I may be one of a very small group of people that enjoyed Lord of the Flies.

1984 - George Orwell
Cat's Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut
The Lion, the Witch, and The Wardrobe - C.S. Lewis
Jonathon Livingston Seagull - Richard Bach
Hamlet
Jane Eyre (which I did not like when forced to read it in school, but enjoyed many times afterward)

Reading Jonathon Swift's A Modest Proposal warped me early on.

Did anyone read The Pigman in school? That was a great one.

In regards to The Merchant of Venice while Shylock is portrayed in a negative way he is also the one who says the famous "if you prick us do we not bleed" speech. I think this shows that while Shakespeare knew his audience he was also trying to open them up a bit as well.

Hm. I didn't find him stereotypical. But it's been a while since I read it. He might have been emotional but he was intelligent and eloquent and stately. Certainly not what I would consider stereotypical of a person of color.

Hm, but he did show Othello in a stereotypical way. It was the dark man and his brute passions, remember? Prone to violence, etc.,

I haven't read Merchant of Venice but I don't think that he's racist because he didn't show Othello in a stereotypical way. Actually Iago was portrayed as the real beast IMHO. I don't doubt that his work reflected the attitudes of his times. The fact that many of his works are outside of England shows that he did have an open mind about other cultures and wasn't a xenophobe. I may not know enough about Shakespeare to really say though.

It's in a lot of his stuff, The Merchant of Venice being one of them, so he's either one or the other, LOL. I wouldn't have a hard time believing him a racist considering his setting.

I didn't understand The Tempest at all. When we talked about it, the lightbulb came on. I was like, That's cool!

He also has very interesting insight into racism and colonialism in The Tempest. I read this in a class that was focused only on Shakespeare though so I'm not sure I would have been able to get the same things out of it on my own.

My thoughts is he was commenting on racism. And also how a strong, capable person can be destroyed by the weaknesses in their personality. I'm not a literature critic type but that's what I got out of the play. I can't see Shakespeare as a bigot.

I didn't really know what to think about Othello. Either he was commenting on racism or he was just racist, LOL.

NU and Lisa Anne, you sound very cynical about Romeo and Juliet, but you're probably right. I thought it was horribly silly. Oddly enough, Othello moved me more than Romeo and Juliet. I do believe that Othello loved Desdemona but he was driven mad by Iago's sly insinuations and his own insecurities.

new_user wrote: "LOL, the funny thing is that it's not really ideal at all. xD Romeo was pretty fickle and a little shallow. "Oh, Rosaline! Why have thou forsake-- oh, damn, who's that?""

Exactly!! And the balcony scene wasn't exactly a getting to know you conversation. If they hadn't killed themselves they probably would have been looking for a divorce.

LOL, the funny thing is that it's not really ideal at all. xD Romeo was pretty fickle and a little shallow. "Oh, Rosaline! Why have thou forsake-- oh, damn, who's that?"

In high school and junior high we had to read quite a bit of Edgar Allan Poe and he definitely sticks with you. He gets you to feel almost in tune with such dark characters. Plus I think the length of his stuff is great for a teenagers attention span.

Romeo and Juliet I liked once I took a Shakespeare class and really delved into the story. However, what I really don't like is what others do with the story, making it seem like this wonderfully ideal love story, if only they hadn't died in the end.

Exactly. :) Though not without her own flaws, Hester definitely had some heroic points.

new_user wrote: "LOL, Danielle, those aren't pulpy! Those are classics. I love those.

I wouldn't really see Scarlet Letter as sexist. The only evidence I could see to support that argument would be that Hester was..."

That's how I see Hawthorne. Also he showed Hester as the one unafraid to stand up against the hypocrisy of her society and how woman are demonized for the same 'sins' that are ignored in men.

LOL, Danielle, those aren't pulpy! Those are classics. I love those.

I wouldn't really see Scarlet Letter as sexist. The only evidence I could see to support that argument would be that Hester was the seducer instead of the reverse-- and even that you can interpret as Hawthorne simply flipping a popular device, as he very much liked to do (e.g. in the introduction, US symbol of the eagle; Hawthorne replaces the olive branch with bolts of lightning and arrows). You can see why he was so ahead of his time.

In fact, I think Hawthorne is more empowering than many authors of his time. He made Hester a passionate woman and exalted her for it, when decades later in real time, society still didn't believe women should have any passion in any sense.

/rant xD

I liked all the pulpy type stuff that was supernatural such as Edgar Allen Poe, Hawthorne, The Most Dangerous Game, The Lady or the Tiger, etc.

I love The Scarlet Letter. I thought it was brilliant. (I guess some think it's sexist but I think it was very pro-woman in its message).

I loved and still love To Kill a Mockingbird. I wanted to marry and/or have Atticus Finch as my dad. I love Shakespeare but I have trouble understanding it if I read it without help from an instructor (I can be honest about my shortcomings. :) I didn't get The Tempest until we discussed it in class and then I loved it. I understood Othello very well and it was very effective though tragic. I didn't like Romeo and Juliet much. I love to watch dramatizations of Taming of the Shrew.

I think Fitzgerald's Great Gatsby was already mentioned, but I read it my sophomore year of high school, and loved it, while everyone I knew hated it.

Others that I loved were The woman Warrior , which I read both for Highschool and college, and being first generation American, I could really connect to, Emma, in my last year of high school (and okay, it wasn't until after I found out Clueless was based on it, that I gave it a chance) Family by Pa Chin which I read in college and Ender's Game which my sister had to read for highschool english when she was a freshmen, and loved it so much, she said I absolutely had to read it. Which I did, and then followed it with the rest of the series.

I really enjoyed reading Roald Dahl in grade school. One of our teachers read The BFG, which I remember liking, but don't remember all the plot points anymore. My favorite by him wasn't actually a school read, but is wonderful none the less, Matilda. However, I remember not caring for James and the Giant Peach when it was read to us in class, but maybe I missed something.

new_user, my son loves Roald Dahl and I really enjoy reading the books with him. He created wonderful stories and his books are timeless.

Oh, Roald Dahl is awesome. I still think he has a wonderful imagination. It's great that kids have books like his to capture their imaginations.

This is the only book that I really remember reading in Middle School Across Five Aprils

Of Human Bondage, The Sound and the Fury, Childhood's End, BRave NEw World

Macbeth was fun, mostly because the teacher would assign us parts to read out loud during class. Then we would discuss the culture and language. My classmates and teachers made it fun.

I was obsessed with Wuthering Heights and Romeo and Juliet. I also read anything by Judy Blume, Paula Danziger and Roald Dahl (Primary School). My favourite books were Easy Connections, Easy Freedom and Mel by Liz Berry.

I liked: Wuthering Heights, Macbeth, King Lear The Merchant of Venice and F. Scott Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby

I found her second book much more powerful, Joy, although I warn you, be prepared for depression, LOL.

I really enjoyed To Kill a Mockingbird, & Island of the Blue Dolphins.

The Outsiders was okay...

I also really enjoyed The Things They Carried, which I didn't expect to like at all.

I enjoyed Wuthering Heights also. It wasn't a mandatory read but I read it in junior high as a book report and I remember my teacher thinking I was crazy to be reading a book like that.

I didn't fully appreciate Shakespeare until college, where I had to take a whole course on him. Now I think he's brilliant. I really like Twelfth Night, Hamlet(except I got a little Hamletted out when I had to do an editing project on it) and The Tempest

I did read 'That was Then, This is Now' very good, but very sad.

The Giver, The Outsiders, for sure. Did you ever read That Was Then, This Is Now? It was so sad. Also, Shane. Classic. Shane is very much a hero.

I also liked Wuthering Heights and The Scarlet Letter.

From high school the two that stand out the most are:
Wuthering Heights
Sophie's World

The only time I truly had required reading was in high school, we had a few in middle but they aren't worth mentioning.

I think the only book I actually enjoyed reading in High School was Hamlet.

One that sticks out from High School is A Tale of Two Cities

And in Junior High I really enjoyed The Giver and The Outsiders