11th Grade Recommended Reading List

Charlie Gordon goes through an experimental treatment to increase his intelligence, with unexpected and ultimately tragic results.

This scathing dramatization of the Salem Witch Trials is also an allegory of Senator Joseph McCarthy's pursuit of Communists in the 1950s.

Shakespeare's famous tragedy tells the story of a Danish prince who must decide whether or not to avenge his father's death.

In the 1940s, a working class African-American family in Chicago must decide how to best spend a ten-thousand dollar insurance payout.

In letters to God and each other, two sisters, Celie and Nettie, share the details of their trouble-filled lives in the American South and Africa.

This Pulitzer Prize-winning play dramatizes a single evening in the life of the Pollitts, a fractured Mississippi family.

In this Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Willy Lohman is weary of his life as a traveling salesman and tormented by his failure to achieve his dreams.

Set in both London and Paris, this novel brings the French Revolution vividly to life.

Considered a classic of Modernist literature, this unpredictable poem is a collage of voices and languages that explores British society and myths of devastated civilizations.

Crowded by his parents and eight siblings in a New York City apartment, twelve-year-old Sam Gribley runs away to live by himself on his great-grandfather's abandoned farm in the Catskill Mountains.

In this comedy, two Athenian couples and a troupe of actors become unwitting pawns in a squabble between a fairy king and queen.

Brutus is a trusted confidant of the Roman general Julius Caesar, but when he becomes convinced that Caesar's ambitions are a threat to the republic, he plots his friend's assassination.

In the early 20th century, a young Englishwoman travels through Italy.

This semi-autobiographical novel chronicles a young woman's struggle with depression.

During the French and Indian War, a British colonist's daughters, their Native American guides, and a scout named Hawkeye attempt a dangerous journey from Fort Edward to Fort Henry.

Marie-Laure is a blind French girl who flees the Nazi occupation of Paris. Werner Pfennig is a young orphan living in a German mining town. In this Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, their lives intertwine in unexpected ways as they try to survive the havoc of war.

Five cousins from an unconventional family try to reestablish ties while uncovering family secrets.

Set against the backdrop of the Civil Rights Movement, this Pulitzer Prize-winning play follows former baseball player Troy Maxson as he tries to find his place in the world and navigate troubled relationships with his wife and son.

In this autobiography, first published in 1789, Olaudah Equiano recounts his life as an enslaved person and then as a free man.

After having a child out of wedlock, Hester Prynne is shunned by her Puritan community and forced to wear a scarlet "A" on her clothing — but Hester is not the only one who has transgressed. This classic novel explores guilt, sin, and hypocrisy.

Born to Indian immigrants and legally named after a Russian writer, but familiarly called Nikhil, Gogol Ganguli grows up in Massachusetts struggling with his parents' choices and expectations.

When Edna Pontellier meets Robert Lebrun, she begins to question her roles as wife and mother. Set in New Orleans in the late 1800s, this pioneering novel is considered to be an early feminist classic. Read the full text here.

This American classic chronicles the exploits of Huck and Jim: one is running away from an abusive father and the other is fleeing enslavement. Read the full text here.

In this classic of the transcendentalist movement, Thoreau explains what he learned by living simply and in seclusion near a pond in eastern Massachusetts.

Nonfiction writer Jon Krakauer retraces the steps of Christopher McCandless, a young man who gave up his material possessions and met a tragic end in the wilds of Alaska.

Spanning three decades, this novel tells the story of the Prices, a missionary family that settles in the Belgian Congo in the late 1950s.

This novel uses multiple narrators and perspectives to tell the story of a family's quest to honor a relative's last wishes.

Considered a seminal work of African-American literature, Their Eyes Were Watching God is notable for its strong and independent female protagonist.

This novel tells the story of Ifemelu and Obinze, Nigerians who immigrate to the United States and London, respectively, and eventually reunite in their homeland.

Nick Carraway rents a summer house in Long Island where he befriends his mysterious neighbor Jay Gatsby, a self-made millionaire who hides behind an extravagant and decadent lifestyle.

Influenced by the duplicitous Iago, Othello, a Moorish general in the Venetian army, begins to doubt his wife's faithfulness.

This award-winning novels traces the lives of several Native American families over six decades.

In Ralph Ellison's classic novel, a nameless narrator struggles with his sense of identity in a world that treats him like he is invisible.

During the Great Depression, the Joad family leaves a failing farm in Oklahoma in hopes of a better life out west.

Included in the often-revised collection Leaves of Grass, "Song of Myself" expresses the 19th-century American poet's visions of common and universal humanity. The full text can be found here.

In this collection of twelve essays, the leader of New England's transcendentalist movement shares his philosophical ideas on different aspects of mid-nineteenth-century life. Read the full text here.

Caught up in the brutality of World War I, an American ambulance driver on the Italian front falls in love with an English nurse.

This novella tells the story of a young survivor of the bombing of Hiroshima, Japan.

Kingston integrates mythology into this memoir about growing up as a Chinese immigrant in California.

Ovid's Metamorphoses features myths and stories of change, mutation, and transformation. Learn these words from the translation by John Dryden here.

This memoir traces Franklin's life from his birth in 1706 through 1757. It details his work as a printer, writer, and inventor, as well as his involvement in the French and Indian War. Read the full text here.

Published in 1906, this novel helped expose the oppressive and unsafe labor conditions in Chicago's meatpacking industry.

In this exposé, award-winning journalist Eric Schlosser explores the effects of the American fast food industry on global health, labor conditions, and the environment.

W.E.B. Du Bois explores the struggles and triumphs of generations of African Americans in this collection of essays.

A series of linked stories explores the lifelong effects of trauma on a platoon of soldiers during and after the Vietnam War.

Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy instantly loathe one another when they first meet. Can they overcome their first impressions?

Jane is a strong-willed young woman who finds employment as a governess at Thornfield Hall, where she meets the mysterious Edward Rochester and learns his darkest secret.

A classic of Russian literature, this novel explores the psyche of a poor young man who plots to murder and rob a wealthy pawnbroker.

Published after Melville's death, this novel chronicles the tragic story of young sailor Billy Budd after he boards a naval warship, the H.M.S. Bellipotent.

In the Nobel Prize-winner's first novel, a young black girl yearns to conform to society's rigid standards of beauty.

Set against the backdrop of political revolution in Cuba, this novel tells the stories of three generations of visionary women in the del Pino family.

In this pamphlet, Paine urges the American colonists to fight for independence from Great Britain and form a new government. Read the full text here.

Using novelistic techniques, this autobiography details Wright's coming of age during the Jim Crow era.

In 1831, French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville visited the United States. In this book, he records his impressions of the customs and culture of the young nation. Learn these words from the translation of Volume I by Henry Reeve.

How does a small idea become a global craze? In this work of nonfiction, Malcolm Gladwell analyzes how trends are set in motion.