Friday, May 14, 2010

Required Reading for Local Schools

I was in a Border Books store in Georgia today. I noticed two racks with signs that said "Required Reading for Local Schools" Worrying about what kind of leftist pap I would find, I took a look. I was pleasantly surprised. While there are certainly some books there that I don't know (I should) there are many that I do. The list included two Ayn Rand titles, as well as the important classics 1984 and Fahrenheit 451. Huck Finn, Gatsby, and All Quiet on the Western Front are still there. While I may be disappointed once I read the books that have been added over the last 30 years, this is an American Reading List. If kids are reading, Atlas Shrugged, 1984, and Fahrenheit 451, there is hope for us yet.

What books are the kids in your part of the country getting?

Here are the photos and the almost complete lists... some I couldn't remember the titles or read them on the photos.



Confederacy of Dunces
Of Mice and Men
Life of Pi
Brave New World
The Crucible
Catcher in the Rye
1984
To Kill a Mockingbird
The Poisonwood Bible
Streetcar Named Desire
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Their Eyes Were Watching God
A Clockwork Orange
Watership Down
Tom Sawyer
The Joy Luck Club
Slaughterhouse Five
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Pride and Prejudice
The Awakening
?
Ender's Game
The Hobbit
The Count of Monte Crist
The Great Gatsby
The House on Mango Street
The Bridge at San Luis Rey
Catch-22
Fahrenheit 451
Time Machine


Princess Bride
As I Lay Dying
The Color Purple
A Lesson Before Dying
Invisible Man (Ellison)
Foucault's Pendulum
The Fountainhead
Atlas Shrugged
The Bell Jar
Lolita
?
Flowers for Algernon
Ishmael
The Bluest Eys
Beloved
Moby Dick
?
How to Read Literature Like a Professor
Grapes of Wrath?
The Jungle
All Quiet on the Western Front
?
?
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Hamlet
MacBeth
Julius Caesar
Romeo and Juliet


(Disclaimer: The book racks were too tall to capture them in one shot, so I have merged two photos to show the full rack)

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Off the top of my head:

Eat The Rich. -O'Rourke

The Road to Serfdom. -Hayek

Economics in One Lesson. -Hazlitt

Diamond Age. -Stephenson

Moneyball. -Lewis

Modern Times. -Johnson

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. -Heinlein

?

May 28, 2010, 3:56:00 PM  

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