Books/Movies you had to read in school

[matt72582]

I'm very curious, trying to see what different locations want to expose their students, so if you could put at least the area where you're from, and say the year you read them.. Comparing and contrasting.

I didn't know it at the time, but we read/saw some pretty good stuff, but I was more interested in goofing off, talking, making jokes, looking at girls, and wish I had paid more attention. Most of us would use the internet, or read something that would brief every chapter, and sometimes if it was necessary, copy off each other.

I'm from Michigan, USA..
In 1997, my 10th grade (I was 15) we read..
-To Kill a Mockingbird

11th grade - Aged 16
Animal Farm
Fahrenheit 451
The Great Gatsby
Of Mice and Men

12th Grade - 17
Dante's Inferno


I remember watching "To Kill A Mockingbird", and my last year in high school we watched "Breakfast At Tiffany"

In college (University of Michigan) I took "Philosophy in Film and Literature" and we watched

-Double Indemnity
-Shane
-Taxi Driver
-Blade Runner (It's so rare, but I fell asleep and woke up at the very end)

(I'll remember more later)

[Mr Minio]

As of Polish literature (among others) : Potop and other Sienkiewicz stuff, Ch³opi by Reymont, Lalka by Prus, Przedwio¶nie, Nad Niemnem...

Besides dozens of Polish books I remember Crime and Punishment, Antigone, Oedipus Rex, Hamlet, Macbeth, Animal Farm, 1984, Heart of Darkness (Polish title: J±dro Ciemno¶ci - j±dro also means testicle, so The Testicle of Darkness is a nice title), The Plague by Camus. Robinson Crusoe in elementary school as well. xD

[matt72582]

We read plenty of Shakespeare, usually one student would read a passage, and go around a circle. I don't think this was the best way..

I also remember "Antigone"

[Mr Minio]

We had to read all these books, but hardly anyone has really read them. We only read synopsis. :)

Once we had an assignment to write a tragedy. I wrote a Shakespeare-inspired masterpiece taking place in contemporary world. My work was incredible (I know, I'm so modest...). Before that we had another homework. We had to write something, it was shorter, so it was easier, but then the teacher said we have to perform this play and that should lead to learning the whole thing by heart! I was a genius, though, so I came up with an idea of preparing special kind of masks that would have the play's text pasted on one side, so we actually read the whole thing!

[matt72582]

Ha, nice story. Brando would do the same sort of thing, and for good reason. He said people don't have their conversations memorized for weeks or months at a time, so it remained fresh. He used to play jokes, in "The Godfather" when he's talking with Lenny Montana (Luca Brasi) he had a "Fuk You" written on his forehead :)

I still haven't read them - I like reading certain things, but if I read books, their usually auto or bios.

[NatashaR]

In school we were required to read only stuff by national authors so I doubt it would be anything known abroad.
As for movies... I think once we watched in class a movie about Beethoven but I don't remember what it was called. In college I took management and we watched Modern Times cause it was related to what we were talking about in class.

[MovieGal]

I remember reading "Lord of the Flies" in high school and I love both versions of the film.

edit: oh yes, and we watched "Romeo and Juliet".. never had to read the book.

[Gabrielle947]

Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, Camus , Kafka , Goethe and the rest was Lithuanian stuff.

[matt72582]

At what age and what countries (for those who didn't mention it)

[MovieGal]

Im in the USA and I read those in high school during the early 1980s...

[Mr Minio]

during the early 1980s... 1980's or 1880's? :p

[Miss Vicky]

Books I remember having to read in high school: Of Mice and Men, Farenheit 451, To Kill A Mockingbird, The Great Gatsby, After the First Death, The Sound of Waves, Lord of the Flies, Brave New World, Romeo and Juliet, Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night's Dream

Films We had to Watch: To Kill A Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, The Great Gatsby, Lord of the Flies, Glory, and parts of the series Roots.

I'm American and graduated high school in 1999.

[christine]

in the UK. From what I remember cos it was quite a while ago ( pre 1975) variously all through senior school (11 to 18)
Far From the Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee
The Spire - William Golding
Animal Farm and 1984 - George Orwell
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
The Gun - C.S.Forester - this sticks in my memory as amongst the most tedious lessons I ever had at school
Treasure Island - R.L.Stevenson
probably some of the Brontes but can't remember which ones were at school and which at home
the Shakespeares we studied were Macbeth, Cleopatra, Richard II, Henry IV both parts.
and the poetry I can remember was Wilfred Owen's WW1 poems, Keats and Wordsworth. Did Sean O'Casey's plays Juno and the Paycock and the Plough and the Stars.

In French I remember - Le Pere Goriot by Balzac, Le Chateau de Ma Mere and La Gloire de Mon Pere by Marcel Pagnol, Les Mains Sales by Jean-Paul Sartre, Le Misanthrope by Moliere, L'Etranger and La Peste by Camus, Maupassant's short stories, Madame Bovary by Flaubert.

[MovieGal]

1980's or 1880's? :p

Do you want to get slapped?

You know my age :p

[Sexy Celebrity]

In 1997, my 10th grade (I was 15) we read..
-To Kill a Mockingbird

11th grade - Aged 16
Animal Farm
Fahrenheit 451
The Great Gatsby
Of Mice and Men

12th Grade - 17
Dante's Inferno

I had all of those in high school except Of Mice and Men and Dante's Inferno.

[gbgoodies]

I'm very curious, trying to see what different locations want to expose their students, so if you could put at least the area where you're from, and say the year you read them.. Comparing and contrasting.



I'm in New York, and I graduated from high school in 1984, so I don't remember everything I read, or when I read them, but these are the books that I remember reading in school.

Romeo & Juliet
Hamlet
MacBeth
Of Mice and Men
To Kill A Mockingbird
The Red Badge of Courage
A Tale of Two Cities
Moby Dick
Lord of the Flies
The Tell-Tale Heart
The Raven
The Scarlet Letter
The Bell Jar
The Diary of Anne Frank
The Crucible
The Lottery
Flowers for Algernon
Death of a Salesman
The Picture of Dorian Gray

[ayushchandra]

In school we had to read books only because to improve our speaking skills. It starts with a student at the first seat then after he/she complete a paragraph then the next one has to read. That's so boring ..

[Gatsby]

The Great Gatsby. Fellow classmates found it boring but I loved it. Still one of my favorite books and it's how I got my username obviously. :D

[matt72582]

Books I remember having to read in high school: Of Mice and Men, Farenheit 451, To Kill A Mockingbird, The Great Gatsby, After the First Death, The Sound of Waves, Lord of the Flies, Brave New World, Romeo and Juliet, Taming of the Shrew, A Midsummer Night's Dream

Films We had to Watch: To Kill A Mockingbird, Of Mice and Men, The Great Gatsby, Lord of the Flies, Glory, and parts of the series Roots.

I'm American and graduated high school in 1999.

Almost exactly what I read and saw. We also read Taming of the Shrew (and watched "10 Things I Hate About You" - didn't care for) and A Midsummer Night's Dream. I graduated high school in 2000 from a public school in Michigan. Seems like even people outside the U.S. read the same stuff.

[linespalsy]

Graduated in 1999 in NJ. Didn't actually read most of these but here's what i remember being assigned (also not 100% sure about the correct grades some of them were assigned):

9th grade:
the miracle worker, romeo and juliet, diary of anne frank, night, great expectations.

10th:
julius caesar, old man and the sea, the secret life of walter mitty, death of a salesman, of mice and men.

11th:
ethan fromme, the scarlet letter, an occurence at owl creek bridge.

12th:
macbeth, brave new world, catch 22, lord of the flies, a tale of two cities.

Don't think most of my classes showed too many movies. One exception was my US History II teacher in 10th grade, who showed us Glory and Matewan. We also watched plenty of stuff in Media Arts I (11th grade), mostly pre-1960s hollywood.

[Sexy Celebrity]

The Great Gatsby. Fellow classmates found it boring but I loved it. Still one of my favorite books and it's how I got my username obviously. :D

The Great Gatsby bored me in high school. It's a shame the Leonardo DiCaprio/Tobey Maguire movie hadn't come out then. I would have taken the book a lot more seriously.

[mistique]

I'm from Denmark, so telling which I've read or watched in what kind of school is too complicated...

Books:
"Devil in a blue dress" by Walter Mosley
The rest is danish, so I don't assume it is of any interest.

Movies:
Bonnie & Clyde
Devil in a blue dress
Romeo + Juliet
Ghostbusters
The nightmare before christmas
The 13th Warrior
Australia
Alpha Dog
The Place beyond the pines (saw it in the cinema)
The Butler (saw it in the cinema)

[teeter_g]

Books:
-Where the Red Fern Grows
-The Outsiders
-The Phantom Toll Booth


I am sure there were others, but those are the only three that I can remember.


Movies:
-Brians Song
-Where The Red Fern Grows
-Romeo and Juliet
-West Side Story

[matt72582]

I also read "Where The Red Ferns Grow" and "The Outsiders" (I think 8th grade) - and watched the movies. In fact, I saw "The Outsiders" a few months ago, I remember my mom telling me as a child how great of a movie it was; also mentioning "The Karate Kid is in it!"

We also read and watched "West Side Story" - I remember everyone hated watching it from the beginning, but then everyone liked it by the time it ended.

[SeeingisBelieving]

I'm from Blackpool, Lancashire in the UK.

I don't remember reading any books in primary school, only the ones that were read to us in what I think were our last couple of years, around 88–89: The Phantom Tollbooth, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen and The Moon of Gomrath.

At secondary school (90–94):

Year 7:
The Merchant of Venice

Year 8:
Of Mice and Men
An Inspector Calls

Year 9:
Wuthering Heights (also watched Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (also watched the Eighties BBC dramatisation)
The Illustrated Man

Year 10:
?

Year 11:
Macbeth

There must, obviously have been more than this and it's strange that I remember so little of the final years.