the bird on fire

By Luke Langlois

Four years of English class gives students plenty of time to read plenty of books. Some were better than others. So, here is my mostly spoiler-free (for students who haven’t read these yet) ranking of high-school mandated readings. Stick around until the end to read up on the opinions of some other members of the senior class. Please note that this is opinion; these are all world-renowned works and enriching literature.

#19 – Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club: While The Joy Luck Club has a satisfying ending that will at least slightly touch anyone who’s ever had a family, the narrative style was not so satisfying (basically, a collection of short stories), and I never could connect to it. To be fair, the book revolves around Chinese American immigrant families and would likely mean much more to someone more culturally or circumstantially connected to the protagonists. 

#18 – Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451: This was not technically a required class reading, but it was one of the summer reading options for AP English Language and almost everyone in my class picked it up, so it counts. The reason it is so low is because of the, ahem, great expectations I had for it. Fahrenheit 451 is just one of those books that is “hyped up” in the literary sphere, but it did not have the punch I expected when I read it. 

#17 – Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations: This tale of wealth, poverty, love, and rejection is an all-time great bildungsroman (coming-of-age story), but there is just too much coming of age. It is just so long and dreadfully dull at times. I will say, however, that Dickens has to be a significant contributor to our knowledge of the Victorian Era as the way he wrote his settings in this novel, from the cabinets in the cabins to the bustle on the streets, left little to the imagination.

#16 – Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus: This play, while not exactly full of action, is given credit in my mind because of how aware you are of the “expiration date” on Doctor Faustus’s deal with the devil. What does a man look like when his eternal soul is running out of free time?

#15 – Niccolo Machiavelli’s The Prince: Perhaps if I was born five-hundred years earlier and into a royal family I would find more practical use out of this guide on how to rule your sovereign state. The historical value of this book outweighs its content.

#14 – Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray: There are three things I learned from this novel: the soul cannot be cleansed; you cannot hide from yourself; and don’t do drugs.

#13 – William Shakespeare’s Macbeth: The regicidal aspect of this play may not be applicable to today’s world, but I find value in Macbeth by comparing the plot to what happens when you lie. If you lie once, you have to keep lying, but that blood will never leave your hands.

#12 – William Golding’s Lord of the Flies: This novel forced me to take a long hard look at myself and humanity as a whole. I concluded that, yes, we do suck.

#11 – Isabel Allende’s The House of the Spirits: I have to say that this was one of the strangest novels I have read period. Allende seamlessly blends what is real with the magical elements of the novel as if the magic is not even there (thus the label of magical realism). The most intriguing part to me, though, is the portrayal of one of the United States’s not-so-great moments: putting authoritarian leader Pinochet into power in Chile. Isabelle Allende’s familial connection to the leader before Pinochet, Salvador Allende, adds more authenticity to it all. 

#10 – Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea: A relatively short novel that depicts an old man wrestling with a large marlin off the coast of Cuba. It perfectly combines moments of extreme intensity (shark attack!) with the peace of fishing adrift in the ocean.

#9 – Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment: A look into our human psyche that is entirely dreadful, but it’s a good type of dreadful. Like the characters in this novel, I felt like I was also living in a cramped Russian slum trapped inside of my head.

#8 –  F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby: Many people would call this novel the most overrated out of these greats work, but I see it as a touching tragedy because, honestly, I rooted for Gatsby! Gatsby gave his heart and soul building an empire of wealth for his glimmering green light, but it was just out of reach.

#7 TIE – William Shakespeare’s Othello and Hamlet: There was nothing that particularly sticks with me about the meanings of these plays, but, when you read Shakespeare, you see bits and pieces of story elements, themes, and phrases that have survived the test of time and appear in our modern works. It’s quite cool!

#5 Alan Paton’s Cry, the Beloved Country: I know some of you may find this unusually high, but this novel made me want to take a trip to South Africa, even though the state of affairs there is depicted somewhat poorly here. I can attribute that to Paton’s description of the nation’s natural beauty. Plus, Stephen Kumalo is a universally likable protagonist. 

#4 Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns: I am enthralled by this novel in the same way I am enthralled by Cry, the Beloved Country. Even though Hosseini portrays a war-torn Afghanistan where women suffer from heartbreaking abuse that is culturally ingrained, he still makes sure to look beyond the horrors and emphasize the natural human beauty that connects us all, regardless of culture.

#3 John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men: Like Fahrenheit 451, this book is just one of those that is hyped up. Unlike Fahrenheit 451, it has the punch it needed. If you’ve read it, you know the one.

#2 Cormac McCarthy’s The Road: This story of a father and son journeying across post-apocalyptic America is devoid of anything even remotely close to happiness, warmth, life, or hope. That’s what makes it great. It is overwhelmingly grey, chilling, and depressing and is an excellent deterrent to nuclear warfare (even though the catastrophe that occurred is never revealed). 

#1 Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man: Again, this was an AP Lang reading option so most students have not read this one, but, as you can see by the ranking, I recommend you do so. The longer novels have not fared well on this list, but Invisible Man is a six-hundred-page beast that authentically documents every facet of the 20th-century strife of the African-American Harlem and broader American community. In this picaresque novel, the protagonist is never even given a name, but his experience with racially-driven brutality and his inability to find an identity (thus, the invisible man), made me more desperate to cheer for him than any other literary protagonist. The novel is dense and reading it is an investment of time, but it is time well spent for the historical and racial perspective.

Does the senior class agree with me? Let’s find out. . . 

Favorite High-School Mandated Reads:

Brennan Nick – Fahrenheit 451

Sydney Armor – A Thousand Splendid Suns

Shelby Armor – Of Mice and Men

Wilton Zuniga – Doctor Faustus 

Charles Schnell – Crime and Punishment 

Renee Vazquez – Othello?

Lawrence Nelson  – Fahrenheit 451

Least Favorite High-School Mandated Reads: 

Brennan Nick – The Old Man and the Sea

Sydney Armor – Doctor Faustus

Shelby Armor – The Road

Wilton Zuniga – The Prince

Charles Schnell – The Road

Renee Vazquez – Cry, the Beloved Country

Lawrence Nelson – The Joy Luck Club

Favorite Books Editor: James Zheng