The worst books (or movies or plays or whatever) that they made you read or watch in grade school

[ninjaRiv]

Fucking Shakespeare and Stoker's Dracula, man. It was so boring. I understand that the guys are very influential but there have been better and more relevant writers since then. I'd love it if they started teaching Philip K. Dick or something. If they had that when I was at school, I would have paid more attention.

 

[BrotherRool]

Pride and Prejudice is one of my favourite all time books.

Probably Romeo and Juliet for me. The only decent character (Benvolio) just doesn't show up for the second half. At all. For no reason. Actually Mercutio was pretty cool too but why am I doing this again? I get that Romeo's meant to be a lovestruck teen but I just don't think what happened to him was very interesting.

Also, I'd have probably appreciated it more if it was read out loud and I do understand that its nice to have pretty sounding language, but it does get in the way of parsing it properly as well. To me it's like I'm reading the book in German (which I technically speak). I can understand it, but I have to concentrate on understanding which means I'm not concentrating on whats actually happening. Its just a shame we can't have pretty language that enhances the understanding of the text. Romeo and Juliet is a symphony under water

EDIT: But oh wait a sec 'I bite my thumb at you! Do you bite your thumb at me sir?' ... that stuff almost made it worth reading

 

[shrekfan246]

Hey, I get to be controversial for once!

The Odyssey.

Now, I know it's a fine story in itself and everything, but trying to read through that is the most tedious slog of transcription I've ever had to attempt muscling through before.

Also, Nathaniel Hawthorne's The House of the Seven Gables. Again, it's not even that it's a bad story, but Hawthorne's writing is just so bland and plodding that he managed to make an interesting story boring.

I agree, Homer (or perhaps his translator) has this really weird tendancy to interupt himself in the middle of something important to start describing a certain city that we never see, or some historical event, or some legend about some irrelevant spear that never gets used, or (I'm serious) spending like 3 pages describing a scene depicted on some guy's shield.

Won't even lie, The Odyssey is one of the few things during school I couldn't complete. Not that my teachers would've ever noticed since I got perfect scores on all of the tests regardless, but...

It was just so overblown. I'm not one to shy away from expansive descriptions or loquacious dialogue, but The Odyssey just couldn't keep me interested.

That's largely the same reason why I didn't really like Tolkien's writing as well; He'd just go off on some random nonsequiter about some song the elves were singing or what the ents did last Tuesday or why Boromir was a fan of KISS or where Sauraman kept his wallet in that robe of his or whatever. Lord of the Rings is one of the few cases where I think the movies turned out better than the books they were based on simply because they had to cut out all the superfluous crap that didn't add anything.

It's one reason I prefer The Hobbit, to be honest. It's a much neater book, as far as the narrative structure is concerned. I have to re-read the trilogy still, actually...

 

[Judgement101]

The Chronicles of A Death Fortold

200 pages
over 20 characters
WHY?!

 

[doomspore98]

Great Expectation by Charles Dickens

FUCK THAT BOOK

He goes on and on like he loves the sound of his pen touching paper to spew out more mindless drivel that is boring, melodramatic and inconsequential. It made me want to ram my head into a wall. Not a book for 14 year olds.

I agree with you. I had to read it last year and it was just so boring. I usually like dickens, but with this one it felt like it would just go on and on forever.

 

[hazabaza1]

Romeo and Juliet the modern remake.
OHGOD SO BAD

 

[You Can't Take the Sky From Me]

Worst thing I ever had to read is 'The Catcher in The Rye'.
200 pages of some whiny **** bitching about how life is full of "phonies" and how he still hasn't gotten over the death of his brother. Hoo-fucking-rah!

Absolutely, I came here to say exactly that... I really, really, hated that book and my teacher, who would not stop going on about how "great" it was...

 

[amara2021]

The Stranger, Death of a Salesman, The Metamorphosis, and Lord of the Flies.

Dear god it's hard enough now for me to care about existentialist drivel. The Road and Hamlet at least presented it in an interesting way that made you actually think about it, while these books just carried on in the most listless way possible making it easy for a teenager to miss "the point".

I don't remember much about why I hated Lord of the Flies, but I remember my entire English class refusing to finish it on principle.

 

[kevinsux909]

Well, in year 10 (if you're American, that's the second year of High School), we were made to watch the film I am Sam for Health class. Two hours twelve minutes of Sean Penn playing a mentally disabled person. To this day, I'm still not sure why we were made to see it when Health class was only sex ed and speeches about drugs.

 

[Extra-Ordinary]

Great Expectation by Charles Dickens

FUCK THAT BOOK

He goes on and on like he loves the sound of his pen touching paper to spew out more mindless drivel that is boring, melodramatic and inconsequential. It made me want to ram my head into a wall. Not a book for 14 year olds.

Oh, I had to watch the freaking MOVIE.
Now here's the thing, I'm a goody two-shoes who will pay attention even when NOTHING is going on in class,
that movie put me to sleep.

 

[krugerrand123]

Probably Macbeth, I just found it very dull, as the characters were not engaging to me. I could also guess most of what happens without even glancing at it once.

 

[mitchell271]

David Copperfield. Fuck. That. The story itself is good but since Dickens was paid by the word it's padded like his life... well his life did depend on it. It could have easily been a third of the length, but instead it's an 800 page slog. Also, it's one of the most depressing things I've had to read for school, and I read Brave New World, The Handmaid's Tail and Lord of the motherfucking Flies. I hate that last one as well just because we had to analyse it.

 

[Terminate421]

Fuck this book:

Fuck this book
Fuck this book
Fuck this book

This is the worst book I have ever read. I don't care if my Lit teacher loves it and finds it a work of art. I said in my final essay that it was in fact the shittiest book ever written. Everything about this book I found unejoyable. Seriously, FUCK. THIS. BOOK.

Cliche, boring, and overall just unenjoyable.

Fuck this book.

 

[mitchell271]

Well, in year 10 (if you're American, that's the second year of High School), we were made to watch the film I am Sam for Health class. Two hours twelve minutes of Sean Penn playing a mentally disabled person. To this day, I'm still not sure why we were made to see it when Health class was only sex ed and speeches about drugs.

Lucky you. We had to watch The Miracle of Life. Very boring, very drawn out and then, without warning, there's a live birth. I start getting the Chiyo-just-rode-in-Yukari's-car shakes just from thinking about it.

 

[Marter]

For what possible reason. Was it a matter of "This, don't ever do this."? Or did someone at your school actually think something could be learned from that?

If I'm remembering correctly (which I probably am not), we were studying communities at the time. Ones that exist in real life, and also dystopias and utopias.

The Village was meant to illustrate something in regards to that, although looking back I honestly can't think of what.

 

[i64ever]

Old Man and the Sea

We get it. He's almost an invalid, and its a big fish. Never tried to read Hemingway again.

 

[ohnoitsabear]

There are very few books I had to read in school that didn't like, or wasn't indifferent to. However, there is one that really sticks out. I had to read a book called Johnny Tremain in middle school. Basically, it's a piece of historical fiction about an apprentice silversmith living in Boston right before the American Revolution. It sucked so fucking much.

The book heavily romanticized the events and historical figures of the time to the point where it feels like an "America, Fuck Yeah!" wank fest. The title character gets inserted into just about every event of importance in unrealistic and unbelievable ways that make it seem like he was only put there so the character would have any shred of significance. Finally, the book just plain makes up so much shit that I'm frankly surprised that we were allowed to read it in school. Basically every single misconception of what happened in Boston right before the American Revolution is not only present, but also expanded into pure ridiculousness.

Maybe I'm just misremembering a little, or maybe I just hate historical fiction, but this book did not even remotely resemble what anybody could call "good".