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What are the worst books you had to read in school?

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Catcher in the Rye.

Some annoying git's weekend in New York :| Cannot fathom why it's a classic.

Edit: In university, for a sci-fi lit credit, we read a book called He, She, and It by Marge Piercy. It was well written with actual characters, but the problem was that the characters were dumb as rocks, there was tons of misandry (man hating, antonym to misogyny), and what "science" there was seemed to indicate that the author had never taken a science class since grade school and never spoke with anyone in the computer field while writing it. The book was gallingly bad, but I enjoyed the classes we spent on it because I spent most of them ripping it apart on technical details alone.
 
🙂 I was a straight A high school student. Graduated very close to the top of my class. All advanced courses, all the way through high school. I *NEVER* read a single book in high school that was assigned reading. I read several books on my own which I found enjoyable (Stephen King, etc.), but I did not read a single assigned book. Cliff notes? Rarely. There were a few books in the library which gave even better summaries than cliff notes.

Why? Well, after my Sophomore year, it really was more for the challenge of maintaining A's without reading the books. However, of all my courses, the English teachers never made even the most feable of attempts to explain "why do I need to read this... when will I ever use this." There only reason - read because the stories are enjoyable. I agreed. I read what I wanted to read, not what they thought I'd enjoy. (Has there *ever* been a high school student who really enjoyed reading six Shakespeare works in the original English versions?)

I love to read. I do a ton of reading. Give me 1 good reason to read The Scarlett Letter that applies specifically to that story.
 
Originally posted by: keeleysam
The Scarlet Letter

The Hot Zone

/thread
Click to expand...

Damn, you didn't like the Hot Zone? Heh, I actually own that book!

Books I read that sucked and had to read

where the red fern grows
bless me ultima
roll of thunder hear my cry
Catcher in the Rye
Fahrenheit 451
There is probably a few more that I've forgotten (thankfully)


Oh crap, this thread made me remember some more...

Red Badge of courage
To kill a mocking bird
The great gatsby ---Definately was meh
 
Originally posted by: jdobratz
I disliked The Great Gatsby. Very uninteresting.
Click to expand...
Yes. I firmly believe The Great Gatsby is responsible for the increase in suicide rates among early teen.

Oh, The Grapes of Wrath blew too. Except for the part when the daughter and her husband were going at it in the car. That was hot.
 
Originally posted by: killface
Oh, The Grapes of Wrath blew too. Except for the part when the daughter and her husband were going at it in the car. That was hot.
Click to expand...
Kinda how i feel about romeo and juliet. didn't care much for the read but then they showed the old romeo and juliet movie -- Olivia Hussey, hellllllllllloooooooooooooooooooooooo nurse!:Q

 
Originally posted by: DrPizza
🙂 I was a straight A high school student. Graduated very close to the top of my class. All advanced courses, all the way through high school. I *NEVER* read a single book in high school that was assigned reading. I read several books on my own which I found enjoyable (Stephen King, etc.), but I did not read a single assigned book. Cliff notes? Rarely. There were a few books in the library which gave even better summaries than cliff notes.

Why? Well, after my Sophomore year, it really was more for the challenge of maintaining A's without reading the books. However, of all my courses, the English teachers never made even the most feable of attempts to explain "why do I need to read this... when will I ever use this." There only reason - read because the stories are enjoyable. I agreed. I read what I wanted to read, not what they thought I'd enjoy. (Has there *ever* been a high school student who really enjoyed reading six Shakespeare works in the original English versions?)

I love to read. I do a ton of reading. Give me 1 good reason to read The Scarlett Letter that applies specifically to that story.
Click to expand...

how did you pass the tests if you didn't read the books?
 
Originally posted by: goku
Originally posted by: keeleysam
The Scarlet Letter

The Hot Zone

/thread
Click to expand...

Damn, you didn't like the Hot Zone? Heh, I actually own that book!

Books I read that sucked and had to read

where the red fern grows
bless me ultima
roll of thunder hear my cry
Catcher in the Rye
Fahrenheit 451
There is probably a few more that I've forgotten (thankfully)


Oh crap, this thread made me remember some more...

Red Badge of courage
To kill a mocking bird
The great gatsby ---Definately was meh
Click to expand...

You suck.
 
Originally posted by: FrankyJunior
The one with the twins... One is named Niles (I think).... They had a cat. One fell down a well.

Can't think of the name...

Also Hatter Fox and I Am The Cheese.
Click to expand...

Ah, the one I couldn't remember is The Other.
 
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.


James Joyce is a cruel joke played upon the literary world. I'm firmly convinced that some time in the past some jaded, burned out critic was retiring and decided to screw with the colleagues who never invited him to parties. So he found the worst author on earth and gave him a glowing review with a line like "Anyone that doesn't appreciate Joyce is a moron". The other critics didn't want to look like morons, so they claimed that they loved Joyce too. And thus was born a long line of critics who hate Joyce, but are too cowardly to admit it and so claim to like him. Joyce sucks. Joyce has always sucked and 1000 years from now Joyce will still suck and there will still be braindead English techers assigning him because they too are afraid to admit that they hate him.
 
Had to read "War and Peace" and make a book report. The report was 25% of my final grade. I got a B and that wasn't easy. I gave it an honest effort and didn't use the cliff notes that was sold at the local book store. My teacher said we would get an F if it wasn't honestly done. He wanted a honest assessment in our own words and using present analogies to show how it applied in modern situations. Yeah, sweated bullets. You think that was hell on earth. Most of the class didn't do too well, I wondered why?
 
The Scarlet Letter
Great Expectations and anything else by Dickens.
The Great Gatsby

I was a voracious reader through high school, but couldn't make myself finish any of the above.
 
Originally posted by: Bibble
I can't believe no one has said this yet, but Bridge to Terabithia is by far the worst book I have ever read. I had to read it for 6th grade literature class. Seeing as it was 7 years ago, I can barely remember anything about it except how much I hated it. However, I do remember watching the movie after we finished watching it and the entire class laughed when the main female character died (she falls of the "bridge" which was a log i think). The next day the school guidance counselor lectured to us about why that wasn't funny.

Their Eyes Were Watching God is mediocre at best, but it has a great paragraph near the beginning where the tree has an orgasm (yea I know it's weird).
Click to expand...

Bridge to Terabithia is nothing when compared to the horrible, life-draining Bridge of San Luis Ray
 
Originally posted by: hungfarover
Originally posted by: DrPizza
🙂 I was a straight A high school student. Graduated very close to the top of my class. All advanced courses, all the way through high school. I *NEVER* read a single book in high school that was assigned reading. I read several books on my own which I found enjoyable (Stephen King, etc.), but I did not read a single assigned book. Cliff notes? Rarely. There were a few books in the library which gave even better summaries than cliff notes.

Why? Well, after my Sophomore year, it really was more for the challenge of maintaining A's without reading the books. However, of all my courses, the English teachers never made even the most feable of attempts to explain "why do I need to read this... when will I ever use this." There only reason - read because the stories are enjoyable. I agreed. I read what I wanted to read, not what they thought I'd enjoy. (Has there *ever* been a high school student who really enjoyed reading six Shakespeare works in the original English versions?)

I love to read. I do a ton of reading. Give me 1 good reason to read The Scarlett Letter that applies specifically to that story.
Click to expand...

how did you pass the tests if you didn't read the books?
Click to expand...

I didn't just "pass" the tests... I routinely scored well into the 90's. Simple: pay attention during class, take notes during class, and read all the available resources I could which described the story.

What's odd is that in college, I took a course entitled American Short Story. I read every story. (Actually, it was the most enjoyable English class I had ever taken, with the sole exception being that the prof was a sexist, arrogant prick. He was a new grad; had just completed his masters; had gone from being a brother at his fraternity to being the advisor of his fraternity who gave free A's in that class to frat members; and really wasn't a prof - rather, was some sort of administrative monkey who happened to teach one course. I read "Hills like white elephants." I had to write a short 2 page essay on that story. I spent many hours researching the story, reading a ton of scholarly articles about it. After my 2 page essay, I had 2 pages of bibliographic citations. Prof disputed my essay and said I completely misunderstood the story. "Hemingway doesn't use symbolism." "Uhhh, did you fail to notice the caliber of resources I used? They all disagree with you."
 
Oh I forgot about To Kill A Mocking Bird. I mainly hate it on principle though being that whenever a teacher said "Movie Day!" and all of us yelled "Yay!!" it was always that GD movie.
 
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