Classic Literature I Never Read for My English Degree

Just to infuriate those of you who actually worked for your goals, also note that on every single one of these titles I either presented, or wrote lengthy papers, resulting in my graduating magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa.

• Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

• Emma by Jane Austen

• The Collected works of William Shakespeare

• Virgil's Aeneid

• Anything written in Olde English

• The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu

• 40% on Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn 

This is nothing to be proud of. I am less well-read than I was required to be for my certification for a degree.

Except I'm not. The requirements were the papers and orations, the regurgitation of designated information and depiction of my understanding for the original authors' proof of concept in each piece. Call it a sad state of our educational system, call it my own brilliance in understanding meaning without the original context, call it a worthless cop-out that cheats myself as well as my college and my parent.

Absorb the materials that will make you better at what you do. That's the lesson.