What books did you have to study at school?

[demonsss]

My Western Australian school days are long past― over 50 years ago― but I can still recall many of them.

Prose Fiction:
Lorna Doone (an abridged edition; I still have the actual school book, for some reason)
The Old Man and the Sea (Hemingway)
Tale of Two Cities (Dickens); and we were shown the b+w movie with Dirk Bogarde at school.
Great Expectations (Dickens).
Of Mice and Men (Steinbeck)
―and (I think) Tom Sawyer (Twain)
Various short stories, only two of which I can remember:
"The Truth About Pyecraft", by H G Wells (which is a fantasy story, and funny)
"The Loaded Dog," by Henry Lawson. (also funny)
A collection of literary short stories by Australian literary author now almost entirely forgotten, Vance Palmer: The Rainbow Bird and other stories. Forgettable, except for one unforgettably bad simile: "A cold wind ran down the street like a yellow dog." (That's the only thing I can recall of any of his writing).

Drama:
Shakespeare―
Othello
Merchant of Venice
Julius Caesar
Macbeth
―and just possibly, The Importance of Being Earnest (Oscar Wilde)

Radio Plays: Plays for Radio and Television was the book we had, and I recall one about a ship called, I think, The San Demetrio, something to do with convoys in WW2; I can't remember any others, although possibly another one was about Scott of the Anarctic and the ill-fated polar expedition.

Poetry
Tricky, this one, poems being shorter than novels, but one year the text book was Poems of Spirit and Action, which included one of the few I now recall, "The Highwayman", by Alfred Noyes. I can even recall the opening verse.

THE wind was a torrent of darkness upon the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight looping the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding--
Riding--riding--
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn door.

(I just checked that on-line; my memory of line 3 was wrong; I had "crossing the purple moor" embedded in my memory.

Australian icons like "The Man from Snowy River" and "The Man from Ironbark" (Banjo Patterson).

I am sure there were a number of other worthy poems, but they are lost to my memory.

[pwalker8]

Let's see
Moby Dick (I actually like the book)
To Kill a Mockingbird
Of Mice and Men
Grapes of Wraith

I remember doing the Lady or the Tiger


Most of the Shakespeare plays, both in high school and college.
For some reason, my high school focused on grammar and Shakespeare. We did have one class on SF, but that was mostly short stories, heavy on Ray Bradbury.

[AnemicOak]

You can find all kinds of answers to this in these two old to ancient threads...
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=47552
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=288673

Copy and paste of my answer from back then...

There were more, but off the top of my head these were books I had to read for various classes in High School...

Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
The Martian Chronicles - Ray Bradbury
All Quiet On The Western Front - Erich Maria Remarque
Pride & Prejudice - Jane Austen
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë
Last of the Mohicans - James Fenimore Cooper
The Red Badge of Courage - Steven Crane
The Iliad - Homer
The Odyssey - Homer
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kesey
Hamlet - William Shakespeare
Macbeth - William Shakespeare
A Farewell to Arms - Ernest Hemingway
The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway

[haertig]

I can't recall too many of them. Shows you that only a few impressed me enough to remember!

The ones I do remember:
The Odessy
Beowolf
Future Shock
1984
The Scarlet Letter
The Canterbury Tales (in original Olde English, studied in college)

Not "studied", but read on my own for personal enjoyment:
Robert Heinlein
Andre Norton

I can only remember one. On one occasion I was so unimpressed with whatever the book assigned was that I whined to the teacher, who responded by giving me Seven Pillars of Wisdom to do instead. A win for whining!

[GlenBarrington]

Originally Posted by demonsss

A collection of literary short stories by Australian literary author now almost entirely forgotten, Vance Palmer: The Rainbow Bird and other stories. Forgettable, except for one unforgettably bad simile: "A cold wind ran down the street like a yellow dog." (That's the only thing I can recall of any of his writing).

I REALLY like that "yellow dog" line. I'm gonna try to figure out a way to use it, except I might change it to 'Blue Dog', or maybe a 'loping llama'. I like words with two L's

I had to MEMORIZE the introduction to Chaucer's 'The Canterbury Tales'. I still remember pieces of it 50 years later. We also had to memorize Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. (I lived in Springfield, Illinois. Lincoln is a secular saint here)

For Dama:
Inherit the Wind
Spoon River Anthology (Again, a Springfield/Petersburg/Central Illinois connection)

Books:
Dickens - A Tale of Two Cities
Dickens - Great Expectations
Truman Capote's "In Cold Blood"
Shakespeare - Macbeth
Shakespeare - Romeo & Juliet
Hemingway - The Old Man & the Sea
Hemingway - A Farewell to Arms
Ray Bradbury - Fahrenheit 451
Harper Lee - To Kill a Mockingbird

Poetry:
Vachel Lindsay - Congo
Vachel Lindsay - Lincoln Walks At Midnight
Carl Sandburg - Lots of his poems, but I can't remember a single one
Umm - other poems that have had no effect on my life.

In American History class, we had to read Sandburg's Lincoln Biographies

Looking Back I see clearly how much reading we had to do of Authors with connections to Illinois, and the Closer to Springfield the connection was, the better. I'm quite certain that it was unfortunate that Shakespeare never visited Springfield, his writing would have improved considerably if he had.

[DiapDealer]

I remember the short stories and plays more than anything. I'm sure there were more novels, but only a few come to mind.

Plays: heaps of Shakespeare (to my great pleasure) with sides of Waiting for Godot and The Crucible.

Short stories/novellas: tons of E.A Poe, Steinbeck's "The Pearl, Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery", London's "To Build a Fire", Kafka's "Metamorphosis", The Outcasts of Poker Flat, The Interlopers.

Novels: The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Hawthorne's The House of the Seven Gables.

I honestly don't remember much in the way of any formal "study" when I think of these. I just mainly remember being asked to read them. *shrug*

[Catlady]

I kept a brochure from high school that listed the books to be read for all four years, including summer vacations.

Freshman
Summer:

• A Lantern in Her Hand--Bess Streeter Aldrich
• Cheaper by the Dozen--Gilbreth and Carey
• Karen--Marie Killilea
• Deliver Us from Evil--Tom Dooley

School year:

• The Pearl--John Steinbeck
• Great Expectations--Charles Dickens
• The Light in the Forest--Conrad Richter
• Let the Hurricane Roar--Rose Wilder Lane

Sophomore
Summer:

• Act One--Moss Hart
• So Big--Edna Ferber
• Diary of Anne Frank--Anne Frank
• Bridge of San Luis Rey--Thornton Wilder

School year:

• To Kill a Mockingbird--Harper Lee
• Captains Courageous--Rudyard Kipling
• The Scarlet Letter--Nathaniel Hawthorne
• Shane--Jack Schaefer

Junior
Summer:

• Lost Horizon--James Hilton
• Pride and Prejudice--Jane Austen
• Tale of Two Cities--Charles Dickens
• Jane Eyre--Charlotte Bronte

School year:

• Animal Farm--George Orwell
• Picture of Dorian Gray--Oscar Wilde
• Mayor of Casterbridge--Thomas Hardy
• Pygmalion--George Bernard Shaw

Senior
Summer:

• Fathers and Sons--Ivan Turgenev
• Anna and the King of Siam--Margaret Landon
• Anna Karenina--Leo Tolstoy
• Annapurna--Maurice Herzog

School year:

• A Separate Peace--John Knowles
• Cyrano de Bergerac--Edmond Rostand
• Brave New World--Aldous Huxley
• Point of No Return--John P. Marquand

For each year, there is a list of additional recommended books. The brochure said we should try to read a "worthwhile" book a week, a literary magazine once a month, and a newspaper every day.

I remember all the books except for Let the Hurricane Roar and Captains Courageous, so we apparently stuck to the list. But we also read several Shakespeare plays and additional books that are in the recommended sections.

[Pulpmeister]

An interesting assortment, certainly more eclectic than my days. Shane! Cheaper by the Dozen! Not in my school. (I have read both since; also The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Brave New World, Dorian Gray, Ann Frank).

But we did have Hardy, now that my memory is jogged. The Mayor of Casterbridge was one.

Originally Posted by Pulpmeister

(I have read ... Ann Frank).

Our librarian in high school was a big fan, she knew the family, having grown up in the same street, and was roughly Ann's contmporary.

[pwalker8]

Looking through the various lists about, I've read most of those books. I just don't remember if I read them in English class, if they were assigned summer reading, or I just read them for my own amusement. Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer were also books that I read in a less PC time.

[Nabeel]

Inevitably, Shakespeare. I now think of this as a form of innoculation against the Bard. It was damn effective. 45 years later, I still hate Shakespeare. My school did a great job there!

One of the last books we studied was Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist. This was kind of interesting. Hated it at first, but with each class and each re-reading, it got more and more fascinating. I'm now happy to say that 'Ulysses' is the greatest novel ever (IMHO).

[issybird]

Originally Posted by Catlady

• Act One--Moss Hart

This is a favorite of mine to the extent I toyed with the idea of nominating it in the book club this month.

Originally Posted by Nabeel

I'm now happy to say that 'Ulysses' is the greatest novel ever (IMHO).

I didn't read Ulysses until college. I agree it's great; greatest is hard. I'm not sure what I'd pick as greatest ever.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by Nabeel

Inevitably, Shakespeare. I now think of this as a form of innoculation against the Bard. It was damn effective. 45 years later, I still hate Shakespeare. My school did a great job there!

One of the last books we studied was Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist. This was kind of interesting. Hated it at first, but with each class and each re-reading, it got more and more fascinating. I'm now happy to say that 'Ulysses' is the greatest novel ever (IMHO).

I had the great fortune to have an English professor at GT (Bud Foote) who marched to a different drummer. He also happened to be one of the foremost experts in Blues music. His comparison of the of the rhythm of Shakespeare and various Blues songs was really interesting.

Shakespeare is best appreciated by watching top notch theater performances rather than reading it. It was, after all, theater. I personally like Kenneth Branagh's versions. His Henry V was great. Of course, the Laurence Olivier version of Hamlet is considered the gold standard. Since both Branagh and Olivier did a number of the Bards more famous plays, it's can be interesting to compare the two takes.

[crich70]

Originally Posted by Catlady

[*]Captains Courageous--Rudyard Kipling
[*]Lost Horizon--James Hilton
[*]Jane Eyre--Charlotte Bronte
[*]Animal Farm--George Orwell
[*]A Separate Peace--John Knowles
[*]Brave New World--Aldous Huxley

Of your list I've read the ones that are above. Not necessarily for school though. I did read Animal Farm and A Separate Peace for school as I recall but I don't recall which years. I also read "I am The Cheese" and "Flowers for Algernon" as I recall. First we read the short story and then the book length version of FFA.