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I always thought the Great Gatsby was that horrifically boring thing they make you read in High School and everyone just ends up getting the sparknotes too.

You're telling me people actually enjoy it?

This is an existential crisis for me.

 Harriticus wrote:
I always thought the Great Gatsby was that horrifically boring thing they make you read in High School and everyone just ends up getting the sparknotes too.

You're telling me people actually enjoy it?

This is an existential crisis for me.

Some people like pain. What can I say?*

* And by that I mean I am one of millions who believe certain authors should be tarred and feathered, and are in fact lesser Demons of Boredom sent to plague us.

You people are nothing but flea-bitten, uncultured savages. Shame on you!

Frazzled: forced to read crap like that in school.
Genghis Connie: going with her drama class to see Hobbit on Friday at the GIANT IMAX in Austin.

SON OF A B!!!!

Romeo+Juliet was objectively terrible.

Eh, Midsummer's Night Dream was worse in my opinion, or at least as bad.
Then again, I'm not that much of a fan of Shakespeare's comedies.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Eh, Midsummer's Night Dream was worse in my opinion, or at least as bad.
Then again, I'm not that much of a fan of Shakespeare's comedies.

I mean the movie Romeo+Juliet starring DiCaprio and... some chick. I liked Romeo and Juliet. Not as much as MacBeth or the Tempest but it was good.

Recently Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead has given Hamlet a new lease on life with me.

The movie Midsummer's night dream wasn't that good either

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The movie Midsummer's night dream wasn't that good either

The movie? There's been like a dozen movies of Midsummer Night's Dream.

 Frazzled wrote:
Frazzled: forced to read crap like that in school.
Genghis Connie: going with her drama class to see Hobbit on Friday at the GIANT IMAX in Austin.

SON OF A B!!!!

I know man, I mean seriously, I got sent on field trips to train with the marines, but these kids get to go to the flipping MALL for their field trips?(We have a Theater in the mall).
Although i will never forget when we disected a full grown cat in my science class, or when my Biology teacher taught me to make wine from just grapes.

Hmm...I would enjoy watching this...better than that movie about that surfer dude looking to catch the gnarliest wave of zombies against the wishes of his girlfriend.

 htj wrote:

What was the other text? I found Dracula about as interesting as the shipping news. And I'm not a sailor.

It was better than the other choices - I think the time period had to be something like written between 1870-1920, or something like that. I tried for White Fang, but got told no, it wasn't 'time period' enough. To this day, I'm not sure what that meant.

I think the other choices were things like bleak house - I remember there being a lot of Dickens in that room.

That and we did Lord of the Flies. Which I also didn't really enjoy.

If you haven't read it in the last dozen years (or post adolescence, more likely), I suggest giving it a whirl.

It is much better as an adult.

On the other hand, should I ever have to ready 'Crime and Punishent' by Dostoyevsky again, I'm likely to die the death of 10,000 self inflicted paper cuts.

I just found the book to be depressing - it didn't help that my favourite character while I was reading it was Simon.

My greatest hates are Durrenmatt and Brecht. Although it is self inflicted - I chose to do performing arts at college, rather than get a job. 'The Visit' - still makes me shudder.

I enjoyed reading the book.
I don't particularly want to watch this however.

 sebster wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The movie Midsummer's night dream wasn't that good either

The movie? There's been like a dozen movies of Midsummer Night's Dream.

I wouldn't know; I saw the same adaption 3 times over.
I think it was the 1999 version.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Frazzled: forced to read crap like that in school.
Genghis Connie: going with her drama class to see Hobbit on Friday at the GIANT IMAX in Austin.

SON OF A B!!!!

I know man, I mean seriously, I got sent on field trips to train with the marines, but these kids get to go to the flipping MALL for their field trips?(We have a Theater in the mall).
Although i will never forget when we disected a full grown cat in my science class, or when my Biology teacher taught me to make wine from just grapes.

The Austin Imax is new and one of the biggest theaters in the world. Because its the capital of Texas. Of course its bigger.
I am triple jealous.

I'm jealous of both the imax and the training with the marines.

My field trip was to a fething field!

An attempt at a nature reserve - which I think was an excuse to grow nettles.

I got to do one cool field trip yearly in high school, we went backpacking the first week of summer vacation and hiked a mountain. It was awesome. It also counted as an actual class independent of any other so I walked away with science credit.

I have a feeling that this movie is going to help some high school intellectuals get laid this spring.

 Manchu wrote:
I have a feeling that this movie is going to help some high school intellectuals get laid this spring.

+1 internet cookies to you sir!

The old one was pretty good. The ending was less ambiguous than the book, which is good or bad, depending on how you look at it. I had to read the last chapter over about three times to get an actual idea what was going on.

I'm always amazed how F. Scott became a part of the very ideas and communities that he writes about in the book, almost with a quiet venom. If anything, the book demonstrated the impetuous and childlike nature of the rich and famous, from their blatant disregard of the law, to their relationships with others, especially people who aren't rich. Of course, there was plenty of sexual tension going on. It almost felt like Carroway was the MC in a Harem. I don't know. There's very prolific undertones to the whole book, and I hope they can encapsulate them well.

I was in Nordstroms today, trying on 1600 dollar suits just because I felt like it. I couldn't help like feeling like I was a part of some significantly different reality than the rest of the mall. I was chatting it up with an older rich gentleman about Seiko watches. They don't sell them at Nordstroms, but the guy seemed really eager to talk about them, especially the expensive ones, and he showed me his watch, and I showed him mine, and we chatted about them, and their significance to us. It was so pleasant. I'm sure the guy thought I was rich or something.

Ummm...I'm gonna get killed for this, but I LOVE The Great Gatsby. And Their Eyes Were Watching God, The Brothers Karamozov, and The Scarlet Letter]. And I also don't like sci-fi novels. Actually, I love pretty much everything I have been assigned to read in school...

I do hate Romeo and Juliet. It is just so overwrought. The Tempest, or The Taming of the Shrew, or King Lear are much better.

Y'all are just a buncha screeching philistines!

_Tim?

 Some_Call_Me_Tim? wrote:
Ummm...I'm gonna get killed for this, but I LOVE The Great Gatsby. And Their Eyes Were Watching God, The Brothers Karamozov, and The Scarlet Letter. And I also don't like sci-fi novels. Actually, I love pretty much everything I have been assigned to read in school...

I do hate [i]Romeo and Juliet. It is just so overwrought. The Tempest, or The Taming of the Shrew, or King Lear are much better.

Y'all are just a buncha screeching philistines!

_Tim?

Finally! I was beginning to think I was the only one.

 Some_Call_Me_Tim? wrote:
Ummm...I'm gonna get killed for this, but I LOVE The Great Gatsby. And Their Eyes Were Watching God, The Brothers Karamozov, and The Scarlet Letter]. And I also don't like sci-fi novels. Actually, I love pretty much everything I have been assigned to read in school...

I do hate Romeo and Juliet. It is just so overwrought. The Tempest, or The Taming of the Shrew, or King Lear are much better.

Y'all are just a buncha screeching philistines!

_Tim?

You too? I had to bullgak an essay once for "Catcher in the rye", because I didn't read it. Needless to say, or perhaps it is necessary to say, after writing up a bogus essay, I was so inspired by the message of the book, I actually read it in my spare time.

I'm not a big reader, but I'm so easily moved by books, I really don't know why I'm not. I'm sure it's some passion I'll find later in life. High school fostered that, despite it being a colossal waste of time in almost every respect.

I had to read "Lord of the Flies" in school I liked it because it was about kids killing each other.

I think the biggest problem from school reading is this.
You cant criticize the book, you are told you have to love it you have to think it is a master piece.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
I think the biggest problem from school reading is this.
You cant criticize the book, you are told you have to love it you have to think it is a master piece.

The thing is the books they often make you read in school are classic novels that are fairly well known by the public and generally loved by critics so you just end up sounding unreasonable if you dislike it, mind you I'm the worst when it comes to judging a good book (I'm much more critical

when it comes to music and movies) I'll read anything even if it's garbage.

I disagree, there was alot wrong with Lord of the flies(like the sailor just coming in a rescuing them). The only booked in High School i like where
1: Macbeth
2: This one that involved a hispanic little girl finding a baby and taking her in, I dont remember much but i know it left an impact.
Well here is something else i remember, we can only anylyze certain talking points and had to talk about those, and we couldn't come to a different conclusion then the teacher.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
I think the biggest problem from school reading is this.
You cant criticize the book, you are told you have to love it you have to think it is a master piece.

I think that comes down to your English teacher. I hated The Old Man and the Sea, and my teacher had no problem with that so long as I could explain what I didn't like about it... which I did. Scored top grades for a review that essentially boiled down to 'This could have been written by a 10-year-old'.


I've never understood the hate for a book just because you were forced to read it in school, though. I mean, I hated some of the books we did, but because they were crap, not because we were forced to read them. We also did a few books that I thoroughly enjoyed, like the Lord of the Flies (which I had already read a copy to tatters well before we did it in high school) and the Machine Gunners (which we did while I was in the middle of working my way through everything Robert Westall had ever written anyway).