What books did you read at school?

Macbeth
Z for Zachariah - I live in a valley very close to a nuclear power station and I imagine that my valley will be immune from a nuclear apocalypse.
And WW1 poetry - what passing bells etc etc.

Yes! It’s coming back to me now. I was 12 when I read it. And I remember think this boy is my age and the age everyone is allocated their roles and this is weird.

just remembered we read a lot of short stories from around the world. From a Russian who walked home in the snow with bad shoes, a Jamaican boy who played cricket. And one which really stayed with me a story about an Indian/ British girl who was in an unhappy arranged marriage. It was the ocr anthology at the time. And lots of WW1 poetry

For GCSE we did Romeo and Juliet and an anthology of short stories called Modern Short Stories in English - the only ones I remember are Araby from Dubliners; one by Hemingway which I hated as from memory it was he said, she said for endless dialogue (it put me off Hemingway for years, and I was so surprised how much I loved it him when I read him later) and that Doris Lessing one about the boy who swims through the narrow tunnel on holiday and thinks he is stuck which I also hated as it made me feel really panicky!

Others I remember reading (in no particular order):
Macbeth
Z for Zachariah
Apple Bough by Noel Streatfeild
Journey's End
To Kill a Mockingbird
Far From the Madding Crowd
The Crucible
Pygmalion

The only poem I can remember doing is The Thought Fox.

I hated reading books in class when everyone took turns to read aloud. I'm a pretty fast reader so I would always read ahead (and usually finish the book at home) so it was so boring!

I'm enjoying this thread. Brings back memories. I read a lot as a child

Yes I read read animal farm too. Thanks for the reminder. I'd forgotten

Maybe Google it. I googled it myself but they are several including the, tin drum, it's okay to be different, the lion inside, I am enough,
Wonder

I think GCSE was:
An Inspector Calls
To Kill a Mockingbird
Macbeth
Lord of the Flies
Poetry by Simon Armitage and Robert Browning

A Level was:
Macbeth (again)
The Great Gatsby
Wuthering Heights
The Bloody Chamber
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf
Poetry by Keats and Tennyson
The God of Small Things

GCSE: Of Mice and Men, War poetry, An Inspector Calls, Macbeth
A level: Jude the Obscure, The Rivals, A Winter’s Tale, The Color Purple

i enjoyed everything except The Rivals which I loathed.

The main character is Jonah.
All children are allocated their role at age 12.
Couples are arranged into marriages and they are only allowed two children - one boy, one girl which are born via surrogacy (so some girls are basically told at age 12 they are only good enough to be breeders).
This book has so much more of an effect on me reading it as an adult.

Oh yes I remember reading the long and the short and the tall at school. Thanks for the reminder

The ones I remember

Lord of the flies
Wind in the willows
The Chrysalis
The pearl
Of mice of men

Wish I could remember more but it was a very long time ago

I read it over 20 years ago so my memory of it is sketchy about age and things of the characters and things

Biff, Chip and Kipper was notoriously boring until they got to The Magic Key and started to have adventures. (I was reminded of this when I became a teacher and they were still using the same reading scheme!).

As I'd read the entire reading scheme, plus the extra ones, by Year 3/4, I was sent off to the school library by myself to choose something to read. I loved doing that!

I tended to like the books that we read at primary school, like Charlotte's Web, any of the Harry Potter books that were out at the time, and Goodnight Mister Tom.

At secondary school, it went from The Turbulent Term of Tyke Tyler and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas to Blood Brothers, Of Mice and Men, Pride and Prejudice, far too much Shakespeare (with Romeo and Juliet on repeat for three years solid), books that I've probably obliterated from my mind and some terrible poetry.

I am an avid reader in my free time, but even I had to have a break from reading anything after having to read many boring books and dissecting GCSE texts too many times. The fear of being put off reading for life was partly why I didn't choose to do English Literature at A-Level! I was annoyed that my friends at another school got to do their English Literature GCSE based on books that I'd read for fun in my free time...

The movie changed quite a lot apparently. Made the main character older and fans of the book generally don't like it (I've not seen it).
There's 3 more connected novels.
The 4th one called Son gives more insight into the community.

After a quick google it might well be… might put the movie on my watchlist to double check

English Lit O Level : The Pardoner's Tale by Chaucer, Macbeth and Jane Eyre. The only one I slightly enjoyed was tbe Chaucer and that was more because I was fascinated about how similar the English was to German. (German was my autistic special interest).

Other books/plays I can remember reading at school but not for external exams - Anne Frank's Diary, Fiddler on the roof, Animal Farm and Lord of the Flies.

For GCSE, Lord of the Flies and Romeo and Juliet.

At other points, I also read Holes and Macbeth and probably others I’ve forgotten.

Kes
Z For Zachariah
The Children Of Dynmouth
The Mayor Of Casterbridge
The Crucible
Robert Frost’s poetry
The Color Purple
Romeo And Juliet
are just a few I remember.

O and A level :
Rogue Male - Geoffrey Household
Henry V part 1
Othello
1984
A poetry book with war poems
Testament of Youth - Vera Britain
Schindler’s Ark - Thomas Keneally (film was Schindler’s List)
wife of bath - Chaucer

I can't remember all but To Sir With Love in yr 7(slightly scandalous) The Red Pony, Shane, The Solid Mandala by Patrick White and Emma in 6th form that almost put me off Austen forever. (Analyse the use of the seni colon in the Box Hill Incident)

Lord of the Flies
Wind in the Willows
The Day of the Triffids
Merchant of Venice
Romeo & Juliet
Midsummer Night's Dream
Of Mice and Men
Animal Farm
Alice in Wonderland

I'm pretty long in the tooth (61). We read some very odd stuff in the lower years of secondary school.
The Endless Steppe
Lady Precious Stream
Cranford - hated it at age 12 read it as an adult and realised it is a comedy.
David Copperfield's Boyhood - found it cloyingly sentimental, but read the whole book as an adult and loved it (the first wife still sticks in my craw)
For O level we read the war poets, Macbeth, The Browning Version, Pride and Prejudice, Brideshead Revisited.

@CrushingOnRubies was it The Giver by Lois Lowry you read in Year 7?
I read it as a teenager and a lot went over my head.
I re-read it as an adult and I was amazed by it. Some children's books are wasted on children 😂

GCSE - the ones I can remember are Macbeth, Twelfth Night, The Telltale Heart, To Kill A Mockingbird

A Level - loads and loads but ones I can remember are The Color Purple, Hamlet, the war poets, Philip Larkin, Doctor Faustus, William Blake, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, Birdsong, The Handmaids Tale

year 7- can’t remember the title but it was about this society where the elders basically decided your life. Bright people were medics or teachers. And the not so bright bred children. All got the same meal delivered. And it was about this lad who tried to break the mold.

year 8 - Adrian Mole 13 3/4
year 9 Animal farm - we were also doing communism in history so went with the theme.
year 10 - old man and the sea( bloody hell that’s a dull book) and Jane Eyre - felt I should like it but didn’t