[Syonyk]

> ...loss for love of learning...

I'm still quite irritated, decades later, that the end result of my high school Honors English program was to take entire groups of people who clearly loved reading, and teach them to hate books. I kept in touch with a range of them, and almost none of us read a book for fun, for a decade after high school - because HS Honors English taught us that we couldn't properly understand a book unless we sliced it into tiny pieces, analyzed all the literary metaphors, and generally we weren't any good at that anyway, only the English Teacher could properly appreciate the book. And don't you dare read ahead of the assigned section!

I don't remember the plots of stuff I read, but I remember that grass was green to symbolize new life, rebirth, hope, etc. And I learned to bullshit.

It was miserable. And after four years, nobody touched books again outside requirements. It was awful.

[withinboredom]

I remember being friends with a playwright in college. This one play we basically came up with over a few beers and laughs. It was an instant classic and did well in the theater.

So many people analyses the hell out of it. I’ll never forget after the first show when someone asked afterwords, “I love how X is such a metaphor for Y.” My friend just stared at them and said, “it isn’t a metaphor for anything, it’s just an obvious consequence of betraying your friends.”

I HATE that crap. Just enjoy it for what is, entertainment.

[Syonyk]

I asked one of my English teachers, after a particularly (IMO) tortured analysis of something about people like Hemmingway who say things like, "I sit down with a typewriter, bottle of whiskey, and tell stories."

Her response was, "Oh, well, that's why they're great writers - they do all this without even having to think about it!"

[anotheruser13]

I had a high school teacher who did that with Shakespeare. More's the pity. Fortunately, it didn't decrease the enjoyment and entertainment I get from reading for pleasure, just the books that were part of the curriculum.