Here is all of my assigned reading I can remember. It seems where I went to school we were made to read a lot, now that I look at it.

Grade 8:

~Night -- very moved, went onto read on my own Dawn, which is my favorite Wiesel book, and The Accident, which I did not care for

~The Chosen -- loved it; went on to read the sequel

I know we read a lot more this year, but I don't remember it. I vaguely recall something about boys at camp. There were a lot of short stories, too--Edgar Allan Poe (hey, I'm a Virginian, so we got him a lot).

Grade 9:

~Romeo and Juliet -- yes, I liked it, but not a huge amount
~A Tale of Two Cities - loved it
~The Scarlet Pimpernel--loved it. As a teenage girl, I thought it was SOOOO beautifully romantic.
~ The Odyssey -- din't care for it
~ The Illiad - loved Hector's character

We also had to read four on our own of our own choice and write reports on them. I chose:

~Great Expectations -- was bored by it, except for a few wonderful lines
~1984 - it really grabbed hold of my attention and made an impression
~Animal Farm - pretty meaningful read; don't remember a whopping impression, though. Probably chose it because it was short
~Farenheight 451 -- LOVED it

10th grade:

~King Lear--no, I hated it, but only because we were forced to get in groups, cut it down to 45 minutes, and perform it. Since I best understood the language, I did most of the cutting, which meant constant reading. I liked it better when I re-read it in college.
~Mutiny on the Bounty - remembered it being just OKAY.
~Caine Mutiny - LOVED it, and I was inspired to read four Herman Wouk books after it
~Men Against the Sea - boring, boring, boring
~Wuthering Heights - loved it as a teen, but didn't like it so much when I re-read it in high school
~A Separate Peace - I vaguley remember liking it, but it didn't make much of an impression

They seemed to be going for a sea theme that year.

Grade 11:

The one year sans Shakespeare--because it was American lit this year.

~ The Great Gatsby - liked it, but found it far too empty and depressing and negative
~Short stories by Hawthorne -- liked most
~Huckelberry Finn -- liked it, didn't LOVE it
~The Scarlet Letter -- liked it, didn't LOVE it
~ The Crucible -- loved it
~ Of Mice and Men - liked it a lot (this might have been 12th grade; I don't recall)
~ Death of a Salesman
~Stories and poems of Edgar Allan Poe -- liked the poetry better than the stories


12th Grade:

We had to read Genesis, Exodus, Job, and the Gospel of John. And yes, I went to public school. It was for literacy, and certainly not religious purposes. Boy they'd be miffed if they knew it inspired me to read the entire Bible and to become an active Christian.

~Oedipus Rex -- LOVED it
~Pride and Prejudice -- one of my favorite books to this day
~ Hamlet -- LOVED it
~ Fathers and Sons (we had to choose one to read on our own for a paper) - -I LOVED IT
~ To Kill a Mockingbird -- liked it quite a bit
~ Lord of the Flies -- loved it
~ Beowulf -- thought it was just okay. Loved it in college, though.
~ Antigone -- liked it, but not as much as Oedipus Rex
~ Parts of the Canterburry Tales -- didn't appreciate it

I think we read a lot from an anthology this year also --poetry and what not.

I'll see what I remember... some of them are German

- some "Robin Hood" version in 5th grade (English)
- "The Hound of Baskerville" in 8th grade (German) (I already knew it, but I like it still)
- "The Pigman" in 10th grade (English) (that wasn't too bad)
- "Brot und Spiele" by Siegfried Lenz in 10th grade (I hated it!) (German)
- "The Name of the Rose" in 11th grade (German) (I prefer the movie, as the book is very long... but it's still very good)
- "Angela's Ashes" in 12th grade (English) (wonderful book!)
- "Pride and Prejudice" in 12th grade (English) (ok)
- "Der Untertan" by Heinrich Mann in 12th grade (German) (uhm... I found it boring...)
- "Hamlet" in 13th grade (English) (I loved it)
- "Die Blechtrommel" by Günter Grass in 13th grade (German; the most awful book I've ever read... I never finished it! Hated it!!!)

I also read some books in French, but I can't remember the titles.

Donne and all the metaphysical poets, the Elizabethans, the Lake poets, all of Shakespeare...yes , all , plays, sonnets, poems.Most Dickens. (Nothing remotely modern.) Guy Mannering by Scott, Prester John, and in French, Molliere's works, de Maupassant, El Cid, Le Rouge et le Noir, Madame Bovary, La Dame aux Camellias,Antigone, Victor Hugo,(the German stuff was so boring I cant even remember it- oh yes "Faust".Also the Russians, Brothers Karamazov,The Idiot and various other tomes. Shall I go on....
It is a complete miracle that I continue to read at the rate of about 5 books a week after that most offputting introduction. Thank goodness I found Austen and the Brontes later, and managed to reread and enjoy Shakespeare and Dickens and the other stuff.The crowning glory was the set book for A level was Richard the Second (who?). I cannot remember anyone inspiring me and instilling a love of literature in me. I must have done it myself.

Boy, we didn't read much in my school!

Let's see:
8th Grade
To Kill A Mockingbird
Night
The Tell-Tale Heart & The Cask of Amontillado
12th Grade
Hamlet

The sad thing is, I've only been out of school for 4 years and that's all I remember!!

The Little Prince (Hebrew translation)
To Kill A Mockingbird
Flowers for Algernon
The Awakening (possibly the most boring book ever written)
Antigone (Hebrew translation)
Macbeth
The Lover by A.B. Yehoshua (Hebrew)
Balzac's "Le Pere Goriot" (Hebrew translation)

Those are the ones I actually read - there were plenty of others we were supposed to read (actually Macbeth I only read the parts we read in class, and then I read almost all the parts out loud because everyone else read English so slowly it got on my nerves and I wanted to go home already. That's probably part of the reason the teacher got so sick of me three months before the end of the year that she told me I didn't have to come to English lessons anymore)

What can I remember- soooooo long ago?!

Beowulf
The Canterbury Tales
My Antonia
Tess of the Dubervilles
Lord of the Flies
Romeo and Juliet
Farenheit 451
Animal Farm
1984

That's all I can remember off the top of my head.

oh, and The Red Badge of Courage, Where the Red Fern Grows, The Lottery, and The Scarlett Letter.

My brain can't handle this in the early hours of the morning! Mind you I've only got to think back between 5 and 10 years!

Let's see......
A Midsummer Night's Dream
To Kill A Mockingbird
Romeo And Juliet
And Pride and Prejudice.

These are the ones I enjoyed the most. The last was my absolute favourite. I loved reading that book, Jane Austen was such a talented writer! Though I do remember reading more I have no idea what they were! Maybe it was because I didn't like them that much!

Romeo and Juliet
Odepidus Rex - a lot of fun to act out in class!
1984
A Brave New World - boring to read, lots of fun to discuss in class, the movie was surprising in many ways.
The Giver
Night
The Diary of Anne Frank
Julius Caesar
The Oddesy (sp?!)
To Kill a Mockingbird - better than I thought it would be
The Great Gatsby - worse than I thought it would be
The Communist Manifesto (11th grade Geography, don't ask me why)
Educating Esme
David Copperfield

read-??

I never attended more than one class (usually maths) per day - In that class, it was dedicated to Asterix , tintin (till 6th std) and Hardy boys (till 8th), and after that, .......( )

I just remember one play we did in French - a modern version of "Antigone". I forgot who wrote it, but it took us quite long to finish it

PearlQ19, can the french author you're talking about be Jean Anouilh? I read his version of "Antigone" in school.

I also read (at school):
"Romeo And Juliet"
"Chronicle of a Death Foretold" and "100 Years Of Solitude"
"The Catcher In The Rye"
"Don Quixote"
"El Martín Fierro" (Every argentine student must read this book... )
"The Unbereable Lightness Of Being"
"Niebla", "The House Of Bernarda Alba" and "Coplas A La Muerte De Su Padre" (All spanish books that I don't know the exact name in English)
"Jezabel"
"The Moon Palace"
"The Portrait Of Dorian Gray"
"King Solomon's mine"
"The Iliad"
We also read some poetry by Lope De Vega and Quevedo and some short stories by Ernest Hemingway.

I Think that is all. Even though I think we read quite some books at school, I would have liked reading more books. But you can always do that on your own

So far I've read:

Romeo and Juliet (OK,I guess)
Julius Caesar(OK)
The Crucible (liked it a lot)
The Scarlet Letter (eh...)
Jane Eyre(it was one of those "you choose" book reports. Not very interesting but as a whole pretty good)
Wuthering Heights(sad...)
Joy In The Morning (it was on a list of 100 books we could pick from...I LOVED IT!)
The Pearl (so sad...)
The Pony (also sad...)
The Giver (very cool)

Right now,in English 11, we're doing The Fall Of The House Of Usher. I love Poe but I think I know how this one ends. Afterwards, we're doing The Raven. Later on maybe Of Mice And Men which I've already read.(the best Steinbeck novel and extremely sad as well...geez,Steinbeck!)

I had a terrific literature teacher in high school. THere was this "ban list" that came out in the state of Indiana. It had some of the most wonderful books on it. She had us read just about everything on that list. Including: Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath, Look Homeward, Angel (still my favorite book of all time), The Scarlet Letter, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, The Lottery, All Sunlight in A Day, The Crucible, THe Vichy, Flowers for Algernon, etc. I am so glad she took such a stand.

She helped to develop a love of reading and a need for literature. THanks Ms. Schmidt where ever you are !!!!!!!!!!

Why on earth did they ban Jonathon Livingston Seagull?

Hopefully because it was banal, trite, precious and pretentious... though I suspect not.

Grade 9:
Midsummer Night's Dream - I found it really funny, especially the movie and was really surprised when the rest of the class weren't nearly as amused.
Forbidden City - A really nice story about a Canadian guy who goes to China during the unrests in 1989. Realy enjoyed it.

Grade 10:
Romeo and Juliet - wasn't much of a surprise to anyone since everyone knows how the story goes. Ok, I suppose.
Lord of the Flies by Golding - didn't enjoy it much mostly because of the way the teacher taught it. More negative emotions than positive though I can't say that I totally hated it.

Grade 11:
Macbeth - my lease favourite Shakesperean work, though we got to play it out a bit and I enjoyed reading for Lady Macbeth.
The Bean Trees - a really dumb book, something I wouldn't expect to be taught in school, but sold on a rack in supermarket. A lot of annoying characters and a messed up plot.

Grade 12:
Hamlet - I really enjoyed the play and truly love Hamlet though the fact that we studied the play for 6 weeks without a stop got me a little sick of it.
Fifth Business by Robertson Davies - A pretty surprising book to see in school since there is some sexual content I would think a lot of parent disapprove of, but I enjoyed it mostly.

hmmm...i don't know what years i read what, but here's the list i can remember:

*the scarlett letter (my favorite)
*catcher in the rye
*the great gatsby
*the glass menagerie
*a doll's house
*most of the dickens books
*definitely some shakespere, but i don't remember which ones
*some jane austen, but most of her stuff was after i got out of school
*three muskateers and count of monte cristo (i think)
*animal farm
*1984

and, as for harry potter........i love that series!! and, i was 34 before i'd ever read any of them.

debbie

Hello debbie, and welcome to the Book Corner. If your Jane Austen reading included "Sense and Sensibility", do please look in on the "Sense and Sensibility (Book of the Month Club)" thread and let us have your views.

*ahem* I'm still in school but I can still list them can't I? We actually havn't read that many over the past five years.

- Under the Hawthorn Tree
- To Kill a Mocking Bird
- Romeo and Juliet
- MacBeth
- Of Mice and Men
- Pride and Prejudice
- Our Town

See, not that many. The only one that I actually enjoyed was Our Town. I would have prefered to sit and read a King or Prachett novel (I'm a horror/sci-fi fan!).

Drama on the other hand - we've been studying Blood Brothers (my favourite musical) for the past two years which is fantastic. I adore this play and could never tire of it.

thanks.....i will check it out. to be honest, i don't remember if i've ever read the book. i have seen the movie many times (even own it on dvd, along with emma and mansfield park), but i can't remember if i've read the book or not.

Debbie

I went to several schools between 11 and 17 the books that I remember reading are : "The Mabinogion" (Welsh Folk Tales) ; "The Cantebury Tales" - Chaucer; The Complete Works of Dickens, Austen and Shakespeare; various Gerald Durrell books (animal adventures); various Greek comedies and tragedies; various 'modern' authors like Steinbeck; Rhys; Bennet etc all of these I either liked or loved. The only authors I hated were George Eliot, John Bunyan, Thomas Hardy and Siegried Sassoon. Regards, Tin

While I don't remember everything we were required to read in school, I will never forget my high school english teacher for 9th & 10th grades. In addition to our regular schoolwork, he required that outside of class we read 5 books each semester to attain extra credit points that could help with your grades. He only asked that we try to choose "classics" as those received more points. So I perused the classics section in my local library, sure I would get an easy A out of the class, but ended up walking away with a newfound appreciation for my sneaky teacher and for the books I had chosen. Because of this teacher I was able to read "East of Eden", "Great Expectations" "Treasure Island", "Moby Dick" and the like and form a lifelong love of books.

Okay, you asked for it ...

To Kill a Mockingbird
The Chrysalids
Fahrenheit 451
Animal Farm
Lord of the Flies
The Grapes of Wrath
Shakespeare - Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest
Canterbury Tales (selected bits)
A Tale of Two Cities
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
Silas Marner
1984
Pride and Prejudice
Diary of Ann Frank

These are just a few of the ones I remember. I liked them all except "Lord of the Flies". If I liked an author, I usually read as many of his/her works as possible - so I read most of John Wyndham's and John Steinbeck's books and quite a bit of Dickens.

Nobody seems to have mentioned plays. We studied (and I enjoyed):
Shakespeare (as above)
Pygmalion
Oscar Wilde - The Importance of Being Earnest and An Ideal Husband
Juno and the Paycock

Year 7: Goodbye Vietnam - good but quite sad
Hating Alison Ashley - didn't like it at all

Year 8: Hitler's Daughter by Jackie French - interesting

Year 9: Thunderwith - not really that good
See How They Run by David McRobbie - The novel was good but the TV series that went with it was really bad

Year 10: To Kill A Mockingbird - very good