[OFF TOPIC] Βooks Thread

[heywoodu 15,334]

  On 4/16/2020 at 8:48 PM, Bohemia said:

 

That's exactly what I think too, since I never liked the books we had to read for school

One of my least favorite was probably "The Plague" by Albert Camus, which is not the kind of thing you want to read right now.

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Oh it really is  

 

But...

 

The Plague (French: La Peste) is a novel by Albert Camus, published in 1947, that tells the story of a plague sweeping the French Algerian city of Oran. It asks a number of questions relating to the nature of destiny and the human condition.

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Yeah no thanks, I'm out. I want to read a novel/story, not 'ask questions relating to the nature of this and that'.

[Olympian1010 8,068]

  On 4/16/2020 at 5:35 PM, dcro said:

Random question. Has anyone here read The Great Gatsby?

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That’s mandatory high school reading in the US. Luckily, I’m a smarty, so I don’t have to read books to pass a test. I am very familiar with the plot however.

[Olympian1010 8,068]

  On 4/16/2020 at 6:56 PM, Bohemia said:

 

I don't know if I'm the right person to ask  when school forces me to read something I usually don't like it because I don't like to be forced. It wasn't the worst read though, it's a classic so it's a must read I guess!

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I’m going to lead a crusade against required reading one of these days 

[Olympian1010 8,068]

  On 4/16/2020 at 8:58 PM, heywoodu said:

 

Oh it really is  

 

But...

 

The Plague (French: La Peste) is a novel by Albert Camus, published in 1947, that tells the story of a plague sweeping the French Algerian city of Oran. It asks a number of questions relating to the nature of destiny and the human condition.

---

 

Yeah no thanks, I'm out. I want to read a novel/story, not 'ask questions relating to the nature of this and that'.

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Well shit, now I have to read that before the 2022 Mediterranean Games so I can reference that. Thanks a lot 

[Olympian1010 8,068]

I also blame required reading for why I lost my love literature. I also just think cinema is just more appealing, but I digress.

 

There were books I hated, and books I loved in my elevated high school classes (classes that gave college credit if you passed a big test at the end of the year).

 

My required reading (that I can remember) was: Fahrenheit 451, Ella Minnow Pea, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Things Fall Apart, 1984, Animal Farm, The Great Gadsby, Scarlet Letter, Oedipus Rex, Romeo and Juliet, MacBeth, Hamlet, Allegory of the Cave, The Epic of Gilgamesh, The Odyssey, Old Man and the Sea, Doll’s House, Heart of Darkness, Mythology, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, This I Believe, Much Ado About Nothing, Of Mice and Men, The Catcher and the Rye, Metamorphosis, Modest Proposal, Nickel and Dimed, and some others probably.

 

All of these books, stories, etc. are great. I just wish I would have been allowed to choose which of them I actually wanted to read 

[OlympicsFan 860]

  On 4/16/2020 at 9:30 PM, Olympian1010 said:

I also blame required reading for why I lost my love literature. I also just think cinema is just more appealing, but I digress.

 

There were books I hated, and books I loved in my elevated high school classes (classes that gave college credit if you passed a big test at the end of the year).

 

My required reading (that I can remember) was: Fahrenheit 451, Ella Minnow Pea, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Things Fall Apart, 1984, Animal Farm, The Great Gadsby, Scarlet Letter, Oedipus Rex, Romeo and Juliet, MacBeth, Hamlet, Allegory of the Cave, The Epic of Gilgamesh, The Odyssey, Old Man and the Sea, Doll’s House, Heart of Darkness, Mythology, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, This I Believe, Much Ado About Nothing, Of Mice and Men, The Catcher and the Rye, Metamorphosis, Modest Proposal, Nickel and Dimed, and some others probably.

 

All of these books, stories, etc. are great. I just wish I would have been allowed to choose which of them I actually wanted to read 

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Seriously? That's a crazy "schedule". How did you have time to actually analyze those books? In Germany we maybe read 3 or 4 books per year in school.

About the list: Doesn't sound like a lot of poetry (Walt Whitman? Robert Frost?) or contemporary literature (Paul Auster? Jonathan Safran Foer? Jonathan Franzen? Philip Roth? Thomas Pynchon? Michael Chabon? Don DeLilllo?). When i was in school we also didn't read a lot of contemporary literature, but at least it is understandable here, since Germany doesn't really produce great authors anymore. The US produced a lot of great authors in the last couple of decades, so i am a bit surprised that your curriculum ignored them mostly.

 

Also:

Which of those books was/were your favorite(s)?

When you say "Metamorphosis" you mean the book by Franz Kafka?

 

I also somewhat agree with you about the highlighted part, but only when it comes to novels. There are great non-fiction/poetry books that can't be "replaced" by cinema/movies.

 

[Olympian1010 8,068]

  On 4/21/2020 at 8:41 PM, OlympicsFan said:

Seriously? That's a crazy "schedule". How did you have time to actually analyze those books? In Germany we maybe read 3 or 4 books per year in school.

 

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Yeah, it is. It shouldn’t be that shocking since the US ranks rather low in terms of education standards amongst 1st world countries. We typically had to read 6-8 novels a year, 1-3 plays, 4-6 short stories, and probably dozen or more poems (but this is in the hardest, most rigorous English classes in the country). There’s absolutely no time to enjoy the readings or discuss about them in great critical detail. For instance, we only spent a week of discussion on a book like Animal Farm (where a good discussion should probably take a few weeks). We also wrote a ton of research papers, timed essays (generally you had to read a short story/poem, and were given 45 minutes or 1 hour to analyze it with a 5 paragraph essay complete with a thesis and evidence), poems, and some other papers.
 

  On 4/21/2020 at 8:41 PM, OlympicsFan said:

About the list: Doesn't sound like a lot of poetry (Walt Whitman? Robert Frost?) or contemporary literature (Paul Auster? Jonathan Safran Foer? Jonathan Franzen? Philip Roth? Thomas Pynchon? Michael Chabon? Don DeLilllo?). When i was in school we also didn't read a lot of contemporary literature, but at least it is understandable here, since Germany doesn't really produce great authors anymore. The US produced a lot of great authors in the last couple of decades, so i am a bit surprised that your curriculum ignored them mostly.

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I read a lot of poetry (and write a lot of poetry as well) in school and nowadays as well. I tend not to really care or notice who wrote a poem. Poems are more about message and substance more than trivia knowledge or narrator facts (unless revealed by the poem itself). We read some contemporary literature, but focused more on classic literature (which is fine because I prefer classic literature). 
 

  On 4/21/2020 at 8:41 PM, OlympicsFan said:

Which of those books was/were your favorite(s)?

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My favorite novels/stories were Things Fall Apart, Animal Farm, Fahrenheit 451, and Ella Minnow Pea (which you’ll never have heard, and never understand unless you really understand the gramatical rules of literature). There isn’t really much I didn’t like, I probably wouldn’t be a communications student if I didn’t appreciate language, novels, stories, etc.
There’s short story I liked, but it was on a national test, so I’m contracted not to talk about it. I was a really fun story/essay to analyze though. It had to do with how the way we sit (and what we sit on) can infer a lot of about our social status, emotions, etc. I’d be willing to talk more about it in DMs (I could probably find the story if you’re interested).

 

  On 4/21/2020 at 8:41 PM, OlympicsFan said:

When you say "Metamorphosis" you mean the book by Franz Kafka?

 

I also somewhat agree with you about the highlighted part, but only when it comes to novels. There are great non-fiction/poetry books that can't be "replaced" by cinema/movies.

 

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Yes. 
 

I agree with that. I’d add that there is some cinema that can’t be replaced by written word either.

[Griff88 1,971]

  On 4/16/2020 at 5:35 PM, dcro said:

Random question. Has anyone here read The Great Gatsby?

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Heard about it. Know the movie but never watched.

 

If it wasn't for the girls at my high school going crazy and keep pushing it for the prom theme, I wouldn't know about it 

[heywoodu 15,334]

  On 4/21/2020 at 10:00 PM, Olympian1010 said:

Yeah, it is. It shouldn’t be that shocking since the US ranks rather low in terms of education standards amongst 1st world countries. We typically had to read 6-8 novels a year, 1-3 plays, 4-6 short stories, and probably dozen or more poems (but this is in the hardest, most rigorous English classes in the country). There’s absolutely no time to enjoy the readings or discuss about them in great critical detail. For instance, we only spent a week of discussion on a book like Animal Farm (where a good discussion should probably take a few weeks). We also wrote a ton of research papers, timed essays (generally you had to read a short story/poem, and were given 45 minutes or 1 hour to analyze it with a 5 paragraph essay complete with a thesis and evidence), poems, and some other papers.

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I am now happy I didn't go to school there, that sounds even worse than maths and more senseless than the 'art classes' we had  

[dcro 10,210]

Yeah, I started "reading" that one through Audible Audiobook (judge me, but it was a free trial).

 

But I gave up after Chapter 3. Mostly because the dude that read it poorly immitated female voices when reading the lines of female characters. So cringeworthy.