/lit/ - Literature

>>16492138
probably Harold Bloom's book about the western canon, but that's all I can think of off the top of my head

>>16492138
Having books under you belt means nothing. Part of an English degree is how well can you analyse a book. Are you able to read a book and find details you would like to explore in relation to a question. Getting an English degree is basically how good are you at research and crafting arguments.

>>16492138
>What books should I read to prepare?

>how to read a book
>deep work
>atomic habits
>make it stick

>>16492138
The point of literary study is NOT just to expose you to specific texts, but to develop your ability to read critically and efficiently (which is not the same as quickly). In a sense you learn HOW to read at the same time as you read assigned works. So reading in advance is pointless since you won't be doing it the "right" ways.

>>16492138
Unless they gave you some prerequisite reading then nothing. You will probably be more well read than 90% of your class if you have even an actual passing interest in literature.

>>16492138

Reading the King James Bible will give you a big edge over just about everyone.

>>16492553
Imagine reading a book written by a committee.

>>16492148
>Harold Bloom's book about the western canon
Thanks
>>16492151
>>16492278
I'm good at both those things. I just want to patch up any potential gaps in my reading so I don't come off as a pleb in discussions.
>>16492508
>You will probably be more well read than 90% of your class if you have even an actual passing interest in literature.
I really don't think that's true. Why would someone pick English Lit if they don't read as their main hobby? I'm going to be pissed if that's the case; a Laotian MS paint site shouldn't have to be my only place I can talk about literature.

>>16492172
Three of those are literal wastes of time. How to read a book is apparently not bad.

>>16492672
>really don't think that's true. Why would someone pick English Lit if they don't read as their main hobby?
A lot of people just pick it as something to major in while going to uni. Some people might read but they will have really bad taste.

The author(s) of Gilgamesh, the author(s) of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, the authors of the Holy Bible, the authors of the Apocrypha, the authors of Pirke Aboth, Vyasa, Valmiki, Homer, Hesiod, Archilochos, Sappho, Alkman, Pindar, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Herodotus, Thucydides, Heraclitus, Empedocles, Plato, Aristotle, Menander, Longinus, Callimachus, Theocritus, Plutarch, Aesop, Lucian, Plautus, Terence, Lucretius, Cicero, Horace, Persius, Catullus, Virgil, Lucan, Ovid, Juvenal, Martial, Seneca, Petronius, Apuleius, Saint Augustine, Muhammad, the authors of One Thousand and One Nights, the author(s) of the Poetic Edda, Snorri Sturluson, the author(s) of the Nibelungenlied, Wolfram von Eschenbach, Chrétien de Troyes, the author(s) of Beowulf, the author(s) of The Poem of the Cid, Christine de Pisan, Diego de San Pedro, Dante, Petrarch, Giovanni Boccaccio, Matteo Maria Boiardo, Ludovico Ariosto, Michelangelo Buonarroti, Niccolò Machiavelli, Leonardo da Vinci, Baldassare Castiglione, Gaspara Stampa, Giorgio Vasari, Benvenuto Cellini, Torquato Tasso, Giordano Bruno, Tommaso Campanella, Giambattista Vico, Carlo Goldoni, Vittorio Alfieri, Luís de Camões, António Ferreira, Jorge Manrique, Fernando de Rojas, the author of Lazarillo de Tormes, Francisco de Quevedo, Luis de León, San Juan de la Cruz, Luis de Góngora, Miguel de Cervantes, Lope de Vega, Tirso de Molina, Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Geoffrey Chaucer, Thomas Malory, William Dunbar, John Skelton, Thomas More, Thomas Wyatt, Henry Howard, Philip Sidney, Fulke Greville, Edmund Spenser, Walter Raleigh, Christopher Marlowe, Michael Drayton, Samuel Daniel, Thomas Nashe, Thomas Kyd, William Shakespeare, Thomas Campion, John Donne, Ben Jonson, Francis Bacon, Robert Burton, Thomas Browne, Thomas Hobbes, Robert Herrick, Thomas Carew, Richard Lovelace, Andrew Marvell, George Herbert, Thomas Traherne, Henry Vaughan, John Wilmot, Richard Crashaw, Francis Beaumont, John Fletcher, George Chapman, John Ford, John Marston, John Webster, Thomas Middleton, William Rowley, Cyril Tourneur, Philip Massinger, John Bunyan, Izaak Walton, John Milton, John Aubrey, Jeremy Taylor, Samuel Butler (Hudibras), John Dryden, Thomas Otway, William Congreve, Jonathan Swift, George Etherege, Alexander Pope, John Gay, James Boswell, Samuel Johnson, Edward Gibbon, Edmund Burke, Maurice Morgann, William Collins, Thomas Gray, George Farquhar, William Wycherley, Christopher Smart, Oliver Goldsmith, Richard Brinslay Sheridan, William Cowper, George Crabbe, Daniel Defoe, Samuel Richardson, Henry Fielding, Tobias Smollett, Laurence Sterne, Fanny Burney, Joseph Addison, Richard Steele, Jean Froissart, the author(s) of The Song of Roland, François Villon, Michel de Montaigne, François Rabelais, Marguerite de Navarre, Joachim du Bellay, Maurice Scève, Pierre de Ronsard, Philippe de Commines, Agrippa d'Aubigné, Robert Garnier, Pierre Corneille, François de La Rochefoucauld,

>>16493960
Good list

>>16492672
>I'm good at both those things.
Doubt.

>>16493627
Have you actually read any of them? From your statement including the word "apparently" I think you're just shitposting.

>>16494079
Read? I base my opinions on what /lit/ tells me. At least I preface it with "apparently"

>>16492138
Most English majors nowadays are girls who primarily read YA and want to be high school English teachers so I think you'll be fine.

>>16493960
Is this the new pasta you’re going to spam like the one with all the /lit/core books on it?

>>16494931
I completely understand. I just hope OP doesn’t completely shrug off the suggestions based on your post. If I had read those books before undergrad I’d have been in a much better place, now a decade+ later.

>>16493627
>literal

>>16495552
>the one with all the /lit/core books on it
what one?

>>16495588
Are you a newfag? It was just some spam that was posted in any rec thread and it was just all the books typically recommended on /lit/ most being found on /lit/‘s top 100 charts

>>16495668
>Are you a newfag?
Are you? Because >>16493960 isn't new.

>>16492138
>What books should I read to prepare?
mcdonalds handbook

>>16492138
a depressing amount of people studying English lit don't actually read, or at the very least read outside of set texts. Same with most humanities majors (Philosophy majors don't read many philosophy books, history majors don't read many history books etc.)

Just focus on doing reading as a habit, and read things you care about (even if they aren't directly related to your degree). Trust me in the long run the habit will pay off. You may already have this habit down (again, most humanities people I knew didn't)

Also pay no attention to the people blackpilling you about your employment prospects. STEM being employable is becoming as much of a meme as the humanities. Truth is University doesn't prepare you for any work in terms of the curriculum. Employable skills, ones that will actually get you a job, will have to be learned on the side, so decide what looks interesting to you and structure extra curricular activities towards that goal. Try and get this structure down in your first year when there will be less pressure to perform.

I was an Econ major so everyone on my course was very job focused but the truth is Econ is as much of a meme degree as english lit, it's just it tended to attract people who were more job focused so put in the extra non-academic work necessary to get decent jobs on graduation.

Good luck anon!

>>16492138
That's the first time I'm posting this on /lit/ since it's the first time that it's relevant.
>Bible.

>>16492138
Bible

in 2020? harry potter should be enough

I'm starting a literature degree too(Spanish)
I'd say "how to read a book" as it tremendously improved my reading skills. Now I'm preparing by reading some history of literature

>>16497500
>Also pay no attention to the people blackpilling you about your employment prospects.
I didn't pick English Lit to be employable or to get rich, I've known it, and others like it, to kind of be a meme degree. For personal reasons I've decided to let go of ambition and after I do a post grad I'm going to move to like Vermont and live quietly—but that's interesting to hear about its comparative job prospects. I'm more worried about my brother who's doing Economics now, mainly since he's retaking his first year since he skipped all his lectures. Thanks.

>>16492553
>>16497917
>>16497938