My english teacher is a cruel heartless woman.
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hooded pitohui
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nono, I mean there was some movie about this author (I think) and was about 3 woman through time, her while she was writing her book and going nutty nuts, and then one woman in the 60's that was reading her book, and one in the 90's that was living the book... or something.
hooded pitohui
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Kabuki Waq
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i never read your book but i had to read the "THE GREAT GATSBY" in english class, what an overrated trashy book.
Wow, I should ban you for talking any kind of shit about F. Scott Fitzgerald. What's wrong with the kids these days?Kabuki Waq said:
(No, I'm not serious, but yes, I'm disappointed. But I can't say anything, since I hate James Joyce with a passion.)
I'm kind of disappointed in this thread -- based on the title, I assume it was going to be an XXX-rated story.
That's easily one of my 5 favorite novels in the English language!
What have you read by him? He did something for everyone. I could reread Dubliners until the day I die, and still come up with something new every trip through. Reading Portrait of the Artist is absolutely inspiring. I'll leave Ulysses and the Wake out of this since they're clearly not for everyone.
Over. . .tra. . .sweet Jesus. I'm not the biggest Gatsby fan (I generally don't like reading about rich decadent people), but it's a marvel of the form with nigh unrivaled characterization.
Finally, Mrs. Dalloway is decent, but this is coming from a Joyce-head Faulknerite that eats stream of consciousness for breakfast. Virginia Woolf is extremely dated. You'd be hard-pressed to find many modern feminists that identify with her anymore. What your english teacher wants to hear probably has something to do with reconciling Woolf's peer-influenced social activities with her own prudence and morality. If you want a better novel to judge Woolf by, go with To the Lighthouse or Orlando. If you need help with anything, send a PM. I did a term paper on common themes in Virginia Woolf's work some years back.
There's at least a few critics that don't like Joyce much. The prime criticism (aside from the whole 'nonsense' charge brought against the Wake) is that the reader has to be far too biographically familiar with James Joyce in order to truly enjoy the books. That criticism opens a big can of worms that dates back to at least the time of Coleridge.
I dunno. I have to say that most of the people I know that have read Joyce have been either literary geeks or artists of some sort or another. Maybe his work just hits homeruns for a narrow segment of the reading public. I think we could all agree that if published today, something like Portrait wouldn't stand much chance of becoming insanely popular.
You're not broken, though. White Man doesn't love broken things!
(And As I Lay Dying is a bit much, even for Faulkner. It's got good pieces to it, but there's such a thing as pushing the envelope too much)
I've read most of the books listed in this thread, and they all blow. Even my favorite english teacher hated some of them.
I remember his intro to Moby Dick. "Ultimately Moby Dick is a broken failure. Not a very good book at all. But there are glimpses of insight and innovation in writing in all that different thigns that Melville tried to accomplish so thats why we read... parts of it."
Only "classic" literature that english teachers have been able to convince me of having any value at all is shakespeare and thats merely because its amazing at how well those stories still apply to todays life.
I find most classic literature is just about whiney people bitching and the whole story could be shortened to like 20 pages had someone just given the central characters a well deserved kick to the balls.
I remember his intro to Moby Dick. "Ultimately Moby Dick is a broken failure. Not a very good book at all. But there are glimpses of insight and innovation in writing in all that different thigns that Melville tried to accomplish so thats why we read... parts of it."
Only "classic" literature that english teachers have been able to convince me of having any value at all is shakespeare and thats merely because its amazing at how well those stories still apply to todays life.
I find most classic literature is just about whiney people bitching and the whole story could be shortened to like 20 pages had someone just given the central characters a well deserved kick to the balls.
the entirety of wuthering heights is about whiney people that can't stand up for themselves. I could barely read the book because it was so frustrating. You just want to reach into the book and slap them. Its the same reason I can't stand "reality" tv. They pick the whiney dumbest motherfuckers ever to be the central characters.
people should read less whiney bitching and more Vonnegut.
people should read less whiney bitching and more Vonnegut.
I have a strict 'no Bronte' policy. But if by any chance you are slandering the most excellent Kate Bush song (the original recording, mind you), you go to hell. You go to hell and you die.
Um, if you look up the definition of whiny humanistic bitching in the OED, there's a freakin' PICTURE of Vonnegut next to the word. He's also pretty self-centered and egotistical. And when I met him, he was drunk at a book reading/signing. I adore the non-redundant third of the Vonnegut library, too.
Anyway, I fail to see how the majority of classic literature is about whiny bitches. Are you just labeling any emotional discourse over ideas as whiny bitchiness?
EDIT: And half you folks talking about your english teachers: You are talking about high school ones, right? Please say yes.
KilledByBill
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Different strokes for different folks I guess, but Wuthering Heights was one of the few books I read in my High School/College education that I actually enjoyed. I thought the book had great style and interesting characters. Maybe I liked it because Bronte borrowed many of the elements of the British Romantic writers, the saving grace of my "Brit Lit" class.
Edit:
The character Heathcliff is about as far away from whiney as possible, though with the Linton family you've got a case (but their flaws are there to serve a point). The story hardly centers around people not being able to stand up for themselves. The crux of the story was that people were at their worst when they were either too "civilized" or too "wild" and when the two families are eventually united a necessary balance is achieved in their offspring.
Kabuki Waq
Member
Great Gatsby Bored me to tears maybe because i never identified with the characters or the whole american dream concept in that book.
I the only book i really loved that i was forced to read in english class was "Great Expectations" man that rocked.
I the only book i really loved that i was forced to read in english class was "Great Expectations" man that rocked.
Meier said:
wow. the awakening is really really good. and it was written by kate chopin. maybe you should try reading it?
"mrs. pontellier's eyes were quick and bright; they were a yellowish brown, about the color of her hair. she had a way of turning them swiftly upon an object and holding them there as if lost in some inward maze of contemplation or thought. "
what a great character sketch. i'm sorry ya'll hate yr high school reading lists, but think as you grow older and start to look into yrself you'll understand the reason why these books are so great. i don't think high school students (i know i didn't) have the level of personal awareness that it requires to study lit. that's not contemporary (though i doubt high school kids would like 'everything is illuminated" more than joyce or someone) , but just keep the books around and read them again when you go through loss or when you fall out of love or when you find what makes you break and then return to the books.
Uhh, I did read it but sometimes female authors from that time period blur together for me considering they all wrote about the same damn stuff. The main character is honestly the least likeable character I've ever encountered.
And although your attempt at humor is acknowledged (it failed), I'm a senior in college.
And although your attempt at humor is acknowledged (it failed), I'm a senior in college.
ConfusingJazz
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swoon said:
I am sorry, but The Awakening made me want to shoot myself, mostly because I really dispise novels dealing with morality issues, especially in Victorian Times. Great, another novel having to do with a woman questioning her marraige, whoop de fucking do.
RevenantKioku
PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS oh god i am drowning in them
A Light in August and The Grapes of Wrath were the only books I read in HS that really grated me. My school focused too heavily on Shakespeare though, senior year I read King Leer, Othello, and Hamlet, but I did have fun doing the To be or not to be soliloquy as my project. I threw the chair I had been sitting on in the direction of one bitch I particularly disliked at one point during my reciting, and scared the shit out of her, but the class and my teacher loved it.
Don't have to take lit classes in college though.
Don't have to take lit classes in college though.
nitewulf said:
I started to write this whole thing... but I don't care. Just going to say he was the best english teacher ever and the only one who ever taught me anything worth learning. He taught me to write in such a manner that my papers won't get covered in drool from people falling asleep as they read them. In other words he taught me to not write like in Wuthering Heights, Moby Dick, Great Gatsby, and so on.
thats fine, but i dont think any english teacher should influence the student's thoughts pre-emptively with his own opinions. i mean before you even read it, he told you what he thought of moby dick, so you went into the novel with a pre determined set of values. thats not cool, IMO.
Jugendstil
Member
F. SCOTT FITZGERALD? MORE LIKE F. SNOT FITZJERKALD! LOL
READING IS GAY
READING IS GAY
If anything, it only made me more interested in moby dick.
after years of english teachers telling me what books are well written and all these classics are so good and me coming to the conclusion that said teachers are full of shit, having a teacher saying something like, "this book blows BUT..." makes me actually listen to what he has to say in that BUT area to look for even a hint of goodness.
I failed in finding said goodness in moby dick, but I at least looked for it ;P
after years of english teachers telling me what books are well written and all these classics are so good and me coming to the conclusion that said teachers are full of shit, having a teacher saying something like, "this book blows BUT..." makes me actually listen to what he has to say in that BUT area to look for even a hint of goodness.
I failed in finding said goodness in moby dick, but I at least looked for it ;P
enjoy bell woods
Banned
I read The Awakening and I hated it. 
Great King Bowser
Property of Kaz Harai
Who wants to help me analyse Othello 1.3.126 - 1.3.181?
I always have a 'plan' in my head, so figure writing the essay will be easy, thus leaving it to the last minute. When that time approaches I get brain block and end up writing a load of shit. I hate English Lang/Lit.
I always have a 'plan' in my head, so figure writing the essay will be easy, thus leaving it to the last minute. When that time approaches I get brain block and end up writing a load of shit. I hate English Lang/Lit.
Shouta
Member
I think a teacher that flat out says states their opinion but also states why the book is considered to be full of merit by others a teacher that is already way ahead of the game. I've had a lot teachers who weasel their interpretation of the novel into the reading of it which bothers me way too much more than flatly stating it.
All Hail C-Webb
Hailing from the Chill-Web
Awakening was bad, but nothing was worse than reasing Madame Bovary. I was going to get Cliff Notes for it, but my mom said it was a very contoversial book back in the day because it contained lots of sexual themes. Bullfuckingshit. It was like reading a book version of unfaithful without any of the good parts, and a whole lot of old English retardness.
KilledByBill
Member
I'm John Kerry, and I approve this message.
Edit:
An excellent point. I've seen plenty of cases where a student will push their teacher/prof. for their own "informed analysis" of a story. Lo and behold, in nearly every instance that person became brain-locked into that one interpretation and basically abandonned thinking independently for themself. It seems like that has happened here with Mr. Slayin, whose arguments are hardly presuasive (too long, too whiney) and who probably never gave said stories (Wuthering Heights, Moby Dick, Great Gatsby) much personal analysis besides what his teacher told him to consider.
We're talking about ENGLISH here!
That said, I'm sort of obsessive about Madame Bovary. Flaubert almost went to jail for writing it, and it's one of the very first books (maybe even one of the very first written works ever) that doesn't treat adultery like a black and white issue. Emma's one of my favorite characters in all literature, period.
But hey, aside from all the bitchy characters, this would be slayn's kind of book. It's style was almost as controversial as the content at the time. Gustave Flaubert wrote in a brand spanking new style devoid of long speeches and purple prose. The book's also chock full of symbols even though symbolism was still a few years from taking off. Actually, in several ways (characters, greyness of morality, morbidity), this book is a precursor to both the symbolist and decadent movement.
It also sort of reminds me of the French equivalent of Anna Karenina. I really want to finish reading Bovary in French -- I just don't have the time to be doing that sort of stuff anymore.
EDIT: My yelling up top was joking, at first, then I continued reading and saw the worlds 'old English retardedness.' Also, is it really hard to believe this was popular in it's day (the 18-fudging-50s)?
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