Nobody has read or seen or done everything. Here’s a thread for what you missed and maybe for others to tell you whether it’s worth circling back (or not).
I’ll start: I’ve never read Don Quixote. My dad went on and on about how great it was, and I heard it’s the greatest novel ever written. Should I make the time?
Film, TV, art, music, etc. What’s the thing your conscience nags you to learn but you haven’t (yet)?
I always wanted to play piano. It would be nice to finally do it.
I never read Shakespeare. I hear he was good at making puns in some language that vaguely resembles English. Worth trying?
Also never learned any math beyond basic algebra. People keep telling me there’s some lesson about finding the area below a curvy line. Why in god’s name would I ever need to do that?
I do wish I paid more attention in biology class, though. It would be nice to know how animals and plants work.
Despite earning 2 AA degrees (general ed.), a BA (history), and an MA (history), I have never read many of the books that are considered “classics”. In high school I read To Kill a Mockingbird, Animal Farm, and Lord of the Flies. I also read a couple of Shakespeare plays. But I’ve never read anything by Dickens or Twain, never read Catcher in the Rye or The Diary of Anne Frank or or or or…
Find a list of “100 books every high school student should read” and chances are I’ve read maybe 2 of them.
Naturally, I read hundreds, perhaps thousands, of monographs for my BA and my MA. But “classic” literature has never been my thing, and since I wasn’t required to read it, I just… never did. So when someone makes a reference to Orwell or Hugo or some similar classic author I just ::blank stare, drool::
I was hoping to get at this idea—that the person posting looks around and says, “I have a feeling I missed this, and it may have been good (by that poster’s yardstick) to know it. Can someone tell me if it’s worth the trouble?” I did ok with the plays but I had good teachers to keep me on track. Trying to do it on line would be a nightmare.
Fair enough.
To return to my OP many years ago, maybe even pre-VCR, I saw something about Don Quixote on TV. IIRC the interpretation was that even at swordpoint, he would not renounce his (crazy) view of the world, even if he were about to die for it. IDK, that struck me as so profound…that he would give his life rather than change what his perception of it might be. There’s something fierce and beautiful about that IMO.
But at other times some much vaunted work comes along and you think, meh.
In my OP I was hoping to invite. You can be a scholar of Shakespeare or a rocket scientist but not be qualfied as a brain surgeon. You can tower above all historians but not comprehend quantum physics. I’m inviting you to say, “This is an area where I seem to be late to a party…I think I could grow.”
Maybe you’re like me. I’ve tried to read Don Quixote but I can’t get into it.
Don Quixote is a tough grind for sure, you need a good translation. I wouldnt re-read it, that is doubtless.
I have pretty much read all of Twain. Huck Finn is fabulous, but for something lighter try Tom Sawyer or Roughing It. Or at least some of his short stories, Jumping Frog at least. I think Twain is the greatest American writer. Innocents Abroad will have me laughing.
Animal Farm, Lord of the Flies, Catcher in the Rye or The Diary of Anne Frank - all worthwhile but not on my list of pleasure reads. Read once, along with Finnegans wake and you’re golden.
There are many such books- great literature but not great reads.
I’m disappointed that I never got to study calculus. I’d love to do so now and am open to suggestions as to good and affordable web sites for self-assessment (to show what preparatory work I still need) and self-study of the subject.
Getting a TEFL/TESOL certificate is a good idea for me now at this point in my career as I really do not want to remain in China any longer and my wife certainly is not happy with China thanks to her being stuck out of China since February this year. Again, I’m open to suggestions as to quite affordable and accepted online or mixed-delivery certificate programs.
Now that you’ve mentioned Don Quixote, I’ve never read it in English. My Spanish teacher in high school lent me his personal Spanish edition of the book and helped me through it. I thoroughly enjoyed the story. I believe I’ll read it through in English on my next holiday.
I think learning to play a musical instrument well would have been nice. My parents abandoned that idea for my sister, brothers, and me when the two oldest siblings basically abandoned the piano lessons our parents had paid for.
It depends. You can give it a try. Read a couple of pages and see whether you enjoy it or not. If not, forget it.
I started playing the piano once, by myself. I can play the guitar a little. I was a university student at that time and a friend of mine studied the piano (in university, I mean). His mentor had given him the key to a piano room in their university so that my friend could go and study there after classes. I made a copy after that key and managed to sneak in the room in the evenings and learn how to play the piano with a real piano. I did so for about half the year until one night they changed the lock and I was told I was no longer welcome there. My friend also got in trouble for it.
I was good at French as a student when we were supposed to read a lot of information from books that seemed never to be available at the library. The French section, however, appeared to be untouched. I managed to read the stuff required for my exams by borrowing the French versions of the books I needed. I read other books in French as well, such as plays by Shakespeare, O’Neill, or Ibsen.
I hated reading all these books as a school student, but then when I re-read them as an adult, I really enjoyed them. “Lord of the Flies” was still one of the worst books for me to read - a hollow story whose tendentious and unrealistic plot still revolts me. Recently I read an article about a similar group of children that went through a wreckage and managed to survive on an island. Their story is a lesson of human bravery and cooperation.
I read these books as a student, but not necessarily because they had been assigned at school. I had a lot of fun reading “Huckleberry Finn” and “A Yankee in King Arthur’s Court” in fifth grade. I was a little older when I read “Catcher in the Rye” and I was fascinated.
There are a lot of things I didn’t study properly as a student, such as History or Geography. I read history books on my own after I graduated university, but geography is still one of my weakest points. I’m not terrible but I envy my wife, who knows not only every country (and their capital cities) on the face of Earth, but also details such as their GDP per capita.
Music. Never read a note in my life. But I’m now working on it. My Wife bought me a very nice Martin guitar two Christmas’s ago as she knew I had a desire to learn. It’s been a bit of a long road for me. I knew it wouldn’t be easy, but it is harder than I thought it would be. I thought that since I picked up touch typing quickly, this shouldn’t be difficult. Hah.
But, I’ve made some progress now that I’m working from home and can adjust my hours. Since winter is on the way, I’ve been trying to get my last time on the deck in. A great place to noodle on the guitar.
My Wife also bought me a work book ‘Guitar for the Absolute Beginner’. I sort of ignored it at first (trying YouTube lessons instead), but am making myself go through every lesson and exercise in the book until I have it down. You have to crawl before you can walk. If you have to think about it, you still need to work on it.
I’m enjoying it very much. But you can’t take a three month break and pick up your training/learning right where you left off. I’ve had to start from scratch a number of times, including building up callouses on fingertips. Again.
I’ve found that a lot of “classic” literature is great once you get into it, but it takes a while to get into it. So what I’ve done is take a “classic” book with me when I’m traveling. With nothing else to read, I have to get through the slow early parts, and so get to the good parts.
My biggest educational regret is a lack of languages. My best language other than English is Latin, and that’s extremely rusty (because you never get to use it conversationally). After that, I have a couple of years of middle-school French, and Sesame Street-level Spanish. I’m planning that, once I get a permanent teaching job, I’ll find out what the most underserved language is in my school, and then learn that (or at least, try to).
On a more esoteric note, in grad school, I ended up taking some of my core classes in a different order than most of my classmates. With the result that my Electricity and Magnetism teacher told us “We won’t spend much time on Green Functions, because you’re learning those in Mathematical Methods”, and my Mathematical Methods prof told us “We won’t spend much time on Green Functions, because you’re learning those in E&M”. Even now, I only have a vague idea of what they are and how to use them.
I took calculus I, but I would have liked to advanced further and taken calculus II and other high level math classes. Not because I want to learn pure math, but because I would like to have a good understanding of quantum physics and cosmology, and from what I can gather both of those require very high level math.
Anne Frank, haven’t read that. DOH! But I could go on and on. Haven’t read Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. Haven’t read Machiavelli.
Besides books, while I love some of the music I really don’t know the stories behind the operas. What is she singing about?
I found an answer.
Same here. A while back I downloaded a bunch of Shakespeare from Project Gutenberg or some similar public domain library and thought I’d give it a shot. The thing that helps me a lot is to hit the wikipedia page for a play first, get a general idea of who the main characters are and read some of the plot synopsis, so I don’t have to figure all that out while plowing through ye olde English. Otherwise I’m completely lost halfway through Act I.
For those interested, there’s a mobile app called Serial Reader that breaks down classic works of literature and sends them to you in daily 10 minute increments. It’s how I read The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. If you pay them $3 (one - time fee) you can read ahead.
My greatest frustration is I’ve never had any basic economics education. I had a course in undergrad called political economy but it was extremely biased toward leftist policies (to the point the professor showed a Michael Moore documentary.) I didn’t learn much from it. Then in grad school I tried to take an economics course but they wouldn’t let me in because they were reserved for Social Policy students (I was Social Work.) So I have no real idea how the economy works, or the stock market, or the federal reserve, or anything.
William Golding wrote Lord of the Flies in response to the 1857 novel The Coral Island. They both have the same premise–boys becoming stranded on a deserted island. Golding thought The Coral Island was too upbeat and idealistic in nature and that his novel really depicted what would happen in such a scenario. Frankly I think Golding is too myopic with his own beliefs to consider otherwise.
A small suggestion, if you want to learn Shakespeare, watch the plays and/or read the plays out loud. This is the recommendation from multiple teachers and professors. Patrick Steweart’s been reading a sonnet a day for the last few months, if you want to get some small bites in. He’s definitely easy to listen to.
As I am a resident of a foreign country, I am still working to improve my knowledge of the local language.
I would like to learn Italian, which is also one of the official languages here. But I am fairly certain that trying a second foreign language before I get my C1 (or C2?) certificant in German may not be a good idea.
I’ve bought or downloaded a number of books that fall under the top 100 books. I’d like to read them, including Victor Hugo’s Hunchback of Notre Dame. However, I am not convinced I should force myself to read a book, if I just can’t get into it.
As we recently got Netflix, we’re watching a number of movies. Which is a gap for us. Just saw Some Like it Hot last week, plus Life of Pi and Room With a View. Not exactly a gap in traditional education, but neither of is big into movies, so we’re taking the opportunity to catch up.
Shakespeare is way easier to see performed than to read. See it, and see if you like it that way. If you do, keep consuming it. As you get better at the language, you can move to reading it and enjoying it. But its like beer or black coffee, you don’t tend to like it at the first sip, you need to acquire it. Whether its worth your time to acquire it? - well, I don’t drink beer.
And performed live is better than a recorded version. Someday, in a post Covid world, find a local Shakespeare in the Park…And try to start with something good. My youngest developed a love of Shakespeare through performances at the Guthrie - including a Facist staging of King Lear, and a incredible staging of Midsummer that included a band. Decades ago they did a Richard III where they had columns on stage that dripped blood to screeching violins every time someone died, by the end, the columns were blood fountains.
I really wish I knew languages - I’ve started a lot, but I’ve never stuck with it long enough or tried hard enough to be useful at it. I’d also like to be able to draw. I think they were trying to teach us how in art class - I didn’t pick it up.
I’ve read Don Quixote twice. In middle school, my dad made me. He claimed to have read it, but after talking to him, it became clear that he’d only seen “Man of La Mancha.” which (while it uses some character names and steals some scenes) is an entirely different thing altogether. I read it later for a book club. It’s enjoyable, but not essential.
There’s a book called “Calculus Made Easy” which is what it says. I recommend it.
Those of you who are curious about Calculus: one place to get an idea what it’s all about is this series of videos by 3Blue1Brown: The Essence of Calculus:
(Which is just one example of how, with all the videos and websites and other resources available now, going back and filling the gaps in your education is easier now than ever before.)
I tried to read Don Quixote, but the walls of text defeated me before I could even get started. I’ve also not read 100 Years of Solitude (the other Spanish masterpiece) .I haven’t read the Bronte sisters or any of Dickens, either, but I’ve seen so many productions of both that I don’t feel like I’ve missed out. I have read Twain, Steinbeck, Michener, Uris, Shakespeare, and others. I read Atlas Shrugged and shrugged. Haven’t read Fennimore Cooper, but I understand that I haven’t missed much. I’ve not read any of the great philosophers, nor the great Russian writers (but I’ve seen Dr. Zhivago!). I don’t go to operas or ballets, but like some of the music. Speaking of music, my tastes cover a pretty wide spectrum, so I’ve done okay there.