• Top 10 Books for High Schoolers to Read

    by  • December 2, 2011 • On Culture

    A 1985 survey of principals and teachers in Chicago-area high schools produced this list of the top 10 books educators felt every high school student should read.

    1. Plays by William Shakespeare (various titles)
    2. “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” by Mark Twain
    3. The Bible
    4. “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne
    5. “The Odyssey” by Homer
    6. “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck
    7. “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald
    8. “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
    9. “Great Expectations” by Charles Dickens
    10. “A Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens

    Making the top 20 were “Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger, “The Old Man and the Sea” by Ernest Hemingway, “1984” and “Animal Farm” by George Orwell, “The Red Badge of Courage” by Stephen Crane and “Lord of the Flies” by William Golding.

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