Required Reading, or, "I bet this entry makes Fionnabhar mad."

[featherynscale]

triadruid's entry today with the bit about groups trying to ban required reading books with sexual content got me thinking about high school and the things that were on our required reading lists. I was trying to think of everything I read, and whether or not I have retained any of it, and generally sort of what good it might have done me in my life. I came to several conclusions, which were 1) that I received a fair portion of my sexual education from the required reading books, and 2) if the assigned books didn't contain some sort of deviant sexual practices, there really wouldn't have been much to catch the attention of a high school student anyway, so by choosing books with sexual content, teachers are increasing the chances that the students will actually read the books, and might, you know, accidentally learn something.

Now, conclusion #1 is what people are upset about, I know. This lobby represents the sort of people who don't want kids to have any sort of sexual education at all, because ignorant and pregnant at 14 is what god wants for sinner girls. But conclusion #2 is a lot more interesting to me. I'm thinking that, other than the Shakespeare plays and a few other notable exceptions from the HS required reading list, most of what I remember is the sex scenes, which means to me that in general, there wasn't a lot else to get excited about in the Lit'rachure.

To be fair, I also had a teacher one year who was very big on the idea of the Christ Figure, so, in addition to the nature of the deviant sex acts in each book, I could probably also tell you who the Christ Figure was. But really, except for Shakespeare, which I really liked for some reason, that's about it.

Comments

Where's the sex?

[lilia-blackbear.livejournal.com]

Upon reminiscing of my high school literature experience I have decided you had a far more interesting high school literature experience than I...

Thinking of the books I had to read...
The Lord of the Flies -- while it was a bunch of English private school boys alone on an island so it doesn't take much imagination on that one, but I don't recall any sex scenes...
The Oedipus trilogy... and while, sure, the plays wouldn't exist if not for sex, I am thankful none of the sex scenes are actually in the plays because, ooo, yuck...
Great Expectations -- now it has been years and years since I read that and I may have it wrong... But I do believe that while there is certainly lust, there is never an actual sex scene...
The many short stories of William Fuck-no... I mean, Faulkner... so boring... and I don't remember any sex, or maybe I might have liked him.
Beowulf -- don't get me wrong, I loved it. Swords and boasting and monster-dragons, oh my!... but alas, no sex.

I could go on and on, but I'll stop there.

Re: Where's the sex?

[saffronhare.livejournal.com]

Oh, but the sex is all metaphorical 'n shit. :)

Re: Where's the sex?

[celticwhistlin.livejournal.com]

The Lord of the Flies in Jr. High *AND* High School (like it wasn't boring enough the first time).

Crime and Punishment in AP english.

The Oedipus trilogy.

The Grapes of Wrath or Stupid Steinbeck (I hated that book and the movie)

Romeo and Juliet in my Freshman year (they made us act out different scenes by memeory and this an english class)

Flowers for Algernon (I think that's how you spell it)

Re: Where's the sex?

[fionnabhar.livejournal.com]

OMGWTF? If Lord of the Flies was boring, your teacher sucked ass. Good Gods, we've got respectable English schoolboys disintegrating into vicious little savages and the downfall of civiliztion as we know it!!!!!! How can somebody make that boring!

*headdesk*

There is definitely sex in R&J.

Re: Where's the sex?

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Piggy was the Christ Figure. (I liked Lord of the Flies, too.)

Re: Where's the sex?

[celticwhistlin.livejournal.com]

Yeah... but I don't really remember *reading* about the sex (and understanding that that is what that was). When we watched the movie, then yeah. We noticed.

As for LotF... Yeah. Our Jr. High sucked at that kind of stuff... it was all boring as hell when it shouldn't have been.

The only book I remember that really effected me when I was younger in school was Where the Red Fern Grows. I bawled and bawled at that... I can't stand the death of animals...

[fionnabhar.livejournal.com]

Not sure why I'm supposed to be mad and shit. In high school, any reason is a reason to read. There's time later for kids to notice the other stuff.

Hell, the sex bits were why I read Brave New World. In fact the first time I read it, I read the sex bits first and skipped over the other stuff.

Then again, I also took literature classes as electives in high school. I took a lot of Victorian literature, so that's not so sex-intensive, even though it sure wants to be. Science Fiction is where we scored most of the sex.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

I still remember two sex scenes from sci-fi books I read when I was ~12-13, even though I can't recall the titles anymore. Oh, and the book cover on one of them.

Of course, they weren't required reading, just for fun, but they were...formative

[matchgirl42.livejournal.com]

Oh yes. My first...uh...eye opener was Castle Roogna (http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&isbn=0345350480&itm=11), at 12 years old. Which albiet is in the fantasy genre, but the key thing here is that, although not assigned to me by a teacher, it was a book recommended to me by the school librarian. :)

[greektoomey.livejournal.com]

My 11th-grade English teacher was so fixated on the Christ Figure that my classmates and I would place bets on how long it would take her to mention the CF for each assigned novel.