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50 classics from (almost) anybody'due south loftier school reading list

Research shows that reading fiction encourages empathy. While more high school curriculums should include mod, various writers like Amy Tan and Malala Yousafzai, sure classics—like John Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath" and Sandra Cisneros'south "The House on Mango Street"—endure. George Orwell's "1984," a novel published in 1949 about a dystopian futurity where the government controls the truth, even surged to the Amazon best-sellers list in 2017, shortly after former President Trump's counselor Kellyanne Conway described falsehoods every bit "alternative facts."

Sometimes parents, teachers and school-board officials disagree on what kids should or shouldn't read in high school. In 2018, "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" were dropped in a Minnesota school district because they contain racial slurs. Kurt Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse-Five," a book about an American soldier doomed to repeat history, has been controversial for decades. In 2011, a Missouri High Schoolhouse pulled it from library shelves after complaints it was anti-American.

Certain books deserve a beginning, second, or maybe even a third read. Using data from Goodreads, Stacker compiled a list of fifty timeless books, plays, and epic poems commonly found on high school reading lists. A total of 1,002 voters picked the about essential reading required for students. The terminal ranking takes into account how many times each book was voted on and how highly voters ranked them. Read on to encounter which classics made the listing.

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#50. Their Eyes Were Watching God

- Writer: Zora Neale Hurston
- Score: 3,540
- Boilerplate rating: 3.90/5, based on 232,956 ratings

A coming-of-age tome set in early 1900s Florida, "Their Eyes Were Watching God" tackles a multitude of issues: racism, sexism, segregation, poverty, and gender roles. Initially overlooked upon its release, Hurston'south all-time-known work is now considered a modern-American masterpiece, thanks to work done in Black studies programs in the 1970s.

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#49. A Raisin in the Dominicus

- Author: Lorraine Hansberry
- Score: 3,550
- Average rating: 3.76/v, based on 59,314 ratings

The story follows the Youngers, a working-form Blackness family living on the South Side of Chicago who movement to an all-white neighborhood during a fourth dimension of desegregation. In 1959, Lorraine Hansberry became the commencement Black playwright to get a play produced on Broadway. The title of the play comes from "Dream Deferred," a poem by Langston Hughes.

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#48. Moby-Dick; or, the Whale

- Author: Herman Melville
- Score: 3,750
- Boilerplate rating: 3.49/5, based on 445,669 ratings

Herman Melville uses the narrative of a sailor, Ishmael. He is on board with Captain Ahab who is trying to exact revenge against Moby Dick, the white whale that bit off his leg at the knee. For those who didn't written report the tale in high school—or couldn't brand information technology through the 135 chapters—critics say it really is worth a read. Some refer to it as the American Bible, better approached afterwards becoming an adult and not equally a pupil in loftier school.

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#47. The Pearl

- Author: John Steinbeck
- Score: 3,821
- Average rating: iii.45/5, based on 171,505 ratings

John Steinbeck's "The Pearl" tells the story of Kino, a poor diver who is trying to support his family by gathering pearls from gulf beds. He is only barely scraping by until he happens upon a giant pearl. Kino thinks this discovery will finally provide him with the financial comfort and security he has been seeking, just it ultimately brings disaster. The story addresses the reader's human relationship to nature, the human need for connection, and the consequences of resisting injustice.

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#46. The Importance of Existence Hostage

- Writer: Oscar Wilde
- Score: 3,825
- Average rating: 4.17/5, based on 277,734 ratings

This comedic play by Oscar Wilde takes a satiric look at Victorian social values while following ii men—Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff—equally they tell lies to bring some excitement to their lives. "The Importance of Being Earnest" was Wilde'due south final play, and some consider information technology his masterpiece.

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#45. The Red Badge of Backbone

- Author: Stephen Crane
- Score: three,838
- Average rating: 3.23/5, based on 82,944 ratings

In "The Red Badge of Courage," Henry Fleming enlists in the Union Ground forces, enticed by visions of glory. When the reality of state of war and battle set in, Fleming retreats in fear. In the cease, he faces his cowardice and rises to leadership. This American war novel was published in 1895 and is and so accurate that it's piece of cake to believe the author—who was born after the Civil War ended—was himself a veteran.

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#44. Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes

- Author: Edith Hamilton
- Score: 3,902
- Boilerplate rating: 3.99/5, based on 40,876 ratings

Author Edith Hamilton takes the reader on a journey through Greek, Roman, and Norse mythology with tales of the Olympus and Norse gods in Valhalla and the Trojan War in Odysseus. For loftier schoolhouse students, it can serve every bit an of import introduction to classic mythology that can help them better understand the themes backside other works like "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey." Hamilton's book is considered the standard by which all other books on mythology are measured.

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#43. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

- Writer: Maya Angelou
- Score: 3,971
- Average rating: 4.22/v, based on 351,852 ratings

Maya Angelou, who was raped past her mother's boyfriend when she was 8, writes well-nigh her experience with sexual assail and racism while growing up in the Jim Crow S in "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings." The autobiography, which Angelou wrote at the urging of her friend and fellow author James Baldwin, was one of the first written by a Black woman to accomplish a wide general audience.

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#42. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

- Writer: Marking Twain
- Score: 4,073
- Average rating: 3.91/five, based on 686,551 ratings

"The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" takes identify in the fictional town of St. Petersburg, Missouri, during the 1840s. Tom Sawyer and his friend Huck Finn witness a murder past Joe. After the boys stay silent, the wrong man is accused of the criminal offense. When they flee, the whole town presumes them dead and the boys end up attending their own funerals. Mark Twain'due south portrayal of Sawyer and Finn challenge the idyllic American view of childhood, instead showing children as fallible homo beings with imperfections similar anyone else.

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#41. Slaughterhouse-V

- Author: Kurt Vonnegut
- Score: iv,357
- Average rating: four.07/5, based on 1,025,939 ratings

In "Slaughterhouse-Five," Kurt Vonnegut tells the story of Baton Pilgrim—based on a real American soldier—who is "unstuck in fourth dimension." He travels throughout the timeline of his life in a nonlinear fashion, forced to relive sure moments. He is first pulled out after he is drafted and is captured in Frg during Globe War Ii. The book, which explores how humankind repeats history, has been banned or challenged in classrooms throughout the United States. It even landed in the U.S. Supreme Court in 1982 in Board of Education v. Pico, and the courtroom held that banning the book violated the First Amendment.

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#40. The Taming of the Shrew

- Author: William Shakespeare
- Score: four,666
- Average rating: 3.80/5, based on 145,421 ratings

This five-human activity comedy tells the story of the courtship of the headstrong Katharine and the money-grubbing Petruchio, who is determined to subdue Katharine and make her his wife. After the wedding, Petruchio drags his new wife through the mud to their new dwelling in the country. He proceeds to starve and deprive her of sleep to make his new bride submissive. The play, one of Shakespeare'south well-nigh popular, has been both criticized for its calumniating and misogynistic attitude toward women, and praised as a challenging view of how women are supposed to behave.

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#39. A Divide Peace

- Author: John Knowles
- Score: 4,859
- Average rating: 3.57/v, based on 179,467 ratings

In "A Separate Peace," John Knowles explores the friendship of two young men—the quiet, intellectual Gene Forrester and his extroverted, able-bodied friend Finny. Gene lives vicariously through Finny, but his jealousy ultimately ends in tragedy after he commits a subtle act of violence. The book examines themes of envy and the demand to achieve.

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#38. The Little Prince

- Author: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
- Score: 5,234
- Average rating: 4.thirty/5, based on 1,120,033 ratings

In "The Little Prince," a pilot whose aeroplane has crashed in the Sahara desert meets a young male child from outer space. The male child is traveling from planet to planet in search of friendship. On the boy's home—an asteroid—he lived lonely, accompanied only past a solitary rose. Once on Globe, the boy meets a wise fox who tells him he can only see clearly with his eye. The book's somber themes of imagination and adulthood accept resonated with children and adults alike since it published—it is at present one of the almost-translated books of all time.

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#37. Criminal offence and Punishment

- Writer: Fyodor Dostoyevsky
- Score: v,245
- Average rating: four.20/5, based on 543,309 ratings

This Russian classic, published in 1886, tells the story of a former student named Rodion Raskolnikov who is now impoverished and on the verge of mental instability. To go money—and to demonstrate his exceptionalness to himself—he comes upwards with a murderous programme to kill a pawnbroker. Considered ane of the first psychological novels, the plot is likewise a political one that explores the character's pull toward liberal views and his rebellion against them.

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#36. Decease of a Salesman

- Writer: Arthur Miller
- Score: 5,567
- Average rating: three.50/five, based on 165,933 ratings

Arthur Miller introduces readers to an aging Willy Loman, a traveling salesman nearing the end of his career. Loman decides he's tired of driving for work and asks for an role job in New York City, assertive he is vital to the company. His boss ends up firing him. Loman is besides faced with the fact that his son, Biff, has not turned into the success Loman had hoped for. In the end, Loman commits suicide and then his son can have the insurance money to jumpstart a meliorate life. After his death, just Loman's family attends his funeral. "Death of a Salesman" won the 1949 Pulitzer Prize in Drama.

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#35. The Old Man and the Bounding main

- Author: Ernest Hemingway
- Score: 5,822
- Average rating: iii.76/5, based on 715,980 ratings

"The Onetime Human being and the Sea" was Ernest Hemingway's concluding major work. The story follows an former man who catches a big fish, only to have information technology eaten by sharks before he can get it back to shore. Although many may come across symbolism almost life and aging in the book, Hemingway said there wasn't a deeper significant in the prose.

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#34. Flowers for Algernon

- Author: Daniel Keyes
- Score: five,827
- Average rating: 4.11/five, based on 422,243 ratings

The main character in "Flowers for Algernon" is Charlie Gordon, a human being of low intelligence who becomes a genius after undergoing an experimental procedure. The experiment has already been performed on a lab mouse named Algernon. Gordon's intelligence opens his eyes to things he's never understood before, but he eventually loses his newly acquired knowledge. The mouse, who Gordon remembers fondly, dies. Daniel Keyes wrote the volume afterwards realizing that his didactics was causing a rift between him and his loved ones, making him wonder what it would be similar if someone's intelligence could be increased.

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#33. Othello

- Author: William Shakespeare
- Score: v,992
- Average rating: 3.89/5, based on 286,333 ratings

Shakespeare wrote "Othello" in the early 17th century. The play tells the tragic story of Othello—a Moor and general in the Venetian army, and Iago—a traitorous low-ranking officer. Shakespeare tackles themes of racism, betrayal, and jealousy. While he refers to Othello equally "Black," Shakespeare near likely meant he was darker-skinned than most Englishmen at the fourth dimension and non necessarily of African descent.

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#32. The Canterbury Tales

- Author: Geoffrey Chaucer
- Score: 6,040
- Average rating: iii.49/5, based on 175,388 ratings

"The Canterbury Tales," written by Geoffrey Chaucer in the 14th century, was one of the first major works of English literature. The story follows a group of pilgrims who tell tales during their journey from London to Canterbury Cathedral. The cast of characters—including a carpenter, melt, and knight, among others—paint a varied picture of 14th-century society. The stories inspired the modern film "A Knight's Tale," starring Heath Ledger every bit a poor knight, and Paul Bettany equally Chaucer.

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#31. Beowulf

- Author: Unknown
- Score: 6,572
- Boilerplate rating: iii.43/5, based on 209,182 ratings

"Beowulf" is an epic poem—an original manuscript copy is housed in the British Library—of 3,000 lines. It was written in Old English somewhere betwixt 700 and 1000 A.D., and tells the story of Beowulf, a nobleman, and warrior in Sweden who is sent to Denmark to fight a swamp monster called Grendel.

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#30. The Hobbit

- Author: J. R. R. Tolkien
- Score: 6,701
- Average rating: iv.27/v, based on 2,554,239 ratings

In this prequel to The Lord of the Rings trilogy, readers tag along with Bilbo Baggins, an unassuming hobbit who is convinced to go on an adventure by the wizard Gandalf. Bilbo finds in that location is much more to himself than he thought—and he finds a sure ring, as well. "The Hobbit," written in 1932, contains many of the edifice blocks—an ballsy quest, an unwilling hero, elves, and goblins—that modern fantasy writers withal reference today.

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#29. A Tale of Two Cities

- Writer: Charles Dickens
- Score: seven,077
- Average rating: 3.83/five, based on 750,394 ratings

"A Tale of Two Cities," famously starts out: "It was the all-time of times, it was the worst of times..." Set in the belatedly 1700s, Charles Dickens vividly writes about the time leading up to and during the French Revolution. The historical novel describes death and despair, but also touches on themes of redemption.

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#28. Wuthering Heights

- Author: Emily Brontë
- Score: 7,222
- Average rating: three.84/v, based on 1,183,188 ratings

"Wuthering Heights," published in 1847, was the first and but novel by Emily Brontë, who died a yr afterward at the historic period of xxx. Brontë tells the tragic love story between Heathcliff, an orphan, and Catherine, the daughter of his wealthy distributor. Considered a classic in English literature, the novel shows readers how passionate and destructive love can be.

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#27. The Grapes of Wrath

- Author: John Steinbeck
- Score: 7,540
- Average rating: 3.95/five, based on 666,190 ratings

"The Grapes of Wrath" is considered a great American novel partly considering it brought to light the destruction and despair caused by the Dust Bowl and the Groovy Depression. The story follows Tom Joad later on he is released from prison to notice his family unit's Oklahoma farmstead empty and destroyed. Joad and his family afterwards set off for a new life in California, only to face struggles forth the style. The book, which focuses on the theme of difficult work, won the 1940 Pulitzer Prize for Novel (now Fiction).

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#26. Frankenstein

- Writer: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
- Score: 7,931
- Average rating: iii.78/v, based on ane,032,148 ratings

Mary Shelley wrote "Frankenstein," considered the determinative horror text and one of the greatest horror novels of all fourth dimension, when she was only 19. The story was published in 1818 and introduced readers to Dr. Victor Frankenstein, a scientist who brings to life a creature he assembled from discarded corpse parts. Although Dr. Frankenstein is horrified by his creation and abandons it, the creature manages to educate itself and so seeks revenge on his creator. The novel explores humanity'south desire for innovation and the fear of alter it brings.

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#25. A Midsummer Dark'due south Dream

- Author: William Shakespeare
- Score: 7,999
- Average rating: 3.94/v, based on 409,141 ratings

Like many of Shakespeare'south plays, "A Midsummer Night'south Dream" explores the theme of love. This comedy shows the events that surround the spousal relationship of Theseus, the duke of Athens, to Hippolytus, a onetime Amazon queen. The play also shares the stories of several other lovers who are influenced by the fairies who live in the woods about the hymeneals. The play is a favorite for actors and audiences, even today.

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#24. Swell Expectations

- Author: Charles Dickens
- Score: 8,479
- Average rating: three.77/5, based on 590,620 ratings

This Charles Dickens classic tells the story of Pip, an orphan who gets a gamble at a meliorate life through an anonymous benefactor. The plot mostly centers around Pip'south regular visits to Miss Havisham, a wealthy recluse, and his love for her adopted daughter Estella, who is cold toward Pip until years later. Many consider the novel a nifty masterpiece.

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#23. The Outsiders

- Author: S.E. Hinton (Goodreads Author)
- Score: eight,480
- Boilerplate rating: iv.08/5, based on 816,572 ratings

S.E. Hinton introduced readers to fourteen-year-one-time Ponyboy Curtis in "The Outsiders," a novel she wrote when she was 15. The plot centers around ii rival gangs: the lower-grade Greasers and the well-off Socials. Information technology touches on themes of teen angst, including the frustrations young people have when they tin can't rely on adults to change things, while as well not knowing how to set things themselves. Hinton's publishers encouraged her to publish nether her initials because they didn't call back the public would respect a book nearly teenage boys by someone with a feminine name.

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#22. Nighttime

- Author: Elie Wiesel
- Score: 9,166
- Average rating: 4.32/five, based on 868,121 ratings

Elie Wiesel gives a first-hand account of the atrocities experienced in German concentration camps during World War Two. Wiesel and his family unit were deported to Auschwitz. His mother, male parent, and younger sister all died. In "Night," Wiesel's bright and horrific descriptions of beatings, starving men, and decease shine a chilling, personal light on the tragedy of the Holocaust.

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#21. Julius Caesar

- Author: William Shakespeare
- Score: 9,413
- Boilerplate rating: three.67/5, based on 153,978 ratings

Shakespeare takes on history with "Julius Caesar," a tragic story of ability and expose. Brutus, who worked closely with Caesar, joined his swain conspirators to assassinate Caesar in lodge to salvage the democracy from a tyrannical leader. The events had the opposite effect when, only two years later, Caesar'due south grand nephew was crowned the offset emperor of Rome. The play marked a political shift in Shakespeare'southward writing.

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#20. Brave New World

- Author: Aldous Huxley
- Score: 9,759
- Average rating: 3.98/v, based on 1,276,116 ratings

In "Brave New Earth," published in 1932, Aldous Huxley paints a flick of a dystopian futurity where people consume pills called soma to get a sense of instant bliss without side effects. Emotions, individuality, and lasting relationships aren't allowed. A preordained class system is decided at the embryonic stage, with sure people getting hormones for peak mental and athletic fitness. Some historians believe the volume's plot could somewhat stand for our actual future in the adjacent 100 years.

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#19. The Crucible

- Author: Arthur Miller
- Score: ix,789
- Boilerplate rating: iii.57/five, based on 291,382 ratings

This 1953 play is a dramatized version of the Salem witch trials of the late 1600s. In the novel, a group of immature girls are dancing in the wood. When they're caught, they simulated illness and shift blame to avoid penalisation. Their lies set off witchcraft accusations throughout the town. Arthur Miller wrote "The Crucible" as a protest to the actions of Sen. Joseph McCarthy, who prepare upwardly a committee to investigate and prosecute the Communists he thought had infiltrated the U.S. government. It won the 1953 Tony Award for All-time Play.

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#eighteen. The Giver

- Author: Lois Lowry (Goodreads Writer)
- Score: ten,075
- Average rating: iv.thirteen/5, based on 1,548,599 ratings

This 1993 young developed dystopian novel tells of a society that values similarity and not individuality. People are discouraged from being unlike and are given jobs that will all-time serve the customs. Those who don't similar their role are "released," which means they are forced to go out lodge. One person is assigned the role of the Giver, and tasked with holding onto memories. Young Jonas becomes the new Giver. With his new memories, his sensation grows and he begins to question life. The movie adaptation of the volume was released in 2014.

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#17. Fahrenheit 451

- Author: Ray Bradbury
- Score: 10,450
- Average rating: 3.98/five, based on 1,437,170 ratings

Ray Bradbury describes a futuristic world where books are banned and burned. Guy Montag, one fireman tasked with extinguishing the books, begins to question the practice. When Bradbury wrote the archetype in the 1950s, television sets were becoming ubiquitous in American households. The theme of the book was a warning about how mass media could interfere with people'southward ability or desire to retrieve critically, a theme that many think resonates with the social media-obsessed world of today.

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#16. Jane Eyre

- Author: Charlotte Brontë
- Score: 10,629
- Average rating: 4.eleven/5, based on i,455,935 ratings

Charlotte Brontë—sister to Emily—speaks straight to the reader in "Jane Eyre." The Victorian novel follows the headstrong Jane, an orphan who lives with her aunt and cousins, on her quest to discover her identity and true love. The novel, marketed every bit an autobiography and published in 1847 under the pen name Currer Bell, is written in commencement person and introduced "the concept of the cocky" in writing.

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#xv. Pride and Prejudice

- Author: Jane Austen
- Score: eleven,884
- Average rating: iv.25/5, based on 2,607,645 ratings

Published in 1813, "Pride and Prejudice" was Jane Austen'south second novel. The story follows the will-they-won't-they relationship between the wealthy Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett, who comes from meager means. Throughout the chapters, both modify for the better every bit they fall in love. The book has inspired at least more than a dozen film and television adaptations.

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#14. The Diary of a Young Girl

- Author: Anne Frank
- Score: 12,962
- Boilerplate rating: 4.13/5, based on two,423,799 ratings

In 1944, a young Anne Frank recorded her thoughts and feelings as she and other Jewish citizens hid from the German language Nazis during Globe War Two. The coming-of-age diary, which chronicles Frank's time hiding in the Secret Annex while she became a young adult female, has been translated into 70 languages. While she and almost of her family unit were killed, her father survived and helped publish her piece of work, making it possible for millions to learn her story.

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#thirteen. The Odyssey

- Author: Homer
- Score: 13,345
- Average rating: iii.75/five, based on 791,715 ratings

"The Odyssey," a Greek ballsy verse form, follows Odysseus every bit he travels back to the island of Ithaca after fighting in the state of war at Troy—something addressed in Homer'southward poem, "The Iliad." When he returns abode, he and his son, Telemachus, kill all the men who are trying to marry Odysseus's wife, Penelope. In the end, Athena, the goddess of wisdom, victory, and war, intervenes. Like many Greek myths, it focuses on themes of love, courage, and revenge.

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#12. 1984

- Author: George Orwell
- Score: 13,721
- Average rating: 4.17/5, based on 2,637,484 ratings

George Orwell describes a dystopian hereafter rife with war and one where the government—led by Big Brother—controls the truth and snuffs out individual thought. The protagonist, Winston Smith, becomes disillusioned with the Political party, and he rebels against information technology. Although it was published in 1949, the novel had a resurgence in 2017.

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#11. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

- Author: Mark Twain
- Score: xiv,430
- Average rating: iii.81/5, based on 1,084,798 ratings

Huckleberry Finn is the main graphic symbol in this follow-upwards novel to "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer." The book explores themes of racism every bit Huck Finn floats down the Mississippi River with a man escaping slavery. Like Huck, Twain inverse his childhood views and rejected slavery as an institution.

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#10. The Scarlet Letter

- Writer: Nathaniel Hawthorne
- Score: fifteen,426
- Average rating: 3.39/five, based on 642,352 ratings

Nathaniel Hawthorne published "The Scarlet Letter" in 1850. In the novel, which is based on historical events, readers follow the story of Hester Prynne, a woman who is forced to wear a red "A" on her clothes after she conceives a child out of wedlock. She bears the penalization alone when she refuses to name the baby'south father. Her graphic symbol marked one of the start where a potent woman was the protagonist. Hawthorne as well touches on themes of hypocrisy, shame, guilt, and love.

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#9. Of Mice and Men

- Author: John Steinbeck
- Score: 17,192
- Average rating: three.86/5, based on i,743,236 ratings

"Of Mice and Men" tells the story of George and his simple-minded friend, Lennie. The 2 accept to become new jobs on a ranch because of some trouble in Lennie's past. The novel, prepare during the Slap-up Depression, tackles topics of poverty, sexism, and racism.

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#8. Hamlet

- Author: William Shakespeare
- Score: 17,276
- Average rating: 4.01/5, based on 657,227 ratings

Hamlet, the prince of Denmark, becomes vengeful later attending his male parent'southward funeral, only to find his mother has remarried his uncle, Claudius. The stepfather crowns himself king, a role that should have gone to Hamlet. The prince finds out his father was murdered, after which he kills the new rex. Ambiguity runs through the play and the character of Hamlet, with his visions of ghosts up for interpretation—are they real, or a figment of the troubled human being'due south imagination? The tragedy, which launched the famous line "to be, or non to be," shines a light on some of the worst traits of humanity. Some consider the play Shakespeare's greatest work.

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#7. The Catcher in the Rye

- Writer: J. D. Salinger
- Score: 17,633
- Average rating: 3.80/five, based on 2,451,530 ratings

J. D. Salinger aptly captures teen malaise in "The Catcher in the Rye" when the reader gets a wait at three days in the life of its narrator, the 16-year-old Holden Caulfield. The book was an instant success, but some schools accept banned information technology from their libraries and reading lists, citing vulgarity and sexual content.

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#half dozen. Animal Farm

- Author: George Orwell
- Score: xviii,315
- Boilerplate rating: 3.92/5, based on 2,377,098 ratings

A group of farm animals organizes a revolt after they realize their master, Mr. Jones, is mistreating them and offering them zip in return for their work. When they challenge the leadership, they are disciplined for speaking out. This archetype isn't about animate being rights. It is a larger critique on Soviet Communism. Orwell wrote it equally an attack against Stalinism in Russia.

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#5. Macbeth

- Author: William Shakespeare
- Score: nineteen,153
- Average rating: 3.89/five, based on 605,131 ratings

Another Shakespeare classic, "Macbeth" portrays the weakness of humanity. The grapheme of Macbeth receives a prophecy that he volition one day become king of Scotland. His unchecked ambition ends in murder; Macbeth kills Male monarch Duncan to steal the throne for himself. It shows the subversive influence of political appetite and pursuing ability for its own sake.

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#4. Lord of the Flies

- Author: William Golding
- Score: 20,677
- Average rating: iii.67/five, based on 2,002,142 ratings

"Lord of the Flies" tells the alarming story of a group of young boys who survive a airplane crash, merely to descend into tribalism on the island where they landed. Two of the boys—Ralph and Jack—clash in their pursuit of leadership. The novel, which has been challenged in schools, shows how struggles for power based on fearfulness and division can effect in a collapse of social order, themes that might seem relevant today.

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#3. The Peachy Gatsby

- Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Score: 24,750
- Average rating: 3.91/v, based on three,322,289 ratings

Nick Carraway, a Midwest transplant and Yale graduate, moves to Due west Egg, Long Island. Carraway enters a globe of extravagance when he becomes entangled with millionaire Jay Gatsby and socialite Daisy Buchanan. The novel is viewed every bit a cautionary tale well-nigh achieving the American dream of wealth and excess.

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#2. Romeo and Juliet

- Writer: William Shakespeare
- Score: 30,769
- Average rating: 3.74/v, based on 1,878,322 ratings

Ii star-crossed lovers meet and perish in this tragedy. Juliet, a Capulet, falls in love with Romeo, a Montague. Because their families are rivals, they are forbidden to marry. They secretly wed before misfortune leads to their deaths. Losing their children inspires a peace amid the families. Some critics merits the play's childish view of love hasn't stood the test of time, merely others think the story is multilayered and deserves its classic status.

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#1. To Kill a Mockingbird

- Writer: Harper Lee
- Score: 39,482
- Boilerplate rating: 4.27/5, based on 3,977,468 ratings

Harper Lee'south first novel, which was published in 1960, tackles issues of racial and social injustice in the South. Set in Alabama, it introduces readers to Atticus Finch, a lawyer who defends a Black human accused of raping a white woman. The betoken-of-view comes from Atticcus's daughter, Scout, while Boo Radley, their reclusive neighbor, adds another dimension to this classic story of racism and childhood. Lee'southward work won her a Pulitzer Prize and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Because of some racial language, the volume has been challenged in many schools throughout America.

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