Here is a long list of texts that will give you some pointers for your RPR. Take time to choose something that seems right for you, and as you first read through it, think about what the central concerns of the text are. What is it actually about, deep down? Please feel free to discuss this with me at any point.
Pre-Twentieth Century works
Jane Austen Pride & Prejudice
Sense & Sensibility
Emma
Charlotte Bronte Jane Eyre
Emily Bronte Wuthering Heights
Wilkie Collins The Moonstone
The Woman in White
J. Fenimore Cooper The Last of the Mohicans
Charles Dickens A Tale of Two Cities
The Pickwick Papers
David Copperfield
Alexander Dumas The Three Musketeers
The Man in the Iron Mask
George Eliot Middlemarch
Adame Bede
Mill on the Floss
Hogg Confessions of a Justified Sinner
Victor Hugo Les Miserables
Notre Dame de Paris
Kipling Kim
Sir Walter Scott Old Mortality Redgauntlet
R. L. Stevenson Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Weir of Hermiston
Oscar Wilde The Picture of Dorian Gray
20th Century
Kingsley Amis Lucky Jim
J. G. Ballard Empire of the Sun
The Drowned World
Raymond Chandler The Big Sleep
The Long Goodbye
Len Deighton Game, Set and Match
Hook, Line and Sinker
(Various titles)
R. F. Delderfield To Serve Them All My Days
F. Scott Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby
Tender is the Night
E. M. Forster A Passage to India
A Room With a View
Maurice
Frederick Forsyth The Day of the Jackal
The Fourth Protocol
Paul Gallico The Hand of Mary Constable
The Poseidon Adventure
Stella Gibbons Cold Comfort Farm
Dashiel Hammet The Maltese Falcon
The Thin Man
L. P. Hartley The Go-between
Ernest Hemingway A Farewell to Arms
For Whom the Bell Tolls
William Horwood Callanish
Skallagrigg
Geoffrey Household Rogue Male
John Le Carre Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
A Perfect Spy
The Russia House
The Night Manager
Harper Lee To Kill a Mockingbird
Eric Linklater Private Angelo
W. Somerset Maugham Of Human Bondage
Cakes and Ale
Collected Short Stories
A. J. Quinnel Siege of Silence
The Mahdi
Ruth Rendell Lake of Darkness
Collected Short Stories
J. D. Salinger The Catcher in the Rye
Paul Scott The Jewel in the Crown
Carol Shields The Stone Diaries
The Republic of Love
Alan Sillitoe The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner
Paul Theroux The Mosquito Coast
The Consul’s File
Leon Uris Mila 18
Trinity
Evelyn Waugh Decline and Fall
Brideshead Revisited
Morris West The Summer of the Red Wolf
Proteus
The Ringmaster
The Shoes of the Fisherman
Scottish
Elspeth Barker O Caledonia
Ian Hay Beith The First Hundred Thousand
George Blake The Shipbuilders
George Mackay Brown Greenvoe
Magnus
The Sun’s Net ss
Catherine Carswell Open the Door
A J Cronin The Citadel
The Keys of the Kingdom
Douglas Dunn Secret Villages ss
Margaret Elphinstone The Incomer
An Apple From a Tree ss
Ann Fine The Killjoy
Taking the Devil’s Advice
George Friel Mr. Alfred M.A.
The Boy Who Wanted Peace
Ralph Glasser Growing up in the Gorbals
Neil Gunn The Silver Darlings
Highland River
Butcher’s Broom
Cliff Hanley Dancing in the Streets
Another Street, Another Dance
Robin Jenkins The Cone Gatherers
Guests of War
The Thistle and the Grail
Fergus Lamont
James Kennaway Tunes of Glory
Jessie Kesson A White Bird Passes
Another Time, Another Place
Joan Lingard Reasonable Doubts
The Somen’s House
Brian McCabe The Other McCoy
The Lipstick Circus ss
Fionn MacColla And the Cock Crew
Carl MacDougall Elvis is Dead ss
Stone Over Water
The Devil and the Giro (ed.)
William McIlvanney Docherty
Laidlaw
The Papers of Tony Veitch
Compton McKenzie Whisky Galore
Bernard McLaverty Cal
A Time to Dance
The Great Profundo etc. ss
John Prebble Glencoe
Culloden
Christopher Rush Twelvemonth and a Day ss
Into the Ebb ss
Sir Walter Scott Old Mortality
Redgauntlet
Iain Crichton Smith Consider the Lilies
Thoughts of Murdo ss
Mr. Trill in Hades ss
Selected Poetry
Muriel Spark The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
A Far Cry from Kensington
Smyposium ss
Robert Louis Stevenson The Master of Ballantrae
Weir of Hermiston
Jeff Torrington Swing, Hammer, Swing
Historical
Ian Hay Beith The First Hundred Thousand
Edmund Blunden Undertones of War
Paul Brickhill The Dam Busters
Reach for the Sky
Vera Brittain Testament of Youth
D. K. Broster The Flight of the Heron
Taylor Campbell Dear and Glorious Physician
Stephen Crane The Red Badge of Courage
Lloyd Douglas The Robe
The Big Fisherman
Howard Fast Spartacus
James Allan Ford The Brave White Flag
John Galsworthy The Forsyte Saga
Lewis Grassic Gibbon Spartacus
Robert Graves I. Claudius
Claudius the God
Goodbye to All That
Neil Gunn Butcher’s Broom
Ernest Hemingway A Farewell to Arms
James Kennaway Tunes of Glory
Fionn MacColla And the Cock Crew
John Masters Bugles and a Tiger
The Road Past Mandalay
The Nightrunners of Bengal
James Michener Centennial
Nicholas Monsarrat The Cruel Sea
John Prebble Glencoe
Culloden
The Highland Clearances
Erich Remarque All Quiet on the Western Front
Ishobel Ross Little Grey Partridge
Cornelius Ryan A Bridge too Far
Nigel Tranter Robert the Bruce (various titles)
Leon Uris Exodus
Lew Wallace Ben Hur
Herman Wouk The Caine Mutiny
Romance And Adventure
Louisa May Alcott Little Women
H. E. Bates The Purple Plain
Fair Stood The Wind for France
R. D. Blackmore Lorna Doone
Charlotte Bronte Jane Eyre
Emily Bronte Wuthering Heights
A. J. Cronin Keys of the Kingdom
Hatter’s Castle
The Citadel
Daphne du Maurier Rebecca
(various titles)
Ernest Hemingway A Farewell to Arms
Jack London The Sea Wolf
Richard Mason The Wind Cannot Read
Colleen McCullough The Thorn Birds
Margaret Mitchell Gone with the Wind
Alexandra Ripley Scarlett
Nevil Shute A Town Like Alice
(various titles)
Han Suyin A Many Splendoured Thing
Mrs. Henry Wood East Lynne
Women
Louise May Alcott Little Women
Maya Angelou I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Jane Austen Emma
Vera Brittain Testament of Youth
Barbara Castle Sylvia & Christabel Pankhurst
George Eliot Middlemarch
Edna Healey Wives of Fame
Jessie Kesson The White Bird Passes
Another Time, Another Place
Alison Lurie Foreign Affairs
Edna O’Brien Country Girls
August is a Wicked Month
Ishobel Ross Little Grey Partridge
Francoise Sagan That Certain Smile
Incidental Music
Flora R. Schreiber Sybil
Mary Shelley Frankenstein
Fay Weldon Watching Me, Watching You
Letters to Alice (about Jane Austen)
Praxis
Puffball
Gothic, Science Fiction And Fantasy
Richard Adams Shardik
Watership Down
Isaac Asimov I, Robot
The Foundation Trilogy
Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451
The Martian Chronicles
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Angela Carter “Heroes and Villains”
Arthur C. Clarke Songs of Distant Earth
The Odyssey Series
Stephen Donaldson The Thomas Covenant Series
Arthur Conan Doyle The Lost World
Robert Heinlein Citizen of the Galaxy
Stranger in a Strange Lang
Frank Herbert Dune
Dune Messiah
Children of Dune
Aldous Huxley Brave New World
Stephen King The Shining
Salem’s Lot
The Stand
Ursula Le Guin The Earthsea Trilogy
Jack London The Star Rover
The Iron Heel
H. P. Lovecraft Short Stories
Anne McCaffrey The Ship Who Sang
The Dragons of Pern Series
George Orwell 1984
Animal Farm
Mervyn Peake Titus Groan
Gormenghast
Titus Alone
Edgar Allan Poe Tales of Mystery and Imagination
Terry Pratchett Various – Discworld series
Philip Pullman The Dark Materials Series
Mary Shelley Frankenstein
Nevil Shute On the Beach
Robert Louis Stevenson Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Bram Stoker Dracula
J. R. R. Tolkein The Lord of the Rings
Jules Verne 20,000 Leagues under the Sea
The Master of the World
H. G. Wells The Time Machine
The War of the Worlds
The Food of the Gods
T. H. White The Once and Future King
John Wyndham The Day of the Triffids
The Kraken Wakes
World Literature
The Americas
Maya Angelou I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
James Baldwin Go Tell it on the Mountain
The Fire the next Time
Dee Brown Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee
Willa Cather My Antonia
Death Comes for the Archbishop
James Finimore Cooper The Last of the Mohicans
Margaret Craven I Heard the Owl Call my Name
Rebel Angels Robertson Davis
Edna Ferber Giant
F. Scott Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby
Various titles + ss
Che Guevara Motorcycle Diaries
Alex Haley Roots
Lillian Hellman The Little Foxes
Garrison Keillor Lake Wobegon Days
Jack London The Sea Wolf
Call of the Wild
Carson McCullers A Member of the Wedding
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
Of Love and other Demons Gabriel Garcia Marquez
James Michener Hawaii
Mexico et al
V. S. Naipaul A House for Mr. Biswas
Edgar Allan Poe Tales of Mystery and Imagination
Chaim Potok My Name is Ahser Lev
The Chosen
J. D. Salinger The Catcher in the Rye
Jack Schaeffer Shane
Carol Shields The Stone Diaries
Upton Sinclair The Jungle
Isaac Bashivis Singer Gimpel the Fool
Various
Enemies: A Love Story
Betty Smith A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Paul Theroux The Mosquito Coast
Mark Twain Huckleberry Finn
John Updike Americas - Rabbit
Herman Wouk Marjorie Morningstar
The Caine Mutiny
Africa
Chinua Achebe Things Fall Apart
Karen Blixen Out of Africa
Bessie Head When Rain Clouds Gather
Elspeth Huxley The Flame Trees of Thika
Alan Paton Cry, The Beloved Country
Laurens Van der Post A Story Like the Wind
The Lost World of the Kalahari
AUSTRALASIA
Keri Hulme The Bone People
Thomas Keneally Schindler’s Ark
The Playmakers
Vance Marshall Walkabout
Patrick White Voss
Asia
Jung Chang Wild Swans
M. M. Kaye The Far Pavilions
Rudyard Kipling Kim
John Masters The Deceivers
The Nightrunners of Bengal
Bhowani Junction
Paul Scott The Jewel in the Crown
Central / Eastern Europe
Ida Fink The Journey
Alexander Solzhenitsyn One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
The Gulag Archipelago
Humour & Satire
Douglas Adams Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency
The Hutch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Charles Dickens The Pickwick Papers
Roddy Doyle Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha
Gerald Durrell The Mockery Bird (and other titles)
Helen Fielding Bridget Jones’ Diary
Stella Gibbons Cold Comfort Farm
Giovanni Guareschi The Little World of Don Camillo
Nick Hornby About a Boy
Veronic K. Jerome Three Men in a Boat
Neil Munro Para Handy Tales
Terry Pratchett Repaer Man
Small Gods
Iain Crichton Smith Tales of Murdo
P. G. Woodhouse The Inimitable Jeeves (and other titles)
Short Stories
Ray Bradbury Various Short Stories
George Mackay Brown Various Short Stories
Anton Chekov Various Short Stories
Arthur C. Clarke Various Short Stories
Frederick Forsyth No Comebacks
Nadine Gordimer Various Short Stories
Ernest Hemingway Various Short Stories
Somerset Maugham Collected Short Stories
Edgar Allan Poe Various Short Stories
Iain Crichton Smith Various Short Stories
H. G. Wells Various Short Stories
Autobiography / Biography / Travel
Chris Bonnington The Everest Years
Vera Brittain Testament of Youth
Alan Burgess The Small Woman
Donald Caskie Tartan Pimpernel
Barbara Castle Sylvia & Christabel Pankhurst
Monica Dickens One Pair of Hands
Ruth Dobscheiner Selected to Live
Gerald Durrell Various titles
Diane Fossey Gorillas in the Mist
Anne Frank Diary
Ghandi Autobiography
Ralph Glasser Growing up in the Gorbals
Robert Graves Goodbye to all That
Thor Heyerdahl Kontiki Expedition
Edmund Hillary Nothing Venture Nothing Win
Richard Hillary The Last Enemy
John Hunt Ascent of Everest
Elspeth Huxley The Flame Trees of Thika
Laurie Lee Cider with Rosie
Sally Magnusson The Flying Scotsman
Laurence Olivier Confessions of an Actor
George Orwell Down and Out in London & Paris
Antoine de St. Exupery Night Flight
Siegfried Sassoon Memoirs of an Infantry Officer
Paul Theroux Indian Summer
Laurens Van Der Post The Lost World of the Kalahari
