I am older now; I have more than what I wanted, but I wish that I had started long before I did

[primroseburrows]

When I was in high school, we had to read things like Flowers for Algernon and other depressing fare.


Kids have it better in today's English classes.

What books did you have to read in school? Did you find books you'd read forever? What books did you hate? What about books from the outside? Is there one book that forever defines your youth? Is there one book you WISH your English teacher had used in his/her curriculum?

I really, really wish there'd have been more SF and Fantasy, but. Books like I Never Promised You a Rose Garden still haunt me. I don't know how many times I read it as a teenager, and I first discovered it (along with Go Ask Alice and Lisa, Bright and Dark) in my school's Resource Room (where I used to hang out, geekily, because d00d, teh Books).

Geez, it's no wonder I'm a psych nurse, with what I read as a kid. Of course, I also read Helter Skelter so many times that at one point I had memorised the first few paragraphs. *ponders*

Comments

[stormwynd.livejournal.com]

Are you asking what did I read in *school* or what did I read in *class*? Huge difference for me.

My high school was (back then) very much tied to the traditional western canon. Of all the books I read in English class, the only one that made a huge mark on me personally was The Scarlet Letter. The whole "destroying your own life by keeping something a secret because you're ashamed of it" theme resonated very strongly with me, being a hyper-closet gay teenager at the time. I still remember one particular passage from the end of the novel that, as much as anything else, told me that it was time to come out:

"Among the many morals we can draw from our poor minister's miserable experience, we put only this into a sentence: Be true! Be true! Be true! Show freely to the world, if not your worst, yet some trait whereby the worst may be inferred!"

As for books I read *while* I was in high school, I found the Outsiders in the school library during my freshman year and devoured it and SE Hinton's other books during a bunch of free periods one week. I also found a copy of John Fox's The Boys on the Rock in the school library, swiped it without checking it out, and read it at home. (It's a boy's coming out story -- there was no way I was going to actually check it out with the librarian.) I *did* return it anonymously at the end of the year, though.

I share your wish that there had been more SF/Fantasy as well.

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

I *did* return it anonymously at the end of the year, though.

It's important to be honest when you steal. That's my motto. *eg*

Have you read At Swim, Two Boys? It's one of the most heartbreakingly beautiful stories I've ever read. *loves*

[stormwynd.livejournal.com]

You're the third or fourth person to tell me that about At Swim, Two Boys. I should definitely check it out.

[primroseburrows.livejournal.com]

*nods emphatically*