But I come from a family of readers, who believed in reading great lit to children, at very early ages ( age appropriate; such as Lamb's Shakespeare for Children, when I was around 4 and the greats of children's lit and poetry...Lear, the Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen, Kipling, The leather Stocking Tales, etc. )and so I became an avid reader too.
And yes, we did HIAWATHA in the 3rd grade and the required reading just kept on accelerating.
When I was a teen, I asked my mother why she only read non-fiction and she said:"Because I have all of the great fiction there is to read already." and she had.
Modern authors haven't been able to write a decent novel in 50 years and all of it is so derivative and/or very badly written, that it's worthless.
Moms are the worst influences. Mine had me reading before I was supposed too and then accelerating to older levels of books. Agatha Christie, Ed McBain, and non fiction. She, still at 87 destroys books so fast and will reread one from years ago occasionally. I listened to the whole book Moby Dick. I told mom it was to long and boring. I would rather read War and Peace and the New York phone book before Moby Dick again. Trouble with older authors is the history of the times has to be in your mind or you don’t appreciate the story so much. To be able to read and be absorbed into the story is a gift from mom, mom is a gift from God.