What lit did you love (and hate) in English class?

quickbeam

So, when you were in school and had to do poetry, plays, short stories, novels, etc. which ones did you love and which ones did you hate?

Loved:

Wuthering Heights

Romeo & Juliet

Lord of the Flies

"The Listeners" - Walter dela Mare

"The Lady of Shallot" - Tennyson

Liked most of the poetry by John Donne and GM Hopkins too. I can still recite off Pied Beauty and The Windhover from memory and the line: "when thou hast done thou hast not done, for I have more," sticks in the mind too.

The story about how roast pork was discovered - where a Chinese guy (I think) burned down the house which contained the pigs and they discovered they actually tasted nice


Hated

Silas Marner
Great Expectations
King Lear
Most of the Irish poets
The Great Gatsby


Anybody else got favourites and least favourites?

simu

Lord of the Flies
WB Yeats
Thomas Kinsella
Juno & the Paycock


Silas Marner

John

Over the years in school I really enjoyed Of Mice and Men, The Merchant of Venice, Macbeth, Hamlet, Remains of the Day and Antigone. The poetry of Siegfried Sassoon, Seamus Heaney, Michael Longley, Philip Larkin and Emily Dickinson also really got my motor running. On the other hand the book Reading in the Dark made me want to chew my own eyes out and the poetry of Evan Boland and Elizabeth Bishop was absolute pants. Pants I say.

arbeitsscheuer

Seems like a long time ago now, but course twas only 3 years for me!

Em... Enjoyed To Kill A Mockingbird, For Whom the Bell Tolls, Lord of the Flies, all the Shakespeare (I'm quite the fan), loved poetry of Sassoon, Yeats, Owen, Mahon, etc...

Hated Heaney, Boland, Plath (really really hated her), Emily Dickinson, The Great Gatsby (never even liked the film either).

There's probably more but I can't recall much else at the mo.

YeAh!

Loved: Romeo + Juliet, Emily Dickinson's poetry, Strictly Ballroom

Hated: Wordsworth, Literary Genre of Comparative Study.

arbeitsscheuer

YeAh! wrote:

Loved: Romeo + Juliet, Emily Dickinson's poetry, Strictly Ballroom
Hated: Wordsworth, Literary Genre of Comparative Study.

Strictly Ballroom?
You jammy b*stards, we never got to do that one... Maw.:(

John

We did Cinema Paradiso. I forgot all about the film part of the course. Cinema Paradiso was a wonderful film and one of very few movies I've seen that get better with each subsequent viewing.

melekalikimaka

i think i did strictly ballroom and cinema paradiso, both good stuff, i liked the directors cut, toto getting it on with the hooker on the floor of the cinema

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Despised - to the very pit of my stomach - (sorry OP) Wuthering Heights.

Liked King Lear, Lord of the flies, but didn't do it during secondary school (friend did it).

Hated - the fact that we did ONLY one novel (mentioned above) and ONE Shakespear play in two years. Instead of a variety of riches, the overkill killed off any interest I had in literature for about six years after I finished second level education and part of me is still very bitter about that.

John

melekalikimaka wrote:

i think i did strictly ballroom and cinema paradiso, both good stuff, i liked the directors cut, toto getting it on with the hooker on the floor of the cinema

Director's cut? We only had the original cut. I didn't know there was a director's cut.

Bodhidharma

Loved - Shakespere, Animal Farm, Longley, Yeats, Heaney, Plath, Larkin

Hated - Dancing at Lughnasa, Playboy of the Western World, Dickenson

Merrick

Loved - Hamlet, Dickinson

Hated - Amongst Women, Strictly Ballroom (grrr...), Playboy of the Western World

GerryRyan

Loved: Room With A View / Old Man And The Sea / Death of a Salesman

Hated: Silas Marner / Macbeth

meldrew

Loved Animal Farm , The Rhyme of The Ancient Mariner
Hated Wuthering Heights

Time Magazine

Loved: The A1 at the end of it all , Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, To Kill a Mockingbird, Playboy of the Western World, Of Mice and Men, 'A Disused Shed in County Wexford', Derek Mahon, Emily Dickinson, Sylvia Plath, Seamus Heaney.

Hated: Wuthering Heights.

John

Angry Banana wrote:

Loved: The A1 at the end of it all

I could have had an A1 but I left paper 2 after 45 minutes so I had to make do with the A2

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Angry Banana wrote:

Loved: The A1 at the end of it all , Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, To Kill a Mockingbird, Playboy of the Western World, Of Mice and Men, 'A Disused Shed in County Wexford', Derek Mahon, Emily Dickinson, Sylvia Plath, Seamus Heaney.

Hated: Wuthering Heights.

[QUOTE=Angry Banana
Loved: The A1 at the end of it all [/QUOTE]

Some people have waaay too much free time...!

Blush_01

Loved most stuff, including Derek Mahon. I hate poetry as a rule, but I want his babies.

Hated: Amongst Women, The Plough and the Stars, Heaney, Wordsworth etc.

Merrick

John2 wrote:

I could have had an A1 but I left paper 2 after 45 minutes so I had to make do with the A2

Hee hee, I ended up with an A2 as well
Not sure how, but I managed

I have remembered another hate: Yeats.

Valmont

John2 wrote:

the poetry of Evan Boland was absolute pants. Pants I say.

Soooooo god awful, it almost ruined my leaving cert experience.

funky penguin

Hopkins will always be my favourite, but I never had as much fun as I did watching Strictly Ballroom. What a great film. Also loved Antigone, Macbeth, Frost to name but a few.

I disliked having to study Plath, but I recognise her brilliance as a poet....If that makes sense. "The Grass is Singing" by Doris Lessing was one of the most tortuous periods in school I had. I despised it.

I didn't mind Heaney, but I could never seem to write good essays on his poetry. Ah well.

Earthhorse

Loved: Macbeth

Hated: Hard Times (For These Times) by Charles Dickens

"I have never been one to call a post a pump nor a post a pump."

Yeah, have you not? Well shut the f*ck up about it then.

Dades

Loved: The Great Gatsby, Death of a Salesman, Lord of the Flies, Huck Finn

Hated: Waiting for Godot, poetry in general...

arctic lemur

I loved the Merchant of Venice and Silas Marner.

I disliked poetry.

emeraldstar

Loved: Plough and the Stars, Heaney, Plath, Bishop, Wuthering Heights, Romeo and Juliet, Strictly Ballroom (didn't study this for the LC but did it in 4th year)

Hated: A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man, Yeats, Cal

bringitdown

Loved: Hamlet, Death of a Salesman, Animal Farm
Hated Hated Hated: Emma

nollaig

Would have loved to done Playboy in the leaving. Thats a great great play.

Loved doing My Left Foot, for the film.

Hated Death of a Salesman! Pure & Utter ****e, nothing else!

Did Hamlet too. Enjoyed that but did **** in that question on the exam.

Things Fall Apart was a decent enough novel though, enjoyed that a lot.

The Field, for JC was good too.

Anything but Death of a Salesman

r3nu4l

Loved:
A Portrait of the Artist as a young man - Great read
Julius Ceaser - I think I liked this because Brother Byrne, aka Chad , (my teacher) explained it all so well.

Hated
Hamlet - My teacher didn't put in much of an effort and let us struggle through it
Playboy of the Western World - Interesting story but just couldn't warm to it

Why was there no Oscar Wilde? Was it because young minds might be corrupted by a gay author? His stuff is hilarious and very well written.

John

r3nu4l wrote:

Why was there no Oscar Wilde? Was it because young minds might be corrupted by a gay author?

Yes that's exactly why he's not put on the course and Shakespeare and Elizabeth Bishop were put on the course. :rolleyes:

r3nu4l

Yes but Oscar Wilde was a gay Irishman :eek: so I could see the Church saying "Down with this sort of thing!", "Careful now".

So why do you think he's not on the course then?

da_deadman

I really enjoyed 'Macbeth', 'The Merchant of Venice', 'Machine Gunners', 'To Kill a Mockingbird' and 'Philadelphia Here I Come'.

Didn't really like anyof the poetry, probably because I just couldn't get my head around it at all, but I have since read and enjoyed a lot of Yeats poems.

Also didn't like 'Hard Times', and this wasn't helped by my teacher doing accents for the characters when she was reading excerpts. It was quite annoying.

I also think Oscar Wilde could be put on the syllabus, it's very enjoyable (and good) stuff.

John

r3nu4l wrote:

Yes but Oscar Wilde was a gay Irishman :eek: so I could see the Church saying "Down with this sort of thing!", "Careful now".

The church don't set the papers though, this isn't 1956. I don't know why he's on the course, you'd have to contact the department.

MrJones

liked othello, merchant of venice, juno and the peacock. silas marner was ok.

cinnamon

nollaig wrote:

Hated Death of a Salesman! Pure & Utter ****e, nothing else!

Death of a Salesman is a work of genius.
I don't think you 'got' what the play was about. I absolutely love it - the symbolism, the characterisation, the attack on capitalism.
I think you just need to peel back the layers and don't take it at face value

John

cinnamon wrote:

Death of a Salesman is a work of genius.
I don't think you 'got' what the play was about. I absolutely love it - the symbolism, the characterisation, the attack on capitalism.
I think you just need to peel back the layers and don't take it at face value

Don't assume that because someone doesn't like a piece of art that they don't understand it.

cinnamon

John2 wrote:

Don't assume that because someone doesn't like a piece of art that they don't understand it.

I am assuming by calling a book (in this case a play) "utter sh!te" means they didnt give it much time. It's fine to dislike a piece of art, but you can't write "utter sh!te" on an exam paper! I need more of an argument than that!

I was merely trying to enlighten the reader to the play's virtue.

r3nu4l

How about 'total and utter sh!te'?

NAh, only kidding, liked Death of a Salesman myself but didn't do it in school so didn't mention it previously.

Faerie

Well it was just last week so it shouldn't be too hard to remember!
Loved: Lear, Plath, Eliot, Pride and Prejudice, Goodnight Mr Tom.
Liked: The Field & Sive, Longley
Hated: Yeats, Juno and the paycock, Big Maggie, The Country Girls, Of Mice and Men

I think there's way too much emphasis on having to do IRISH writers.

NADA

John2 wrote:

Yes that's exactly why he's not put on the course and Shakespeare and Elizabeth Bishop were put on the course. :rolleyes:

Liked:

• Juno and the Paycock
• Of Mice and Men
• The Field

Detested:

• King Lear
• How Many Miles to Babylon
• Plath
• Bishop
• Longley
• Yeats
• Donne

You know I check the Leaving Cert Sylabus on and off and decide not to buy anything listed on it ever. They really took the joy out of reading in my school days. Not out of school long though. Actually not finished the LEaving until monday. That's in 3 days. lol

matrim

Loved
Hamlet
Dickenson (although my teacher didn't really do her poetry)
Goodnight mr Tom

Hated
Words cannot describe how much I hated Emma.
I burned that book after I had finished school.

is_that_so

Loved

Hamlet(Shakespeare in general)
Old Man and the Sea
Animal Farm
Lord of The Flies
Playboy


Hated

Lord Jim

odhran

I loved Hamlet, The Merchant Of Venice, and the poetry of Eliot and Plath. I hated pretty much everything else: The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn, Amongst Women, Juno And The Paycock, Yeats, Boland, Wordsworth and (especially) Kavanagh. The A1 at the end of it all did make it all seem more bearable though

theCzar

is_that_so wrote:

Loved

Hamlet(Shakespeare in general)
Old Man and the Sea
Animal Farm
Lord of The Flies
Playboy


Hated

Lord Jim

Jesus! what a ****ing great set of books for course work! And that's presuming playboy was of the western world variety :eek:

I liked Great Expectations, Lord of the Flies and Death of a Salesman, hated King Lear which I thought was a pile of crap and has left me eternally put off shakespeare.

MrJones

old man and the sea...was it made into a film,,the old man who catches the whale but the effort ends up killing him??

is_that_so wrote:

Loved

Hamlet(Shakespeare in general)
Old Man and the Sea
Animal Farm
Lord of The Flies
Playboy


Hated

Lord Jim

MrJones

great expectations is a great book. i read it myself in my spare time.

theCzar wrote:

Jesus! what a ****ing great set of books for course work! And that's presuming playboy was of the western world variety :eek:

I liked Great Expectations, Lord of the Flies and Death of a Salesman, hated King Lear which I thought was a pile of crap and has left me eternally put off shakespeare.

theCzar

MrJones wrote:

old man and the sea...was it made into a film,,the old man who catches the whale but the effort ends up killing him??

wanna lash spoiler tags around that spoiler?

Pet

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings
Cat's Eye
Macbeth
Sylvia Plath (pfffh! to all you haters!)
Emily Dickinson
On the Waterfront
Derek Mahon

</3
Amongst Women (moany, depressing, boring 1960s Catholic Ireland ****e)
Seamus Heaney (yawn)
PATRICK KAVANAGH (whingy, annoying, uninspired drivel from a dirty undersexed old pervert)


Oh, and speaking in more abstract terms, the single biggest irritation of mine was the tendency of some of my classmates to "learn essays" and notes off by heart, instead of actually engaging with the texts. I mean - why bother? They were just making a complete chore out of something which should have been (and was, for me) enjoyable.

I did better than them all anyway, so it all worked out well in the end.

nando

Loved
Romeo&Juliet, Hamlet, To Kill a Mockingbird, Goodnight Mr. Tom, Philadelphia Here I Come, How Many Miles to Babylon?, Emma, The Remains of the Day, Dances With Wolves, Dickinson, Boland, Shakespeare's sonnets.

Hated
The Grass is Singing, Elizabeth Bishop, Keats

Dagnir Glaurung

Loved:
A Doll's House
Great Expectations
Pride and Prejudice
To Kill A Mockingbird
King Lear
T.S. Eliot
G.M. Hopkins

Hated:
I can't remember really disliking anything. Maybe Longley. He bored me a bit.

Tobias Greeshman

Loved:
Hamlet
Emma
Lord of the flies
The great gatsby
Yeats
Kavanagh
Shelley
Keats
T.S. Eliot

Hated:
John Donne
George Herbert