- Agee, James
- A Death in the Family
- Story of loss and heartbreak felt when a young father dies.
-
- Anderson, Sherwood
- Winesburg, Ohio
- A collection of short stories lays bare the life of a small town in
the Midwest.
-
- Baldwin, James
- Go Tell It On the Mountain
- Semi-autobiographical novel about a 14-year-old black youth's religious
conversion.
-
- Bellamy, Edward
- Looking Backward: 2000-1887
- Written in 1887 about a young man who travels in time to a utopian
year 2000, where economic security and a healthy moral environment have
reduced crime.
-
- Bellow, Saul
- Seize the Day
- A son grapples with his love and hate for an unworthy father.
-
- Bradbury, Ray
- Fahrenheit 451
- Reading is a crime and firemen burn books in this futuristic society.
-
- Cather, Willa
- My Antonia
- Immigrant pioneers strive to adapt to the Nebraska prairies.
-
- Chopin, Kate
- The Awakening
- The story of a New Orleans woman who abandons her husband and children
to search for love and self-understanding.
-
- Clark, Walter Van Tilburg
- The Ox-Bow Incident
- When a group of citizens discovers one of their members has been murdered
by cattle rustlers, they form an illegal posse, pursue the murderers, and
lynch them.
-
- Cormier, Robert
- The Chocolate War
- Jerry Renault challenges the power structure of his school when he
refuses to sell chocolates for the annual fundraiser.
-
- Crane, Stephen
- The Red Badge of Courage
- During the Civil War, Henry Fleming joins the army full of romantic
visions of battle which are shattered by combat.
-
- Dorris, Michael
- A Yellow Raft in Blue Water
- Three generations of Native American women recount their searches for
identity and love.
-
- Ellison, Ralph
- Invisible Man
- A black man's search for himself as an individual and as a member of
his race and his society.
-
- Faulkner, William
- As I Lay Dying
- The Bundren family takes the ripening corpse of Addie, wife and mother,
on a gruesomely comic journey.
-
- Fitzgerald, F. Scott
- The Great Gatsby
- A young man corrupts himself and the American Dream to regain a lost
love.
-
- Gaines, Ernest
- The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman
- In her 100 years, Miss Jane Pittman experiences it all, from slavery
to the civil rights movement.
-
- Hawthorne, Nathaniel
- The Scarlet Letter
- An adulterous Puritan woman keeps secret the identity of the father
of her illegitimate child.
-
- Heller, Joseph
- Catch-22
- A broad comedy about a WWII bombardier based in Italy and his efforts
to avoid bombing missions.
-
- Hemingway, Ernest
- A Farewell to Arms
- During World War I, an American lieutenant runs away with the woman
who nurses him back to health.
-
- Hurston, Zora Neale
- Their Eyes Were Watching God
- Janie repudiates many roles in her quest for self-fulfillment.
-
- Kesey, Ken
- One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
- A novel about a power struggle between the head nurse and one of the
male patients in a mental institution.
-
- Lee, Harper
- To Kill a Mockingbird
- At great peril to himself and his children, lawyer Atticus Finch defends
an African-American man accused of raping a white woman in a small Alabama
town.
-
- Lewis, Sinclair
- Main Street
- A young doctor's wife tries to change the ugliness, dullness and ignorance
which prevail in Gopher Prairie, Minn.
-
- London, Jack
- Call of the Wild
- Buck is a loyal pet dog until cruel men make him a pawn in their search
for Klondike gold.
-
- McCullers, Carson
- The Member of the Wedding
- A young southern girl is determined to be the third party on a honeymoon,
despite all the advice against it from friends and family.
-
- Melville, Herman
- Moby-Dick
- A complex novel about a mad sea captain's pursuit of the White Whale.
-
- Morrison, Toni
- Sula
- The lifelong friendship of two women becomes strained when one causes
the other's husband to abandon her.
-
- O'Connor, Flannery
- A Good Man is Hard to Find
- Social awareness, the grotesque, and the need for faith characterize
these stories of the contemporary South.
-
- Parks, Gordon
- The Learning Tree
- A fictional study of a black family in a small Kansas town in the 1920s.
-
- Plath, Sylvia
- The Bell Jar
- The heartbreaking story of a talented young woman's descent into madness.
-
- Poe, Edgar Allan
- Great Tales and Poems
- Poe is considered the father of detective stories and a master of supernatural
tales.
-
- Potok, Chaim
- The Chosen
- Friendship between two Jewish boys, one Hasidic and the other Orthodox,
begins at a baseball game and flourishes despite their different backgrounds
and beliefs.
-
- Salinger, J.D.
- The Catcher in the Rye
- A prep school dropout rejects the "phoniness" he sees all
about him.
-
- Sinclair, Upton
- The Jungle
- The deplorable conditions of the Chicago stockyards are exposed in
this turn-of-the-century novel.
-
- Steinbeck, John
- The Grapes of Wrath
- The desperate flight of tenant farmers from Oklahoma during the Depression.
-
- Stowe, Harriet Beecher
- Uncle Tom's Cabin
- The classic tale that awakened a nation about the slave system.
Tan, Amy
- The Joy Luck Club
- After her mother's death, a young Chinese-American woman learns of
her mother's tragic early life in China.
-
- Twain, Mark
- The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
- Huck and Jim, a runaway slave, travel down the Mississippi in search
of freedom.
-
- Vonnegut, Kurt
- Slaughterhouse-Five
- Billy Pilgrim, an optometrist from Ilium, New York, shuttles between
World War II Dresden and a luxurious zoo on the planet Tralfamadore.
-
- Walker, Alice
- The Color Purple
- A young woman sees herself as property until another woman teaches
her to value herself.
-
- Welty, Eudora
- Thirteen Stories
- A collection of short stories about people and life in the deep South.
-
- Wolfe, Thomas
- Look Homeward, Angel
- A novel depicting the coming of age of Eugene Gant and his passion
to experience life.
-
- Wright, Richard
- Native Son
- Bigger Thomas, a young man from the Chicago slums, lashes out against
a hostile society by committing two murders.
- Achebe, Chinua
- Things Fall Apart
- Okonkwo, a proud village leader, is driven to murder and suicide by
European changes to his traditional Ibo society.
-
- Allende, Isabel
- House of the Spirits
- The story of the Trueba family in Chile, from the turn of the century
to the violent days of the overthrow of the Salvador Allende government
in 1973.
-
- Austen, Jane
- Pride and Prejudice
- Love and marriage among the English country gentry of Austen's day.
-
- Balzac, Honore de
- Pere Goriot
- A father is reduced to poverty after giving money to his daughters.
-
- Borges, Jorge Luis
- Labyrinths
- An anthology of literary fireworks based on Borges' favorite symbol.
-
- Bronte, Charlotte
- Jane Eyre
- An intelligent and passionate governess falls in love with a strange,
moody man tormented by dark secrets.
-
- Bronte, Emily
- Wuthering Heights
- One of the masterpieces of English romanticism, this is a novel of
Heathcliff and Catherine, love and revenge.
-
- Camus, Albert
- The Stranger
- A man who is virtually unknown to both himself and others commits a
pointless murder for which he has no explanation.
-
- Carroll, Lewis
- Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
- A fantasy in which Alice follows the White Rabbit to a dream world.
-
- Cervantes, Miguel de
- Don Quixote
- An eccentric old gentleman sets out as a knight "tilting at windmills"
to right the wrongs of the world.
-
- Conrad, Joseph
- Heart of Darkness
- The novel's narrator journeys into the Congo where he discovers the
extent to which greed can corrupt a good man.
-
- Defoe, Daniel
- Robinson Crusoe
- The adventures of a man who spends 24 years on an isolated island.
-
- Dickens, Charles
- Great Expectations
- The moving story of the rise, fall, and rise again of a humbly-born
young orphan.
-
- Dostoevski, Feodor
- Crime and Punishment
- A psychological novel about a poor student who murders an old woman
pawnbroker and her sister.
-
- Eliot, George
- The Mill on the Floss
- Maggie is miserable because her brother disapproves of her choices
of romances.
-
- Esquivel, Laura
- Like Water for Chocolate
- As the youngest of three daughters in a turn-of-the-century Mexican
family, Tita may not marry but must remain at home to care for her mother.
-
- Flaubert, Gustave
- Madame Bovary
- In her extramarital affairs, a bored young wife seeks unsuccessfully
to find the emotional experiences she craves.
-
- Forster, E.M.
- A Passage to India
- A young English woman in British-ruled India accuses an Indian doctor
of sexual assault.
-
- Fuentes, Carlos
- The Death of Artemio Cruz
- A powerful Mexican newspaper publisher recalls his life as he lies
dying at age 71.
-
- Garcia Marquez, Gabriel
- One Hundred Years of Solitude
- A technique called magical realism is used in this portrait of seven
generations in the lives of the Buendia family.
-
- Gogol, Nikolai
- The Overcoat
- Russian tales of good and evil.
-
- Golding, William
- Lord of the Flies
- English schoolboys marooned on an uninhabited island test the values
of civilization when they attempt to set up a society of their own.
-
- Grass, Gunter
- The Tin Drum
- Oskar describes the amoral conditions through which he has lived in
Germany, both during and after the Hitler regime.
-
- Hardy, Thomas
- Tess of the D'Urbervilles
- The happiness of Tess and her husband is destroyed when she confesses
that she bore a child as the result of a forced sexual relationship with
her employer's son.
-
- Hesse, Hermann
- Siddhartha
- Emerging from a kaleidoscope of experiences and pleasures, a young
Brahmin ascends to a state of peace and mystic holiness.
-
- Huxley, Aldous
- Brave New World
- A bitter satire of the future, in which the world is controlled by
advances in science and social changes.
-
- Joyce, James
- A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
- A novel about a young man growing up in Ireland and rebelling against
family, country, and religion.
-
- Kafka, Franz
- The Trial
- A man is tried for a crime he knows nothing about, yet for which he
feels guilt.
-
- Lawrence, D.H.
- Sons and Lovers
- An autobiographical novel about a youth torn between a dominant working-class
father and a possessive genteel mother.
-
- Mann, Thomas
- Death in Venice
- In this novella, an author becomes aware of a darker side of himself
when he visits Venice.
-
- Orwell, George
- Animal Farm
- Animals turn the tables on their masters.
-
- Pasternak, Boris
- Doctor Zhivago
- An epic novel of Russia before and after the Bolshevik revolution.
-
- Paton, Alan
- Cry, the Beloved Country
- A country Zulu pastor searches for his sick sister in Johannesburg,
and discovers that she has become a prostitute and his son a murderer.
-
- Remarque, Erich Maria
- All Quiet on the Western Front
- A young German soldier in World War I experiences pounding shellfire,
hunger, sickness, and death.
-
- Scott, Sir Walter
- Ivanhoe
- Tale of Ivanhoe, the disinherited knight, Lady Rowena, Richard the
Lion-Hearted, and Robin Hood at the time of the Crusades.
-
- Shelley, Mary W.
- Frankenstein
- A gothic tale of terror in which Franken-stein creates a monster from
corpses.
-
- Solzhenitsyn, Aleksander
- One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
- Ivan Denisovich Shukhov endures one more day in a Siberian prison camp
and finds joy in survival.
-
- Swift, Jonathan
- Gulliver's Travels
- Gulliver encounters dwarfs and giants and has other strange adventures
when his ship is wrecked in distant lands.
-
- Tolstoy, Leo
- Anna Karenina
- Anna forsakes her husband for the dashing Count Vronsky and brief happiness.
-
- Weisel, Elie
- Night
- A searing account of the Holocaust as experienced by a 15-year-old
boy.
- Wells, H.G.
- The Time Machine
- A scientist invents a machine that transports him into the future.
- Angelou, Maya
- I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
- An African-American writer traces her coming of age.
-
- Ashe, Arthur and Arnold Rampersad.
- Days of Grace
- Biography of a highly respected tennis star and citizen of the world
who dies of AIDS.
-
- Baker, Russell
- Growing Up
- A columnist with a sense of humor takes a gentle look at his childhood
in Baltimore during the Depression.
-
- Berenbaum, Michael
- The World Must Know: The History of the Holocaust as told in the
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
-
- Brown, Dee
- Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
- A narrative of the white man's conquest of the American land as the
Indian victims experienced it.
-
- Cooke, Alistair
- Alistair Cooke's America
- A history of the continent, with anecdotes and insight into what makes
America work.
-
- Criddle, Jan. D. and Teeda Butt Mam
- To Destroy You Is No Loss: The Odyssey of a Cambodian Family
- After the 1975 Communist takeover of Cambodia, Teeda's upper-class
life is re-duced to surviving impossible conditions.
-
- Crow Dog, Mary and Richard Erdoes
- Lakota Woman
- Mary Crow Dog stands with 2,000 other Native Americans at the site
of the Wounded Knee massacre, demonstrating for Native American rights.
-
- Curie, Eve
- Madame Curie
- In sharing personal papers and her own memories, a daughter pays tribute
to her mother, a scientific genius.
-
- Delany, Sara and A. Elizabeth with Amy Hill Hearth
- Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters' First 100 Years
- Two daughters of former slaves tell their stories of fighting racial
and gender pre-
- judice during the 20th century.
-
- Epstein, Norrie
- Friendly Shakespeare: A Thoroughly Painless Guide to the Best of
the Bard.
- Gain a perspective on Shakespeare's works through these sidelights,
interpretations, anecdotes, and historical insights.
-
- Frank, Anne
- The Diary of a Young Girl
- The story of a Jewish family forced by encroaching Nazis to live in
hiding.
-
- Franklin, Benjamin
- The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
- Considered one of the most interesting autobiographies in English.
-
- Haley, Alex
- Roots
- Traces Haley's search for the history of his family, from Africa through
the era of slavery to the 20th century.
-
- Hersey, John
- Hiroshima
- Six Hiroshima survivors reflect on the aftermath of the first atomic
bomb.
-
- Karlsen, Carol
- The Devil in the Shape of a Woman: Witchcraft in Colonial New England
- The status of women in colonial society affects the Salem witch accusations.
-
- Keller, Helen
- The Story of My Life
- The story of Helen Keller, who was both blind and deaf, and her relationship
with her devoted teacher Anne Sullivan.
-
- Kennedy, John F.
- Profiles in Courage
- A series of profiles of Americans who took courageous stands in public
life.
-
- King, Martin Luther, Jr.
- A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings of Martin Luther King,
Jr.
- King's most important writings are gathered together in one source.
-
- Kovic, Ron
- Born on the Fourth of July
- Paralyzed in the Vietnam War, 21-year-old Ron Kovic received little
support from his country and its government.
-
- Machiavelli, Niccolo
- The Prince
- A treatise giving the absolute ruler practical advice on ways to maintain
a strong central government.
-
- Malcom X, with Alex Haley
- The Autobiography of Malcom X
- Traces the transformation of a controversial Black Muslim figure from
street hustler to religious and national leader.
-
- Marx, Karl
- The Communist Manifesto
- Expresses Marx's belief in the inevitability of conflict between social
classes and calls on the workers of the world to unite and revolt.
-
- Mathabane, Mark
- Kaffir Boy: The True Story of a Black Youth's Coming of Age in Apartheid
South Africa
- A tennis player breaks down racial barriers and escape to a better
life in America.
-
- Maybury-Lewis, David
- Millenium: Tribal Wisdom and the Modern World
- Profiles members of several tribal cultures.
-
- McPherson, James
- Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era
- From the Mexican War to Appomattox, aspects of the Civil War are examined.
-
- Mills, Kay
- This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer
- Fannie Lou Hamer, a sharecropper's daughter, uses her considerable
courage and singing talent to become a leader in the civil rights movement.
-
- Plato
- The Republic
- Plato creates an ideal society where
- justice is equated with health and happiness in the state and the individual.
-
- Rogosin, Donn
- Invisible Men: Life in Baseball's Negro Leagues
- Negro League players finally gain recognition for their contributions
to baseball.
-
- Thoreau, Henry David
- Walden
- In the mid-19th century, Thoreau spends 26 months alone in the woods
to "front the essential facts of life."
-
- Tocqueville, Alexis de
- Democracy in America
- This classic in political literature examines American society from
the viewpoint of a leading French magistrate who visited the U.S. in 1831.
-
- Tuchman, Barbara
- A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous Fourteenth Century
- Tuchman uses the example of a single feudal lord to trace the history
of the 14th century.
-
- Williams, Juan
- Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years, 1954-65
- From Brown vs. the Board of Education to the Voting Rights Act, Williams
outlines the social and political gains of African-Americans
-
- Yolen, Jane
- Favorite Folktales From Around the World
- Yolen frames these powerful tales with explanations of historical and
literary significance.
- Attenborough, David
- The Living Planet: A Portrait of the Earth
- Various habitats expand the vision of Planet Earth.
-
- Bronowski, Jacob
- The Ascent of Man
- A scientist's history of the human mind and the human condition.
-
- Carson, Rachel
- Silent Spring
- Carson's original clarion call to environmental action sets the stage
for saving our planet.
-
- Darwin, Charles
- The Origin of Species
- The classic exposition of the theory of
- evolution by natural selection.
-
- Hawking, Stephen
- A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes
- Cosmology becomes understandable as the author discusses the origin,
evolution, and fate of our universe.
-
- Leopold, Aldo
- A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There
- Leopold shares his present and future visions of a natural world.
- Campbell, Joseph
- The Power of Myth
- Explores themes and symbols from world religions and their relevance
to humankind's spiritual journey today.
-
- Hamilton, Edith
- Mythology
- Gods and heroes, their clashes and adventures, come alive in this splendid
retelling of the Greek, Roman and Norse myths.
-
- Kotlowitz, Alex
- There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in
Urban America
- Lafayette and Pharoah Rivers and their family struggle to survive in
one of Chicago's worst housing projects.
-
- Kozol, Jonathan
- Savage Inequalities: Children in America's Schools
- Kozol's indictment of the public school system advocates equalizing
per pupil public school expenditures.
-
- Terkel, Studs
- Race: How Blacks and Whites Think and Feel About the American Obsession
- This kaleidoscope covers the full range of America's views on racial
issues.
-
- Beckett, Samuel
- Waiting for Godot
- Powerful, symbolic portrayal of the human condition.
-
- Brecht, Bertolt
- Mother Courage and Her Children
- A product of the Nazi era, Mother Courage is a feminine "Everyman"
in a play on the futility of war.
-
- Chekhov, Anton
- The Cherry Orchard
- The orchard evokes different meanings for the impoverished aristocrat
and the merchant who buys it.
-
- Ibsen, Henrik
- A Doll's House
- A woman leaves her family to pursue personal freedom.
-
- Marlowe, Christopher
- Doctor Faustus
- First dramatization of the medieval legend of a man who sold his soul
to the devil.
-
- Miller, Arthur
- Death of a Salesman
- The tragedy of a typical American who, at age 63, is faced with what
he cannot face: defeat and disillusionment.
-
- O'Neill, Eugene
- Long Day's Journey Into Night
- A tragedy set in 1912 in the summer home of an isolated, theatrical
family.
-
- Sarte, Jean Paul
- No Exit
- A modern morality play in which three persons are condemned to hell
because of crimes against humanity.
-
- Shakespeare, William
- Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet,
- Macbeth, Twelfth Night, others.
-
- Shaw, Bernard
- Man and Superman, Saint Joan, Pygmalion, others.
- Sophocles
- Oedipus Rex
- Classical tragedy of Oedipus who unwittingly killed his father, married
his mother and brought the plague to Thebes.
-
- Wilde, Oscar
- The Importance of Being Earnest
- Comedy exposing quirks and foibles of Victorian society.
-
- Wilder, Thornton
- Our Town
- The dead of a New Hamshire village of the early 1900s appreciate life
more than the living.
-
- Williams, Tennessee
- A Streetcar Named Desire
- Blanche Dubois' fantasies of refinement and grandeur are brutally destroyed
by her brother-in-law.
-
- Wilson, August
- The Piano Lesson
- Drama set in 1936 Pittsburgh chronicles black experience in America.
- Angelou, Maya
- And Still I Rise
- Poems reflecting themes from her autobiography.
-
- Brooks, Gwendolyn
- Selected Poems
- Poetry focusing on the lives of African American residents of Northern
urban ghettos, particularly women.
-
- Cummings, E.E.
- Complete Poems, 1904-1962
- Prepared directly from the original manuscripts, preserving the original
typography and format.
-
- Dickinson, Emily
- The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson
- A chronological arrangement of all known Dickinson poems and fragments.
-
- Donne, John
- The Complete Poetry of John Donne
- Poems distinguished by wit, profundity of thought, passion and subtlety.
-
- Eliot, T.S.
- The Waste Land
- A poem of despair by one of the most important modern poets in English.
-
- Frost, Robert
- The Poetry of Robert Frost
- Collected works reflecting both flashing insight and practical wisdom.
-
- Ginsberg, Allen
- Howl and Other Poems
- Works from the leading poet of the so-called "beat generation."
-
- Giovanni, Nikki
- My House
- The poems in this collection deal with love, family, nature, friends,
music, aloneness, blackness, and Africa.
-
- Hughes, Langston
- Selected Poems
- Poems selected by Hughes shortly before his death in 1967, representing
work from his entire career.
-
- Keats, John
- Complete Poems
- Among the greatest odes in English, written by a genius who died young.
-
- Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
- The Poetical Works of Longfellow
- Includes "The Song of Hiawatha" and "The Courtship of
Miles Standish."
-
- Sandburg, Carl
- Complete Poems
- Sandburg celebrates industrial and agricultural America and the common
people.
-
- Thomas, Dylan
- Poems of Dylan Thomas
- Poetry by a "word magician" with a powerful imagination.
-
- Williams, William Carlos
- Selected Poems
- Williams' poetry is firmly rooted in the commonplace details of American
life.
-
- Wordsworth, William
- Poems
- Poetry revealing the extraordinary beauty and significance of simple
things.
-
- Yeats, William Butler
- The Poems
- Leading poet of the Irish Renaissance.
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