Literature students!

I thought I'd make a thread for this subject since I'm sure a lot of us have studied Literature at some point in our lives or indeed are planning to do so in the future. By 'Literature' I just mean anything really; English Literature, World Literature, Comparative Literature, whatever you happen to have studied.

Personally, it's always been my favourite subject and I'm currently studying it at university, in two forms really; I do English Literature and Spanish (which involves studying Literature in Spanish, something I haven't done much of before). It's pretty difficult, but rewarding at the same time.

So, what about everyone else?
Feel free to chat about what books you're doing or have done, what you like/hate about Literature, essay tips or anything related to your studies.

Oh, and I deliberately didn't include a definition of what 'Literature' is since I don't believe an accurate one exists - but that's another interesting question. What does 'Literature' mean to you?

I'm doing AS Level English Literature at the moment, and I love it so far.

xD We're doing a collection of poems called The World's Wife by Carol Ann Duffy, and they are awesome because there's loads of references to other literature and mythology and stuff, so we get to learn about that too.

There isn't even anything I hate about it, except the few people who get better marks than me and don't even work for it, but I suppose you get them in every subject.

I don't know if this really fits into the topic, but has anyone else noticed that a lot of people seem to be biased against Literature as a school subject in general? You know, compared to English Language?
Maybe it's just people I know.

I'm doing AS English Literature and at the moment it is one of my favourite subjects.
I like the social and historical context of novels and poems.

The only thing I don't like is the exam, like in my GCSE English Literature exam it was really rushed because there was no time.

Also I did GCSE Classical Civilisation, one part of that was Greek Literature which was basically stuff by Homer and Sophicles. I enjoyed that aswell.

I suppose I'm not a legitimate literature student yet, but I'm in a humanities class (here you select a subject area when you start high school and specialize in that) and I'm going to do either Comparative Literature and English or English Literature and History at university. I'm aiming towards literary criticism and history on the long run. sortof. I can't imagine doing anything else with my life.

We've just finished Edgar Allan Poe in World Lit and we're doing 20th century poetry in Romanian Lit. and Catullus & Augustan poetry in Latin this year, but my classes are honestly ...not demanding and not enough. So I read outside class curriculum a lot. I'm currently reading my way through 20th century British literature and French realism and I want to pass to Russian realism and (re)read Tolstoy in December. I have a list of things I want to read, it's quite long and there is never enough time. I'm really excited about university and then I'm not because then I really won't have any time to read.

Hmm. I see literature as the art whose medium is letters (not necessarily in written form), in the same way music is the art whose medium is sound.

I'm doing A2 Literature at the moment and I hate it. I regretted taking it as soon as I picked it but i couldn't drop it. I can't wait to finish.

I'm doing A2 Literature. Back in High School I loved it, adored it, favourite subject.
But my AS and A2 teacher has ruined it for me
I plan on doing it at uni though :/

I'm in AP lit this year, and it's my absolute favourite class.
It's fun to be in a room full of people that are all intelligent and into discussion.

Peter Petrelli.:

I'm doing A2 Literature. Back in High School I loved it, adored it, favourite subject.
But my AS and A2 teacher has ruined it for me

Oh my god same! I used to be really good at it and I loved English. But studying it at A-level has totally killed it. It's so stiff.

I think my love of English only increased at A level xD
Mostly because at GCSE, my teacher would be all 'ohay, here's a poem, tell me what it means' and I always said it 'meant' the wrong thing and generally sucked. It was like being given something to unlock and you had to have exactly the right key. But at A level, you could find whatever meaning you wanted, as long as you could back that up. So suddenly, I no longer sucked. It was great.

plantagenet.:

xD We're doing a collection of poems called The World's Wife by Carol Ann Duffy, and they are awesome because there's loads of references to other literature and mythology and stuff, so we get to learn about that too.

Yay Duffy!
I swear, everyone in my class hated her, in fact everyone who's ever done her seems to hate her, but I don't, I adore her. I think she's wonderful. I mean, her poems genuinely made me realise things about myself and about the world and that made me feel somehow...better. That's sort of cheesy, I know, but it's honestly how I feel about her poetry.

Kevin Zegers.:

Oh my god same! I used to be really good at it and I loved English. But studying it at A-level has totally killed it. It's so stiff.

And teacher's seem to pick such terrible books ._.

elizabeth gaskell:

Yay Duffy!
I swear, everyone in my class hated her, in fact everyone who's ever done her seems to hate her, but I don't, I adore her. I think she's wonderful. I mean, her poems genuinely made me realise things about myself and about the world and that made me feel somehow...better. That's sort of cheesy, I know, but it's honestly how I feel about her poetry.

I love her. Quite a few people in my class do, although a lot hate her because they think she's a mad feminist and also because of having to write about her poems on the GCSE exam.

Same about the realising things. Also, I was reading one of the poems the other day and I had one of those weird "this is so pretty and I love it and no one should be able to have this effect on me with words" moments.

I do lit!
Tomorrow is our last lit lesson for the year, so we're watching the Scrubs musical.

morayah.:

It's fun to be in a room full of people that are all intelligent and into discussion.

I'm looking forward to that at university. Now both my literature teachers (Romanian Lit and World Lit) have the tendency to ask a question in class, wait for five seconds to see if anybody raises their hand to answer it and then make me answer it.
It's weird. and embarrassing.

I wish more emphasis was put on literature in foreign languages classes. I take English, French and Latin and we only do a lot of literature in Latin, we stick to grammar and reading/writing skills in modern languages because that's what the European framework for languages something asks. It's a shame because it would make the classes much more interesting and I find actively reading texts written in a foreign language to be one of the best ways to learn it.

plantagenet.:

I love her. Quite a few people in my class do, although a lot hate her because they think she's a mad feminist and also because of having to write about her poems on the GCSE exam.

My school went to Poetry Live for GCSE and it was basically some poets from the GCSE Anthology book reading out their poems and answering questions from the students and someone asked Carol Ann Duffy if she was a feminist and she laughed so hard.

I do English...?



Anyway, at the moment we're studying Byron and Shelley and the second generation Romantics and we're about to do Jane Austen's Sense and Sensability.

Not too keen on Byron - I liked 'She Walks in the Night' but I adore Coleridge and Blake.

In my Drama, Film and Theatre class, we're doing Macbeth/Throne of Blood (The Japanese Samuri version of Macbeth). A bit dull and we've to start King Lear next week but I'll start some very interesting other dramatists soon.

I'm studying King Lear at the moment, but soon we're moving on to a book called Shark Net (It's an Australian book so yeah, doubt many will have heard of it ) in a comparative study with the film The Talented Mr. Ripley. After that I believe I'll be studying sonnets and poems.

I'm in World Lit. at the moment, studying A Doll House by Henrik Ibsen.

I'm excited though because next year I get to take an AP Lit. Class and two Lit. electives (Shakespeare & Advanced Composition)

I'm doing Eng Lit for AS Level at the moment. For the exam, we're doing The Great Gatsby and Wilfred Owen. I really enjoy that. But for our current coursework we're comparing Spies by Michael Frayn and The Winslow Boy by Terrence Rattigan, and it is the bane of my existence.

EDIT: As for the subject, my love for it has decreased significantly over the years. I used to adore it until we started GCSE. Then it became too structured and generally bleh.

I'm writing such an awesome project for English. It's going to be the Victorian age through the eyes of five different female characters and the introduction will include a kind of short story in which all the characters talk to each other through letters. I'm reading Tess of the d'Urbervilles right now and I've already filled up 5 or 6 pages of notes and it just feels like I'm so productive. I have an essay on pre-classical poetry to write over the Easter holiday too. I love how accomplished and writery doing research for lit projects/essays makes you feel.

I am sort of an English Literature student.