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Books to compare (for coursework/comparative essays)

Around this time, we always get a lot of threads asking about good books to compare for comparative essays. So I decided to make a list of different genres and themes here, and this thread is also a place that you can ask for advice. :woo:

Dystopian

Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale (1985)
George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)
Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go (2005)
T. S. Eliot, The Wasteland (1922)
Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (1932)
Yevgeny Zamyatin, We (1924)
Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange (1962)

Gothic

Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorain Gray (1890)
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)
Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights (1847)
Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre (1847)
Robert Lewis Stevenson, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886)
Christopher Marlowe, Dr Faustus (1592)
Bram Stoker, Dracula (1897)
Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca (1938)

Romance and Sexuality

Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (1813)
Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary (1857)
D. H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)

War

Joseph Heller, Catch-22 (1961)
Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five (1972)
Ernest Hemmingway, A Farewell to Arms (1929)
Vera Brittain, Testament of Youth (1933)
Margaret Mitchell, Gone with the Wind (1936)
Tim O'Brien, The Things They Carried (1990)
Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front (1929)
Sebastian Faulks, Birdsong (1993)
Pat Barker, Regeneration (1991)

Pastoral

Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene (1590)
Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1891)
Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited (1945)
George Eliot, Mill on the Floss (1860)
George Eliot, Middlemarch (1871)
John Milton, Paradise Lost (1667)
Annie Proulx, Brokeback Mountain (1997)

Bildungsroman (The Growing Up Novel)

E. M. Forster, A Room with a View (1908)
Charles Dickens, Great Expectations (1861)
Dodie Smith, I Capture the Castle (1948)
Ian McEwan, Atonement (2001)
Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre (1847)

Religion

Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche, Purple Hibiscus (2003)
John Milton, Paradise Lost (1667)
Dante, The Divine Comedy (1320)
Philip Pullman, His Dark Materials (1995-2000)
Jeanetter Winterson, Oranges are not the Only Fruit (1985)
Iris Murdoch, The Bell (1958)
Christopher Marlowe, Dr Faustus (1592)

Science

Christopher Marlowe, Dr Faustus (1592)
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)



This list is a work in progress - @The Empire Odyssey @Platopus @anyone else any ideas?

If you have an comparative essay to do over the summer, ask for advice in this thread!
(edited 7 years ago)

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Original post by Fox Corner

X


You have so many of my favourites! For Dystopian, what about 'The Wateland' by T.S. Eliot, Brave New World' by Huxley and 'We' by Yevgeny Zamyatin?

For war, 'Testament of Youth' by Vera Brittain and does 'Gone With the Wind' count?

Is 'Mill on The Floss' pastoral?
(edited 7 years ago)
Reply 2
Original post by Platopus
You have so many of my favourites! For Dystopian, what about 'The Wateland' by T.S. Eliot, Brave New World' by Huxley and 'We' by Yevgeny Zamyatin?

For war, 'Testament of Youth' by Vera Brittain and does 'Gone With the Wind' count?

Is 'Mill on The Floss' pastoral?


Thanks! I've added all of these :biggrin:

If you think of any more, or any categories, let me know!
Original post by Fox Corner
X


Dystopian
A Clockwork Orange (1962)
Gothic Dracula (1897)
Rebecca (1938)
War
Birdsong (1993)Regeneration (1991)
Pastoral Paradise Lost (1667)Brokeback Mountain (1997)

I think that's the most popular A-level texts I can think of!
Reply 4
Original post by The Empire Odyssey
Dystopian
A Clockwork Orange (1962)
Gothic Dracula (1897)
Rebecca (1938)
War
Birdsong (1993)Regeneration (1991)
Pastoral Paradise Lost (1667)Brokeback Mountain (1997)

I think that's the most popular A-level texts I can think of!


Thanks! I've added them in :smile:
Hey everyone! So I am doing Advanced Higher English after the summer and my chosen books are Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights for a comparison dissertation. I absolutely love the style of writing in these books, and I'm a sucker for romance/gothic novels. I am reading these books right now and really enjoying it so I highly recommend it to anyone doing A Level/Uni etc disserations and need books to compare!

Even if you are doing A Levels, my exam board SQA has a very helpful list of authors you can look at and also has a list of possible dissertation questions. Take a look at it here: http://www.sqa.org.uk/files_ccc/Specialist_Study_Supplemetary_Guidance_on_the_Selection_of_Suitable_Topics.pdf

Hope this helps to anyone about to write an essay. :biggrin:
Original post by sameehaiqbal
Hey everyone! So I am doing Advanced Higher English after the summer and my chosen books are Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights for a comparison dissertation. I absolutely love the style of writing in these books, and I'm a sucker for romance/gothic novels. I am reading these books right now and really enjoying it so I highly recommend it to anyone doing A Level/Uni etc disserations and need books to compare!

Even if you are doing A Levels, my exam board SQA has a very helpful list of authors you can look at and also has a list of possible dissertation questions. Take a look at it here: http://www.sqa.org.uk/files_ccc/Specialist_Study_Supplemetary_Guidance_on_the_Selection_of_Suitable_Topics.pdf

Hope this helps to anyone about to write an essay. :biggrin:


You are sadly mistaken about those two books aha! I have no met a single soul apart from my old(er) English teachers that loved Wuthering Heights! Ugh what a dreadful novel!

And I had to do a Marxist reading of Jane Eyre at uni and it too was awful! I have yet to encounter a (lit) student who enjoys Bronte! :P
Original post by The Empire Odyssey
You are sadly mistaken about those two books aha! I have no met a single soul apart from my old(er) English teachers that loved Wuthering Heights! Ugh what a dreadful novel!

And I had to do a Marxist reading of Jane Eyre at uni and it too was awful! I have yet to encounter a (lit) student who enjoys Bronte! :P


Really? I have just finished reading both books and I absolutely love them. I'm really excited to start writing about these books :smile:
Original post by sameehaiqbal
Really? I have just finished reading both books and I absolutely love them. I'm really excited to start writing about these books :smile:


WH was just a no-go for me. Was forced to study it at A2, but I literally refused to because I found it absolutely ridiculously incomprehensible to like!

Same with JE. The character is just so pathetic! Why would you go back to Mr Rochester, like seriously?! Ugh! I dunno!

What's your essay on? And how many words? Studying only 2 books must've be a very long essay?
Original post by Fox Corner
Thanks! I've added all of these :biggrin:

If you think of any more, or any categories, let me know!

What about a romance genre? I feel that 'Pride and Prejudice' must make its way onto that list!
Original post by The Empire Odyssey
WH was just a no-go for me. Was forced to study it at A2, but I literally refused to because I found it absolutely ridiculously incomprehensible to like!


Same with JE. The character is just so pathetic! Why would you go back to Mr Rochester, like seriously?! Ugh! I dunno!

What's your essay on? And how many words? Studying only 2 books must've be a very long essay?


The SQA have said that the dissertation word count must be no more than 3000 words and no less than 2500. I might be doing it on the narrative techniques employed in the portrayal of central female characters but of course this might change in the future if I think of something better.
Original post by Fox Corner
Around this time, we always get a lot of threads asking about good books to compare for comparative essays. So I decided to make a list of different genres and themes here, and this thread is also a place that you can ask for advice. :woo:

Dystopian

Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale (1985)
George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)
Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go (2005)
T. S. Eliot, The Wasteland (1922)
Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (1932)
Yevgeny Zamyatin, We (1924)
Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange (1962)

Gothic

Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorain Gray (1890)
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)
Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights (1847)
Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre (1847)
Robert Lewis Stevenson, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886)
Christopher Marlowe, Dr Faustus (1592)
Bram Stoker, Dracula (1897)
Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca (1938)

War

Joseph Heller, Catch-22 (1961)
Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five (1972)
Ernest Hemmingway, A Farewell to Arms (1929)
Vera Brittain, Testament of Youth (1933)
Margaret Mitchell, Gone with the Wind (1936)
Tim O'Brien, The Things They Carried (1990)
Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front (1929)
Sebastian Faulks, Birdsong (1993)
Pat Barker, Regeneration (1991)

Pastoral

Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene (1590)
Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1891)
Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited (1945)
George Eliot, Mill on the Floss (1860)
George Eliot, Middlemarch (1871)
John Milton, Paradise Lost (1667)
Annie Proulx, Brokeback Mountain (1997)

Bildungsroman (The Growing Up Novel)

E. M. Forster, A Room with a View (1908)
Charles Dickens, Great Expectations (1861)
Dodie Smith, I Capture the Castle (1948)

This list is a work in progress - @The Empire Odyssey @Platopus @anyone else any ideas?

If you have an comparative essay to do over the summer, ask for advice in this thread!

A great selection. 1984 is probably my favourite... Or animal farm... Or any Orwell book for that matter! How about you?
not sure if this is studied but purple hibiscus is a great bildungsroman
Original post by scrawlx101
not sure if this is studied but purple hibiscus is a great bildungsroman


I've added it to the list :h: I haven't read that one but I have read Half of a Yellow Sun by the same author and it was really really good.

Original post by AlexSharratt01
A great selection. 1984 is probably my favourite... Or animal farm... Or any Orwell book for that matter! How about you?


I thought 1984 and Animal Farm were really good, and I also thought Coming up for Air was really interesting - I hated Keep the Aspidistra Flying though!!

My favourite ones on this list are the Gothic ones, especially Doctor Faustus and Rebecca. I wrote both my dissertations on the Gothic so I really like it :woo:
Purple Hibiscus is not a bildungsroman as the main protagonist Kambili is still a child from start to finish. A bildungsroman is only that in which a character experiences moral or educational growth that starts from childhood and finishes at adulthood. Something like Mill on the Floss, Great Expectations or Jane Eyre is more suited to be a bildungsroman novel.

What is a real good and popular A-level bidungsroman is Atonement by Ian McEwan (2001). It's a heavy novel, but in my opinion so worth it!
Original post by Platopus
What about a romance genre? I feel that 'Pride and Prejudice' must make its way onto that list!


I've made a romance and sexuality genre - P&P is surely at the top of the list! Any others you can think of?

Original post by The Empire Odyssey
.

What is a real good and popular A-level bidungsroman is Atonement by Ian McEwan (2001). It's a heavy novel, but in my opinion so worth it!


I've added it in now :smile:
Original post by The Empire Odyssey
Purple Hibiscus is not a bildungsroman as the main protagonist Kambili is still a child from start to finish. A bildungsroman is only that in which a character experiences moral or educational growth that starts from childhood and finishes at adulthood. Something like Mill on the Floss, Great Expectations or Jane Eyre is more suited to be a bildungsroman novel.

What is a real good and popular A-level bidungsroman is Atonement by Ian McEwan (2001). It's a heavy novel, but in my opinion so worth it!


but surely it is? since kambili is 15 at the time of the novel and at the end she's about 18
Original post by scrawlx101
but surely it is? since kambili is 15 at the time of the novel and at the end she's about 18


It's more of a coming-of-age-story, than a bildungsroman. Often those two terms are interchangable. But a bildungsroman is usually childhood to adulthood. So literally from below the age of 10 to around 18-21+
Original post by Fox Corner
I've made a romance and sexuality genre - P&P is surely at the top of the list! Any others you can think of?

Well, there's anything by Jane Austen! And maybe Jane Eyre?
Original post by Platopus
Well, there's anything by Jane Austen! And maybe Jane Eyre?


I agree. I think Jane Eyre has only a few hints of Gothic. It's much more suited in the Romance genre.

While Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey is a Gothic piece of fiction.

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