Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge: English Teacher on Trial

Sometimes as a budding English teacher, it's hard not to feel a twang of guilt for every classic lying dormant and dusty on the shelf. While I've been trying to shake this feeling off and own my individual tastes, I recently dipped my toe back into reading from lists or canons. You see, I rediscovered the Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge, based on every book mentioned or shown in Gilmore Girls. Rory was a truly epic bookworm; the teen worked her way through more books in the time the show ran than most would in a lifetime.

I have been trying to let myself enjoy reading and not see it as a race or competition to the top of a mountain of old white dudes, but I couldn't help sizing myself up against the fictional Rory. As a bonus, I'm going to be using her list to get some tips on what bookish teens might enjoy as recommendations aside from YA. Girl has good taste, I'll give her that.

List after the jump. For reference, I've crossed out those that I've read (71 out of 339).

On collages

Last semester I made this haphazard collage of what "being an English teacher" means to me. At the time I didn't understand how I was supposed to know what kind of teacher I was, because I hadn't yet taught anyone anything (English or otherwise). It gave me fascinating insight into what I (rightly or not) believed an English teacher should be and could be. I still don't know where I sit. It's like trying to put ourselves in subculture baskets, which have always confused me. Am I rockabilly-indie-hipster-nerd or a hippyrockaster? I don't want to teach my students to reduce their complexity to neat boxes, and I don't see the need to do that with my professional practice. What kind of English teacher am I going to be? The confused kind, the kind that changes what kind they are, the messy kind.