I was one of those dorks who actually read the book, so I’ve never read a Cliff’s Note before. What’s in them? Do they just contain summaries of the book? Do they have all the answers to every teacher’s quiz in the whole universe and throughout time? Because some people I knew seemed convinced that they did.
They contain both plot summaries and discussions of major literary elements in the book, such as the following: characters, symbols/allegories, historical background, writing style, reasons for fame.
The do focus on elements that teachers are likely to test on. I have found CNs useful at times as a substitute for reading the book. They are pretty well-written and can help you get by (not that I’m recommending this). But they can also help you understand diffcult works and truly can be used as “notes.”
I don’t have any handy, but I’ll do my best to remember.
They have a list of characters with brief descriptions, and a chapter-by-chapter summary of the book, with discussion of major themes, symbols, and so forth.
They can actually be a very useful tool for understanding a hard book- read the chapter, then read that chapter in the Cliffs Notes- I used them when I was reading Ulysses and Sound and the Fury.
Students who use them instead of the book are missing out so much- the Cliffs are rather dry and boring compared to the real thing.
BTW, FisherQueen demonstrates the correct usage: it’s Cliffs Notes with no apostrophe. There really was a fellow named Cliff, but no apostrophe.
They generally give a little bio of the author, then list the main characters who appear in the story.
What follows are chapter-by-chapter summaries and interpretation, critical commentaries, and questions for discussion. The Cliffs notes also provide some possible essay topics, and a bibliography.
not to be snarky or anything, but the SDMB is usually meant to be used to find out things one can’t find out easily on one’s own. A trip to the local book store would have revealed to you a section of Cliffs Notes, where you could have browsed a bunch of them on your own. And a quick Google turned up their website where you can look directly at some of them that are posted on the site, chapter by chapter. Just sayin’ xo C.
You’re right. Please offer your critiques of every other General Question as well. Because, if someone wastes our time, it’s best that you continue wasting it by whining about others’ questions.
I never not read the book and just used the Cliff Notes, but I found if I read the CN before reading Shakespeare I enjoyed it a great deal more. Without the CN, I was always unable to understand Shakespeare well enough to appreciate it, or even know what the hell what basically happening.
I disagree. the SDMB, and especially GQ, can be used to ask questions that not only you are curious about but that you think others might be interested in seeing the answer to. I, for one, browse through GQ and very often find questions on topics that interest me, but that I wouldn’t have thought to even ask, let alone seek the answer to. The SDMB (and especially GQ) is about spreading knowledge. I (and I’m sure others) have gained knowledge by reading the answers here to questions that, yes, the asker could have answered himself via other means, but that I appreciate having been asked and answered here.
Cliffs notes are a godsend for me. Many books I am assigned to read require me to read them 2 or 3 times to totally ‘get’ the book (at most). Since I am not a fast reader, I often do not have time to read some books in detail. Cliffs notes are also useful references for writing essays. If I wanted to give an example of something or support an argument about something in the novel, I can use the Cliffs notes to quickly look up the chapters I am referring to. Since I’m bad with names, the Cliffs notes also help me remember characters and who is who.
I want to clarify that I use Cliffs Notes as a supplement to the reading, and not a replacement. While I will read the Cliffs notes in lieu of the book in some circumstances, I only do this as a last resort, like if I was unable to get the book in time, or didn’t have time to read it, or forgot to read/get it :smack: then I’ll get Cliffs notes because having a vague idea on what a book is about is not the same as reading the book.
Right now I have a Victorian Literature class which is getting a lot of use out of Cliffs Notes, because honestly most of the books we are currently reading (Bleak House, Tess of the D’Urbervilles, Middlemarch, etc) bore me to death- if I can’t get ‘into’ reading a book, its difficult for me to remember facts and understand elements, so Cliffs Notes help patch those ‘gaps’ 
I’ve only had to use CN once, but it saved my ass in 9th grade.
Main Street by Sinclair Lewis. I couldn’t get into this thing past the first chapter.
OK, raise your hand if you had the lit teacher say some time during the first day of classes “Here is your reading list. Oh, I’ve read the Cliffs Notes for them and the comprehensive exam will not contain any questions that can be answered using them” 
I’ve never even cracked a CN 'cause of this
critter42
Well, if you’re the type that would use Cliffs Notes, why would you voluntarily take an English Lit course? I guess that there are some people who would have to take lit courses for a degree requirement, and some that take them because they heard they’re easy (which, IMO, are the type of people that shouldn’t bother going to college). But if you had always hated English in high school and needed the Cliffs Notes to get by, why voluntarily subject yourself to those courses in college? CN’s were banned by most of my high school English teachers too, and I’m sure they’d read them.
I’ve only read two CNs, one for Romeo and Juliet which I got at a used book sale; I didn’t really find it useful. Watching a movie would be just as good as a summary, and the real (annotated) play wasn’t terribly hard for me to understand. Now, maybe I would have begun to get a clue about what Ulysses was supposed to be about if I had had Cliffs Notes, but I didn’t read it for school, and I think it would only have been one person’s idea about what it was about. (Likewise Heart of Darkness, which I did have to read for school and did not find brilliant.)
Strangely, while Cliffs Notes are considered the bane of English teachers everywhere, their scientific equivalents (Schaum’s Outlines and the like) are not really frowned upon. That might be because scientific study guides don’t really help you cheat; they give you a different perspective on some of the material you’re expected to learn, and often give different material than will be taught in a course. They broaden your understanding, but you can’t get out of reading textbooks and going to lectures by reading a study guide. (My other Cliffs Notes was on introductory calculus, and it fell into this category too.)
Roches, I don’t know that Cliffs Notes is really cheating, even if you use them to avoid reading the real mccoy. What’s the purpose of liberal arts classes in the first place? Not to make you well read, but to make you well rounded. If you know what a book is about without having read it, and can talk sensibly about it, you’ve met the goals of the class. Um, now of course I’m not talking about the people that take these classes 'cos they like them.
What’s the purpose of liberal arts classes in the first place? Not to make you well read, but to make you well rounded.
Uh, no. The “purpose” is to teach you to develop and use skills, so that when you have do similar things in later life (e.g., to read difficult texts that you have no Cliffs Notes to) you’ll be able to rise to the challenge.
Uh, no. That would be the purpose of your technically-oriented classes.
I’m not disputing that well-roundedness is a bad thing, either, and I’m not here to pick a fight. There are perfectly valid reasons for requiring liberal arts classes. This is a good article on that theme. But don’t think that reading The Tempest is going to help you be creative in figuring out air speed velocities of various swallows.
I guess I don’t fit your typing scheme there.
I loved literature classes in college, and took them whenever I fit them in. Even if I didn’t enjoy them, I would have taken them in an attempt to fulfill distribution requirements or Phi Beta Kappa requirements. But I like lit enough that a couple of years ago I took a lit course for no reason other than my roommate had to take one to bolster his med school application, and I thought it would be fun to do it together.
However, when I had a bear of a time getting through “Absalom, Absalom” I used Cliffs Notes, which really helped. I suppose if we’d had the web available to me then, I might have gone online to find some critical essays or something like that to help. As it was, Cliffs Notes got me what I needed.
I don’t know what “type” that makes me.
The purpose of a liberal arts education is to learn to think critically. Critical thinking is essential for keeping evil out of society. A major part of critical thinking is learning how to analyze texts (for example, it’s useful to look critically at political advertisments).
They now offer them free online, for some odd reason. Check it out.
Those degree requirements can be pretty extensive. For my astrophysics degree, I needed to take a standard intro-level literature course, an upper-level literature course of my choice, and a couple more classes which consisted largely of literature. I don’t think there was any major in the school where you could get out of taking all lit courses, and I don’t think this is atypical for a liberal arts college.
In accordance with the general edict that no good deed goes unpunished, I kindly suggested that before posting a question on the SDMB, the OP might have availed him?her?self of some other resources. I did so in keeping with the general guidelines of this board, many of which are listed in the mod’s threads at the top of the page. I quote in part:
"USEFUL REFERENCE SITES
Judicious use of the following reference sites may answer a number of questions raised before posting to GQ: (emphasis mine)
The Straight Dope
The Straight Dope Archive: The One Perfect Source of All Knowledge (searchable)
SDMB Search: Search previous Straight Dope MB threads
Search Engines
Google: The de facto standard in search engines…" (emphasis mine)
Since that elicited a sarcastic response and a refutation, I’m again only trying to say that the BBS does have a few guidelines - not rules - and that it might be good to abide by them if possible. Sheesh.