English Degree - liar or just 'clever'?

[Lavalump]

I was talking to someone the other day and she said she knew a girl who had gotten her English Literature degree and yet claims she never read the books on the reading list.

Is this actually possible? Initially, I thought not but then maybe she read York Notes, watch films, read summaries and synopsis, old essays etc.

Or is she just lying?

TheyWentToSeaInASieve
Same situation different language.
I once had to read the draft of a master's thesis and found 24 language mistakes on the first few pages. It had an argument based on a passage in a book that clearly showed the writer didn't stop to turn the page and lacked basic cultural knowledge.
After that I had to listen to DH rant about shoddy "feely" science and bad work ethics. That was fun!

I've an English degree and had to read/ translate Anglo Saxon how can you waffle that? I think a lot of people waffle about SOME books but no it's not possible.

I have a 2:1 in English (pre-internet days) and am rather proud to have never opened a York notes! I did a lot of reading, but enjoyed it too. War and Peace, Clarissa, most of Shakespeare’s plays, the Greek epics and the entire works of Jane Austen are particular notches on my ahem, library ladder.

However, there were definitely some books where I skimmed sections, or would read some literary criticism instead if I was already familiar with the genre. I only read books 1 and 2 of The Faerie Queene and I have barely read any Dickens as I just don’t like him!

I've got an English degree and the list of books we got sent in 3rd year for summer reading would have been well over 100 every module included.

I an avid reader and even I didn't have enough time to complete everything maybe to 90%

Other people chose to focus on a few books and found themselves waffling through tutorials

One lad fancied himself a good blagger but embarrassed himself by holding forth about a book he hadn't read a number of times

When someone says "I didn't read the books" that translates to me as "I read the absolute bare minimum required in order to write essays and pass exams"

I actually did complete Middlemarch and it is brilliant and totally worth it

Never managed to finish Ulysses

I wrote an essay in my Finals on a book I had never read.

@Shalom23 our Anglo Saxon module also included complex Icelandic sagas. Many poorer students didn't take it purely because they couldn't blag it.

One of my Eng Lit modules was all film, that made a change from trying to get through up to three really dense texts per week. Some of them I had already studied at school, or read because they're classics, some of them I had to skip or I never would have managed to complete the work for the other half of my joint honours - French Lit - same again but three novels/plays/films per week in a foreign language. Although I did cheat and read a few of them in translation or watch a film adaptation when I was really pushed for time.

I went to Oxford with someone who said they never completed the reading list for their English lit degree and got a 2:1.

I teach English Lit and I've never 'finished' the reading list for my Cambridge undergrad degree. For the very good reason that it wasn't intended to be finished!

I know all Lit students think it's very clever to claim they never did the reading, and it is a bit of a cliche. But many universities issue reading lists that were never intended to be read in their entirety.

A at A level Eng. Lit. and 2:1 in my degree. Read most of the books but swerved Dickens both times! You could normally get away with not reading a couple as you didn't need knowledge of all of them to do well in the essay and the exam.

Not lying. I did the same.

Perfectly doable. I got a good English degree but was only really passionate about poetry and, to a lesser extent, linguistics. When it came to the novels I speed read, dipped in and out, referenced York Notes, watched various films and took extensive notes in lectures. But actually carefully reading my way through each and every chapter? Nope, not necessary.

I've got a degree in English Literature, and agree that you could definitely get away with this, like I did when I wrote that essay on Ivanhoe!

I remember a lecture once when a student disagreed with the lecturer's claim that Fagin from Oliver Twist was portrayed as a grotesque villain. Student was saying " but he's not completely bad though," and the lecturer was being very kind not to embarrass him by pointing out that the film Oliver! doesn't follow the book Oliver Twist all that faithfully . . .