Books I read before they were set in school I generally loved, saw the point of, and have gone back to. Books that school got to first, I utterly loathed. Have since then discovered that Dickens can actually be worth reading, as long as no-one's attempting to Teach Him - still haven't overcome my aversion to George Elliot or DH Lawrence.

But fortunately for me, most of the rest of the usual suspects I got to first. And my mother made sure I'd seen Shakespeare on stage years before we were expected to read them in class.

- Creatrix