Books From Uni We Didn't Hate

Рет қаралды 15,117

Күн бұрын

At uni you often end up reading lots of things you don't enjoy, but Alice and I also found a bunch of books that really stuck with us.
// b o o k s
Canterbury Tales
Goodreads: bit.ly/GRChaucer
Canterbury Tales (translated)
Goodreads: bit.ly/GRCanterburyTranslation
The Ministry of Fear
Goodreads: bit.ly/GRMinistry
Wide Sargasso Sea
Goodreads: bit.ly/GRSargasso
The Handmaid's Tale
Goodreads: bit.ly/2FUCRgE
The Day of the Triffids
Goodreads: bit.ly/GRTriffids
Nine Stories
Goodreads: bit.ly/GRNineStories
// m e
Check out my enamel book pin!
bit.ly/DontCrackTheSpinePin
Follow what I'm reading on GoodReads.
/ booksandquills
Twitter / booksandquills
Insta / booksandquills
Blog (travel, food & London) booksandquills.co.uk
// d e r p i n a m o d e
Cruelty-free beauty and lifestyle channel with Marion.
/ derpinamode
/ derpinamode
/ derpinamode
// c a p t i o n s
Help me out by contributing captions/subtitles on my videos. Thanks so much to everyone who’s already contributed! A guide:
support.google.com/youtube/an...
// t a l k s & p a n e l s
I can give talks, moderate panels or appear on panels on a variety of topics, from BookTube to working with brands, how to start a KZfaq channel, building your personal brand online, productivity, and much more. I can also host author Q&As, panels and other publishing events.
Get in touch at booksandquills@gmail.com or visit my website for more info: www.booksandquills.co.uk/panel...
// s p o n s o r s h i p s
I’m available to work with brands, both on KZfaq and on my other social channels (Twitter, Instagram, blog). Feel free to get in touch at booksandquills@gmail.com
// f a q
Can you review my book?
I’m always happy to hear about upcoming books, but I’m afraid I don’t review self-published books and can only accept a small number of books for review. I enjoy reading classics, dystopian/apocalyptic novels, sci-fi, translated fiction and a variety of graphic novels, YA and contemporary literary fiction. Get in touch at booksandquills@gmail.com
Where is your accent from?
I was born and raised in the Netherlands, studied English Lit at Leiden University (also in the Netherlands), studied in the US for 3 months and have lots of American friends. I'm definitely not Irish or Canadian, I promise!
Where do you live?
I live in London and have been here for 4 years now.
How did you get into publishing?
I did publishing work experience, did a lot of networking and learned everything I know about social media from creating and running this channel. (P.s. You don't necessarily have to study Publishing or English to get a job in publishing!).

Пікірлер: 67

@EvenStarRute 5 жыл бұрын

So glad you got Alice back for a video, love your videos together. If she ever gets her own channel, I'll totally subscribe. Out of these books, I've read the Handmaid's Tale and Wide Sargasso Sea, both of which I loved. I haven't read The Ministry of Fear, but I'll add a recommendation for another funny, light-hearted Graham Greene: Our Man in Havana.

@minieboisvert367 5 жыл бұрын

This comment is very superficial but I just think Alice is gorgeous ! Her smile is just stunning, and I love your energies together ! Thank you for this lovely video Sanne !

@booksandwoollysocks 5 жыл бұрын

I’ve just read angels in America at uni and I absolutely love it ✨

@Elizabeth-xo4vh 5 жыл бұрын

I had to memorize part of Tennyson's Ulysses in high school and I liked it so much that I got bits of it tattooed on me! It was really cool to go back for my ten year reunion and the teacher how much it had stayed with me.

@ValerieOlive13 5 жыл бұрын

I finally read The Handmaid’s Tale for my masters earlier this year and it is mind blowing! Love this video!

@edencardines5170 5 жыл бұрын

WIDE SARAGASSO SEA! I’m reading it for my Caribbean Women Writers module! I like it so far:,)

@antheagrace3396 5 жыл бұрын

Thank you Sanne and Alice! Brilliant video. You’ve taken me back to my uni days. Love from Australia 🇦🇺

@TheDoodleHorse 5 жыл бұрын

Not yet done any novels this semester, mostly short stories and poems, but stand-outs so far have been: Lydia Davis' 'Five Stories' (So much happening in such a small amount of text, absolutely fantastic), and the poems 'Persimmons' by Li-Young Lee and 'Nocturne of the Poet Who Loved the Moon' by Mark Strand Definitely excited to see what other gems I can discover over the course of my degree! Brilliant video, thank you!

@MaddieBReads 5 жыл бұрын

I had pretty good luck and liked a bunch of books I had to read for class and realized I’m obsessed with gothic and romanticism fiction cause of dramatic they are. Also found my favourite book now of all time from another class: Crime and Punishment. After I read that, I went out and bought all of Dostoevsky’s books haha

@MrArchiePancakes 5 жыл бұрын

I read Mrs Dalloway for my first english course and was so daunted by it but ended up loving it and Woolf is now one of my favourite authors. I don't think I'd have tried her writing without that course. On a less positive note, I also had to read The Crying of Lot 49 for a course and it's best feature was it was so short, so the pain wasn't too long. And to echo another comment, I love listening to you two chat about books. Alice needs to start a channel!

@yvonne9077 4 жыл бұрын

I absolutely loved Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett! It's such a strange play and I never would have found out about it if it weren't for my study

@Alexa-np3vn 5 жыл бұрын

Loved this video and made me SO nostalgic for my English Lit degree! I read 'Evelina' by Frances Burney at uni and LOVED IT, I don't think I'd have ever read that otherwise. My favourite book I read at uni was 'Pillars Of Salt' by Fadia Faqir which deserves to be more famous than it is!!

@kassit8833 5 жыл бұрын

I ordered “The Ministery of Fear” and now waiting for it to come in the mail. It sounds like my kind of book!

@GainedMonaters 5 жыл бұрын

it's not just the Dutch, I also haaated The Road lol! I've seen the movie version of Day of the Triffids and thought it was really cool but I've never read the book, I'll have to add it to my list

@GreenBitterfly 5 жыл бұрын

I studied Dubliners by James Joyce at School as part of my English Language and Literature A-Level, I wasn't even aware of it beforehand but I really enjoyed it. I was also introduced to Simon Armitage through English Language and Literature A-Level, and he's someone whose work I've continually enjoyed.

@luna160881 5 жыл бұрын

I remember watching the video where you bought The Road for university! Man, I feel like I've been here for quite a while now...

@booksandquills 5 жыл бұрын

+RainyDaysReads oh wow! Gosh that’s a long time ago. Thanks for sticking around :)

@luna160881 5 жыл бұрын

@@booksandquills 💗 One of my favorite channels 💗

@thepuppyclub 5 жыл бұрын

I love Salingers nine stories!

@bookishshenanigans4769 5 жыл бұрын

This has.pushed me to read Day of the Triffids which I bought a while ago!

@booksandbroadway 5 жыл бұрын

I studied drama in college so I read hundreds of plays and hardly any novels (I did read The Canterbury Tales and Wide Sargasso Sea!) for four years. I took English classes every semester but two of them were entirely Shakespeare and another was about Restoration Drama. My favorite novel I read for school Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, which we read in a class on American women writers. We read so many good books in that class though!

@mishca5116 5 жыл бұрын

Such an interesting video for me for many reasons. My first year of university I intended to do an English major. This was 30 years ago! Like you two, it seems , my reading list was filled with selections that I "did not get on with". My solution? Switch majors. It was not a good idea. It's interesting to see how you both encountered some courses and reading material that you didn't like but preserved onwards and now enjoying work in areas centred around literature. Good lesson for my children. Thank you for the title suggestions. As a Canadian, I would encourage you all to seek out more Atwood books and also more Canadian authors. Graham Greene is one of my favourite writers - The End of An Affair is quite lovely.

@CrazyProfesser 5 жыл бұрын

I wouldn't normally read Historical Fiction but I read Regeneration in my first year at university and loved it!! I just recently read the second book and I need to get on to the third!

@tesslydon6925 5 жыл бұрын

This is so cute! My favorite books I read for high school were Handmaid's Tale, Of Mice and Men, and To Kill a Mockingbird and my favorites from college (so far) are all of Jane Austen.

@elainebrydon5236 5 жыл бұрын

My degree was English Lit as well. The Faerie Queene is amazing. You really need to give it a chance!!!

@MaryAmongStories 5 жыл бұрын

love these chatty videos 💗

@francestuoriniemi6203 5 жыл бұрын

This is lovely, and as an MA student now, I really get this feeling - doing English really made me pick up more books outside my expected, usual genres... Also, is that The Transition by Luke Kennard in the background? If yes, what a great book! (Though I am biased, he was a lecturer of mine) (and also, Alice is stunning, just had to add that)

@annierice2175 5 жыл бұрын

In my high school lit class we studied The Man Who Loved Children by Christina Stead. I wouldn't have picked it up otherwise but I absolutely loved it! It's long and difficult to get through but so interesting

@amyturner5381 5 жыл бұрын

I trained as a primary school teacher at uni but I specialised in English and did a lot of reading for that with mixed results. My favourite was The Giver by Lois Lowry though, such an incredible dystopia

5 жыл бұрын

i went to canterbury with my creative writing class and our teacher talked about how the canterbury tales were kinda the og rap battles so it's been on my list ever since but it's so intimidating as a non native english speaker!

@rukbat3 5 жыл бұрын

I didn't take any English Lit classes in college (I tested out), but in my last year of high school, we were assigned My Name Is Asher Lev. I certainly wouldn't have picked it up on my own, but I loved it! I've been reluctant to read Wide Sargasso Sea, since I love Jane Eyre so much and I'm afraid it will be too critical of it. And also, I never felt like I needed to know more about that particular side character. But I also didn't realize it was so short! I may have to give it a try just because I'm a completionist.

@cotemoraga3608 5 жыл бұрын

Do the school version of this PLEASE!

@booksandquills 5 жыл бұрын

+Cote Moraga I genuinely can’t remember what I read in high school! 🙈

@GreenBitterfly 5 жыл бұрын

Agreed! Always interested in school set texts, interesting to see the differences even between schools in the UK.

@cotemoraga3608 5 жыл бұрын

@@booksandquills Maybe with the current version of what schools in the UK are required to read now, I don't think is that different, I'm from Latin America and we also read lots of classics. I think that would be interesting. Just saying...

@aflowerthatcannotbebloomed 5 жыл бұрын

Also the Dutch books we had to read in high school were pretty boring and aren't that well known outside of the Netherlands

@GreenBitterfly 5 жыл бұрын

I love The Ministry of Fear, one of the underated Graham Greene books.

@someonerandom8552 5 жыл бұрын

Lol I've always said that Middle English sounds like the German language and Dutch language had a baby together.

@katieha12345 5 жыл бұрын

I didn't study English but my boyfriend did, and both his undergrad and Master's dissertations were on Gravity's Rainbow or other Thomas Pynchon books, so he keeps trying to get me to read Pynchon and I'm like NO I do not want!! I love Salinger's Glass family short stories, my faves so far are Franny & Zooey but I have yet to read the collection For Esme, With Love and Squalor and I'm excited for it!

@lasaves3207 5 жыл бұрын

Ik studeer ook Engels in Leiden en ik ben echt obsessed geworden met Wuthering Heights, en ik vond Middel Engels altijd hilarisch, vooral Chaucer. 😂 Atwood vond ik ook geweldig, bijvoorbeeld Death by Landscape, maar we lazen ook dingen als Waiting for Godot, en dat is gewoon puur gezwam. ☺️ Love the video!

@annabanana8013 5 жыл бұрын

I did English at uni as well and took a course on cannibalism in literature and it was amazing!!

@lilsebastian199 5 жыл бұрын

I did a course on Toni Morrison and Edward Said and I have to say I loved everything I read by Morrison, who is an author I probably wouldn't even have heard if it wasn't for this course.

@jem2627 5 жыл бұрын

One of the subjects I did earlier this year was Australian writing and cultural change. One period we looked at was the interwar period, and we focused on women writers. I picked up some great novels that I may otherwise not have considered. Some classics I'd heard of and some I probably never would have known about - Tiburon by Kylie Tennant, My Brilliant Career by Miles Franklin and The getting of wisdom by Henry Handel Richardson.

@simonh5947 5 жыл бұрын

I had to read Oliver Twist in high school and hated it. But then at uni, I had to read Great Expectations and loved it. So I went back and re-read Oliver Twist and now I really like it, but not as much as Great Expectations... I also discovered post-modern literature while at uni by reading White Noise by Don DeLilo and really enjoy that too. Also, I really recommend you getting on to the second season of The Handmaid's Tale ASAP - it's so good! And now there's a book sequel that has been announced by Atwood. :D

@faduma349 5 жыл бұрын

Interestingly I read Wide Sargasso Sea in uni before I read Jane Eyre so once I did finish it, it felt more complete since I got a backstory on the character

@broccbadgerbean 5 жыл бұрын

I have always wished I did English Lit in Uni, but never did. My mum did though and provided me with a list of books to read which I treasure ^_^ I really loved this video. I am not that much into dystopian, but The Day of the Triffids sounds really good... I studied Handmaid's Tale in high school and it terrified me XD

@Larissa_KD 5 жыл бұрын

I followed a course called Slavery and Memory in the Black Atlantic in my minor on Cultural Memory, for which I had to read Beloved by Toni Morrison and I Tituba, Black Witch of Salem by Maryse Condé, and I wrote my paper for the course on Kindred by Octavia Butler. They have become real favorites, and I think it was one of my favorite uni courses ever.

@laurajasmijn483 5 жыл бұрын

Very excited to read this, I'm following that course next semester!

@Larissa_KD 5 жыл бұрын

@@laurajasmijn483 Ohh enjoy! Let's hope they kept the syllabus the same, these books were great!

@georginah4110 5 жыл бұрын

Slaughterhouse 5!!! I doubt I would have ever read that, as I dont really read sci-fi (althout obviously slaughterhouse 5 is much more than that) but yeah its my faaavourite book that we were ever made to read lol. along with murukami in general

@lynperrett5267 5 жыл бұрын

I remember sitting around the radio with my family on Saturday evenings listening to The Day of the Triffids. We were totally engrossed in the story.

@booksandquills 5 жыл бұрын

+Lynette Perrett ohhhh I wonder if it’s still available.

@lynperrett5267 5 жыл бұрын

booksandquills I live in Australia, and it was on the ABC ( radio station). Would have been in the 60’s, as I was still at school, I am now retired. I don’t think it is available, sorry.

@linamekawatches214 5 жыл бұрын

Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse!

@Missbellissima21 5 жыл бұрын

Almost every book I read for school or university was emotionally devastating. This isn’t a favorite, but I still get angry when I think about “The Age of Innocence” and this video just reminded me of it 😂

@chocolaterockz 5 жыл бұрын

does alice have a twitter or anything? i love her!! and her dress/top!!1

@anaemmawatson 5 жыл бұрын

Could you share the required reading lists? I'd love to have it. English lit sts unite!

@ABFrank. 4 жыл бұрын

Alice is the best

@Sleepover137 5 жыл бұрын

Our class also disliked The Road :D Maybe it's a Dutch/German thing XD

@ChristianRumi 5 жыл бұрын

also didnt like the road and liked handmaids tale and day of the triffids (am canadian, so its not only a dutch thing). gotta get to others of wyndhams (have the chrysalids on my shelf), but ya he's good.

@Roxanewolfie 5 жыл бұрын

i believe the gothic books video is in fact not in the description! 0: that or i'm going blind!

@averekriz 5 жыл бұрын

i'm german, but at uni in the netherlands, in groningen, right now. i am bummed out about two things in terms of reading. 1. so many books about straight, white, cis, privileged people snd their "problems". i don't give a shit about it. give me queer, poc, female stories! not to say that i hate all of them, but i just want a little bit more diversity. 2. no trigger warnings or even considering that some people might not be able to read about matters like rape, suicide and mental illness. i'm pretty ill at the moment with depression and having to write an essay on a text about a hanging isn't the best thing. but it's what i have to do.

@ONYXPages 2 жыл бұрын

Very very random that KZfaq suggested this to me! You might be interested in Gothic Black SciFi that just came out! Byeeee!

@booksandquills 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks for sharing! The one by Flame Tree Publishing? I love your channel :D

@ONYXPages 2 жыл бұрын

Yes! Have you read it? Just got it and it’s gorgeous!

@booksandquills 2 жыл бұрын

I hadn’t heard about it, but have ordered it now. Thanks for the recommendation! 👍

@averekriz 5 жыл бұрын

i wish i did english lit instead of english language and culture, because i can't stand phonology or sentence structure and basically anything that says "linguistics" in the course title