There is definitely some fat to trim. For example, I remember spending almost an entire marking period studying the poems from Edgar Allan Poe. Nothing personal against the guy, but it's largely useless knowledge for the majority of people.
I rebelled internally and hated much of my English courses. “There’s no way the author intended all that secondary meaning.” “I read that whole story and didn’t even find out if the Tiger was behind the door?!” “Who cares about the island kid’s glasses?!”
35 years later, the ability to write English has probably had at least the same amount of positive influence over my career as my ability to write C++ or Javascript. I should probably apologize to my high school English teachers.
