"Outside a dog a book is man's best friend, inside a dog it is too dark to read!" -Groucho Marx========="The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid." -Jane Austen========="I don’t believe in the kind of magic in my books. But I do believe something very magical can happen when you read a good book."-JK Rowling========"I spend a lot of time reading." -Bill Gates=========“Ahhh. Bed, book, kitten, sandwich. All one needed in life, really.” -Jacqueline Kelly=========

Monday, August 29, 2016

Top Ten Tuesday: Contemporary books paired with classics


Classic or required reads and recommended contemporary pairings.
Reposted from Sept 2. 2013 TTT with additional/new parings in red

Required reads/classics
Contemporary pairing
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Nothing by Janne Teller or
Beauty Queens by Libba Bray
Don Quixote by Cervantes
Going Bovine by Libba Bray
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad or
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
Dodger by Terry Pratchett
The Crucible by Arthur Miller
Wicked Girls by Stephanie Hemphill
Hamlet by Shakespeare
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski
or Ophelia by Lisa Klein or A Steep and Thorny
Way by Cat Winters
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Jane by April Lindner or
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Bridgette Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding
1984 by George Orwell
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare
Son of the Mob by Gordon Korman or Perfect Chemistry by Simone Elkeles
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
Paper Towns by John Green or
Dr. Bird’s Advice to Sad Poets by Evan Roskos
The Island of Dr. Moreau by HG Wells
The Madman’s Daughter by Megan Shepherd
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones
Night by Ellie Wiesel
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak or Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys or Maus by Art Spiegelman
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
His Dark Endeavors by Kenneth Oppel
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
Railsea by China Mieville
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
Revolutions by Jennifer Donnelly
The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson
And We Stay by Jenny Hubbard
A Winter’s Tale by William Shakespeare
Exit, Pursued by a Bear by EK Johnston
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
The Memory of Light by Francisco X. Stork
1001 Arabian Nights
The Wrath and the Dawn by Becky Ahdieh



Please give me more suggestions if you can think of any!

22 comments:

  1. Wow! Great list. I'm going to have to add several to my TBR mountain. I finished Poisonwood Bible a few months ago so I'll probably try one of those classics first.

    http://goingforgoldilocks.blogspot.com/2013/09/top-10-tuesday-book-id-like-to-see.html

    ReplyDelete
  2. I teaching both the Achebe and Conrad next semester- I'll have to hurry up and read The Poisonwood Bible before then! Great list.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. My daughter's high school teacher called these three books the Africa Trilogy.

      Delete
  3. The more I see His Dark Endeavors pop up, the more I want to read it. I'm adding a few more books to my to-read list.

    My TTT

    ReplyDelete
  4. I think pairing Heart of Darkness with The Poisonwood Bible is great, as is Night and The book Thief- great list!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Night and The Book Thief is a pairing I would love to teach. I haven't read any of those other contemporary novels, though, so I'll have to look them up!

    ReplyDelete
  6. I love how you've paired Beauty Queens with Lord of the Flies.

    ReplyDelete
  7. This is wonderful! I'm going to have to pick up some of these.

    ReplyDelete
  8. The Eyre Affair, yes! I've read 13 other books on your excellent list. Thanks! My TTT lists some sci-fi cat books to read instead of doing homework.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I'm curious, what you would suggest in pairing with Edgar Allen Poe?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hmm...I may have to chew on this one for a few minutes but my initial reaction is The Monstrumologist by Yancey. It is dark and foreboding like Poe's writing.

      Delete
  10. I absolutely love this list Anne. I love paired books. :-)

    ReplyDelete
  11. I love your list! I read Exit, Pursued by a Bear a few months ago and really liked it. It was very well done. I also read and enjoyed Wicked Girls a few years ago. I just need to read The Crucible now.
    My Top Ten

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I ended up liking Exit, Pursued by a Bear better once I found the connection to Shakespeare.

      Delete
  12. Excellent choices! I love your classic pairings for Beauty Queens, Dodger, and The Eyre Affair! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I know, I love all three of those books. I was trying to think of a pairing for The Shepherd's Crown, Pratchett's last book. I haven't thought of anything yet.

      Delete
    2. I still need to read that one - I've got a bit of catching up to do on his! :)

      Delete
  13. Wonderful list! I always enjoy coming across books that yuo can pair with a classic...I love the way you formatted it too :)

    My TTT

    ReplyDelete
  14. Wow, what an amazing list! Such a clever concept and I think your suggestions are much more exciting, they'd definitely excite young readers more than the classics. I'd probably be more inspired to read the classic after reading the modern version first.

    I'm going to print your list now so I can read them all :)
    Happy Reading
    Rachel @ Paein-and-Ms4Tune

    ReplyDelete
  15. I absolutely adore how you put your list together! I would have loved to have tackled a ton of these reads side by side. Excellent list!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I keep dreaming of the day when a teacher actually wants to do something with his/her class and this list.

      Delete

I look forward to your comments and interactions! Join in the conversation.