class)

Death of a Salesman

Jane Eyre

1984

The Great Gatsby (read in class)

The Lord of the Flies (read in class)

To Kill a Mockingbird

Catcher in the Rye

Catch 22

Old Man and the Sea

The Pearl

Wuthering Heights

Cry the Beloved Country (read in class)

To Sir With Love

The Diary of Anne Frank

Things Fall Apart

 

I'm thinking back more than 20 years, but those are the ones I recall. I graduated in 1989 from a South African high school. I think we read one Shakespeare a year in each of the 5 years of high school, plus poetry and at least one other novel off a year, probably more.

 

This thread is going to provide a lot of reading for dd10!

[Sebastian (a lady)]

Are you guys serious?!?! I don't remember a THING from school. That's why I homeschool.

 

Those lists are unbelievable! Not the fact that you studied those books, but the fact that you remember them all!!!!!

 

Well, most of my English teachers were very vivid people so I can almost picture the classrooms and the discussions. (I ended up in the Navy for about two decades because my eighth grade English teacher told me he didn't know any women who'd graduated from the Naval Academy - I'm always a sucker for a dare.)

 

What I think is interesting is just how much reading was expected 20-40 years ago, and not just in elite settings.

 

FWIW, the SAT prep from my high school consisted of having 20 vocab words assigned every Friday. We went home and defined them and found every derivative. Monday we made a grand list of the derivatives and on that Friday there was a test. Repeat every week of the semester. Part of the final was a massive vocabulary test (something like 50 derivatives selected from the semester's words).

It was expected that the normal math courses were going to leave you ready for the math portion of the exam. And that your normal English courses were going to teach the grammar, comprehension and punctuation skills needed for the other parts of the verbal exam. I find it sad and a bit maddening that it is no longer expected that the end of school will leave you prepared to take a test demonstrating your aptitude for college.

[Harriet Vane]

I found there was a HUGE difference in the expectations of public school versus private school.

 

I was in the honors program of public elementary school up through eighth grade. I do remember reading some good things (Anne Frank being one). I think that most of what I read in junior high were short stories or excerpts. I also remember spending at least one day a week that class time was for free journaling. It wasn't that demanding, especially compared to high school.

 

I went to a college prep, private school for high school. It was a completely different ball game there. I have never had such demanding classes since--and I loved it. I had two English teachers in high school, and remember reading TONS of classics and writing a lot. It was quite rigorous, and has been the standard I shoot for with my own kids and with the group classes I teach.

 

I went to a large public university for college--it's considered a top university. My reading load as an English major was comparable to what I read in high school, but my writing load was much lower and there were virtually no assignments outside of 1-2 papers per semester+mid-term+final exam. Honestly, college felt waaaaay easier to me than high school had been.

[Night Elf]

My high school was 8th through 12th grades. I even had Advanced English. (graduated 1986 from a not-so-great school district in Georgia)

 

The most significant items:

 

Catcher in the Rye (I didn't read it though. I used Cliff Notes.)

The Outsiders

Edgar Allen Poe: The Raven

The Lord of the Flies

 

I hated all of them and didn't do well on the tests.

 

I have never read a full Shakespeare play, only a kid version of one of them which I don't even remember now. The most literature I was exposed to was during a college course called Comparative Literature.

 

We never had summer reading assignments. That would have been a joke in my school district.

Edited May 18, 2011 by Night Elf
adding notes

[Jenny in Florida]

But the truth is I don't remember most of what I read "for school."

 

I remember reading Romeo and Juliet in ninth grade, Julius Caesar in 10th and Macbeth in an elective science fiction class. (Some students took that one for grade forgiveness, and you had to read a Shakespearean play for the class to "count" for that purpose.)

 

I think we read Animal Farm and A Separate Peace and Of Mice and Men, plus a lot of poems. I remember reading All Quiet on the Western Front, because it was in the literature book and I was bored during class, but I also remember being very irritable because I had already read the novel on my own and the version included in the book was abridged. I don't think that one was assigned, though.

 

We read Antigone, I think.

 

I honestly don't remember what else was assigned. I read so much on my own, and I lose track of what I was told to read and what I read because I wanted to read it.

 

Edited to add: Oh yeah! Looking at other people's lists, I remember reading Brave New World (and watching the made-for-TV adaptation), The Scarlet Letter. Grapes of Wrath and Our Town.

 

I think I tuned out a lot in English classes, because listening to other students read aloud (badly) drove me crazy. And I got really tired of listening to other kids goof off and complain about how they didn't understand things. (And I was in honors English, by the way.) So, it's all kind of a blur for me.

 

I went to high school in a middle class suburb of L.A. in the late 70's.

Edited May 18, 2011 by Jenny in Florida

[LittleIzumi]

But the truth is I don't remember most of what I read "for school."

 

I remember reading Romeo and Juliet in ninth grade, Julius Caesar in 10th and Macbeth in an elective science fiction class. (Some students took that one for grade forgiveness, and you had to read a Shakespearean play for the class to "count" for that purpose.)

 

I think we read Animal Farm and A Separate Peace and Of Mice and Men, plus a lot of poems. I remember reading All Quiet on the Western Front, because it was in the literature book and I was bored during class, but I also remember being very irritable because I had already read the novel on my own and the version included in the book was abridged. I don't think that one was assigned, though.

 

We read Antigone, I think.

 

I honestly don't remember what else was assigned. I read so much on my own, and I lose track of what I was told to read and what I read because I wanted to read it.

 

Edited to add: Oh yeah! Looking at other people's lists, I remember reading Brave New World (and watching the made-for-TV adaptation), The Scarlet Letter. Grapes of Wrath and Our Town.

 

I think I tuned out a lot in English classes, because listening to other students read aloud (badly) drove me crazy. And I got really tired of listening to other kids goof off and complain about how they didn't understand things. (And I was in honors English, by the way.) So, it's all kind of a blur for me.

 

I went to high school in a middle class suburb of L.A. in the late 70's.

 

Oh, yes, we did read A Separate Peace earlier. Maybe 5th? I hated that book :lol:. We read that and Bridge to Terabithia in one year. It was like the year of dead kids lit. At least they didn't add Lord of the Flies or I might have left, lol.

[Rhonda in TX]

I really don't remember what we studied in school. I remember a few, and I do remember reading other classics, but I'm just not sure if they were for school or on my own. The only ones I remember definitely studying were:

 

Romeo and Juliet

The Book of the Dun Cow

Alas, Babylon

Huckleberry Finn

The Prince and the Pauper (my personal selection for a literary research paper - blech)

The Great Gatsby

The Winter of our Discontent

The Tell-Tale Heart

 

Others that I read, but can't remember if it was for school:

 

A Tale of Two Cities

The Good Earth

My Antonia

A Farewell to Arms

 

I've actually considered asking about this on facebook because my memory about it is so terrible.

 

I graduated in 1985. I took honors English every year, but did not take any English my senior year. There weren't any AP classes. This was a suburban, blue collar town. Most people worked at the local refinery. There were a few whose parents worked as engineers and other college-educated jobs.

 

I did fine (A's and 1 B) in college level English, so they must have done something right.

Edited May 18, 2011 by Rhonda in TX

[specialmama]

The only ones I remember are:

 

A Midsummer Night's Dream

Our Town

Romeo and Juliet

The Miracle Worker, but I don't think it's a classic... or is it? :confused:

[HappyCrazyMama]

My HS had a textbook excerpts of classics. In full I only remember reading The Red Pony and Call of the Wild (which I don't think is a classic and I was about the only one in class that actually read it!). I remember watching Shakespeare plays (Romeo and Juliet and The Taming of the Shrew) and we also watched Our Town, Of Mice and Men, and The Scarlet Letter. Some poetry was read. Great Expectations was read aloud to me in middle school. So that's what I got excerpts and movies.:glare: Surely I'm not just forgetting. I don't think I ever read anything older than Shakespeare (or even watched a video :lol:, no Iliad, myths, etc.) I have read more of the classics on my own after HS, when my oldest two were doing HS (TOG) and hope to read lots more of them. :) I think the other lists are amazing and not that they remembered but that all those books were actually assigned. What was my school doing.:confused:

[JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst]

From high school, mid-80s, mid-western college town, and in no particular order:

 

Chaucer (read selections plus memorized prologue in Old English)

Greek mythology

Romeo and Juliet

The Crucible

The Scarlet Letter

Short stories by O. Henry, Poe, London, Hemingway, Swift, etc

The Red Badge of Courage

Pride and Prejudice

Ivanhoe

Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Beowulf

1984

Animal Farm

Lots of poetry by Frost, Browning, Shakespeare, the Romantics

The Great Gatsby

The Lord of the Flies

Huckleberry Finn

Tom Sawyer

Our Town

To Kill A Mockingbird

Catcher in the Rye

Jane Eyre

Tale of Two Cities

Wuthering Heights

Of Mice and Men

Heart of Darkness

Waiting for Godot (in French rather than English)

Hamlet

Macbeth

Twelfth Night

Midsummer Night's Dream

Merchant of Venice

Julius Caesar

The Epic of Gilgamesh

Equus

All Quiet on the Western Front

Fahrenheit 451

 

I know there were more but I can no longer remember which were school assignments, which were me, and which were before or after high school.

[Farrar]

Anyone else resisting the urge to compare lists and see who thinks they read the most in high school? :D

[Guest]

Wow, I'm really envious. Although, back then I wouldn't have appreciated reading them, I guess.

 

I remember reading:

 

Julius Caesar

Romeo & Juliet (at least I think we read it, it was the same time that the Leonardo diCaprio movie came out and was big)

Heart of Darkness

The Scarlet Letter

Grapes of Wrath

The Great Gatsby

[Jeanne in MN]

Huck Finn

Animal Farm

Farenheit 451

Brave New World

Great Expectations

A Tale of Two Cities

Macbeth

Many short stories with lots of Edgar Allen Poe

The Jungle

To Kill A Mockingbird

Canterbury Tales-parts of it

Dante's Inferno

Illiad and Odyssey

Edited May 19, 2011 by Jeanne in MN

[akmommy]

Wow! I find myself rather jealous of most of you. I went to a semi-rural school in Alaska in the late 80's to early 90's and our district at that time seems to have had a love affair with textbooks, because that was pretty much all we had. So I read a lot excerpts.

One year I took an elective English and read the Hound of the Baskerville (is that even considered a classic?). In senior English we had to read the Canterbury Tales and choose a book by an old English author to compare to a modern American author. I discovered that while Dickens novels might make good movies I really can't stand his writing style.

 

 

Actually, now that I think about it I was assigned more real books in my 6th grade reading class then in four years of high school. That year I had to read The Hobbit, The Cowboys, The Witch of Blackbird pond, and I'm sure there were a couple others that I'm not remembering.

[funschooler5]

I graduated from a small public high school. This is what I remember reading (junior high and high school):

 

The Time Machine

The Most Dangerous Game

Deathwatch (not really a classic, but it really stuck with me)

Pearl S. Buck (various stories)

Diary of Anne Frank

Flowers for Algernon

Edgar Allen Poe (The Tell-Tale Heart, The Raven)

Huckleberry Finn

Great Expectations

To Kill a Mockingbird

Julius Caesar

Romeo and Juliet

Of Mice and Men

The Old Man and the Sea

The Jungle

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

Edited May 19, 2011 by funschooler5

[AuntPol]

I should say this is what I remember being assigned -I mostly read the cliff notes.

 

Romeo and Juliet

Outsiders

Various short stories: Poe, O'Henry

Hamlet

Macbeth

Moby Dick

Great Gatsby

Scarlet Letter

Beowulf

Our Town

 

I am sure we had a few others but I don't recall.

[Saille]

Late-eighties, early nineties in suburban NJ (who are all you NJ suburbanites, btw?) The below were assigned by school and do not include recreational reading.

 

Jr. High:

The Red Badge of Courage

The Old Man and the Sea

Huckleberry Finn

Tom Sawyer

The Lotus Caves

To Kill A Mockingbird

(plenty more...)

 

Sr. High:

Greek mythology

Romeo and Juliet

Great Expectations

Macbeth

The Crucible

The Scarlet Letter

Frankenstein

Pygmalion

Animal Farm

MacBeth

A Separate Peace

The Pearl

Death of a Salesman

Lysistrata

Wuthering Heights

Anthem

Jane Eyre

Bartelby the Scrivener

Great Expectations

The Handmaid’s Tale

The Once and Future King

Grendel

parts of Dante’s Inferno

Pride and Prejudice

Rime of the Ancient Mariner

We had a survey text several years...American Lit one year, English Lit another, IIRC, so yes, we read a wide variety of short stories, poetry, essays, etc...everything from Blake to Angelou, from Transcendentalists to “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”.

 

The students I see for SAT prep generally cite:

 

The Scarlet Letter

Night

one Shakespearean play, usually Hamlet or Romeo and Juliet

The Crucible

Nineteen Minutes, by Jodi Picoult (this one makes me really crabby)

Edited May 23, 2011 by Saille

[HappyCrazyMama]

Wow! I find myself rather jealous of most of you. I went to a semi-rural school in Alaska in the late 80's to early 90's and our district at that time seems to have had a love affair with textbooks, because that was pretty much all we had. So I read a lot excerpts.

One year I took an elective English and read the Hound of the Baskerville (is that even considered a classic?). In senior English we had to read the Canterbury Tales and choose a book by an old English author to compare to a modern American author. I discovered that while Dickens novels might make good movies I really can't stand his writing style.

 

 

Actually, now that I think about it I was assigned more real books in my 6th grade reading class then in four years of high school. That year I had to read The Hobbit, The Cowboys, The Witch of Blackbird pond, and I'm sure there were a couple others that I'm not remembering.

 

I was starting to feel like the only one and wondering if I had amnesia or something.:001_huh:

[nono]

Graduated from a high school in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia in the early 80s. Almost every book listed by folks here was on our required reading list. (Some, well, they weren't that classic yet since I'm so darn old :tongue_smilie:). Our English Department was known as being very "strong." From the end of Freshman year onward, we had required summer reading. Between my Junior and Senior years, I remember the list was rather long -- at least 10 books.

 

Heck, at the end of Senior year, they sent us off with a lifetime reading list a couple pages long, and I still remember the admonition to wait on the Rabbit series (John Updike) until we were at least 30.