I don’t want cliche titles like anything by Orwell, Kafka, etc. as these kinds of books are overdone. Instead, I want books where a lot of analysis is possible. Ideally the book shouldn’t be too hard to read, something like 1984 level is acceptable. Another important thing is that there should be ample ready analysis/ information online as this is after all a research-based essay.
by Fit-Ad-6787
2 Comments
So you want a book that has a lot of people who already read/wrote about it but that’s also not popular? That’s pretty narrow even before you add “but is also easy to read” to the mix.
Maybe something by Ishiguro? He’s one of the “new” classics so he’s not as overdone but is pretty popular. He’s pretty easy to read too. *An Artist of the Floating World*, *The Remains of the Day* and *Never Let Me Go* have a lot of academic writing I think.
Or you could do Vonnegut who wasn’t even accepted as literary for a while (but is now). You could do *Slaughterhouse 5* for a book that’s very deep but not as widely studied as Orwell and co. Very easy to read and more relevant than ever too.
Are you an IB student? (I’m going to assume yes and go from there.) My extended essay was based on a historical topic, but my favorite works from IB English included Their Eyes Were Watching God (Zora Neale Hurston) and I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (Maya Angelou). We also read Hamlet (Shakespeare), Crime and Punishment (Dostoyevsky), The Awakening (Chopin), and a bunch of other books I can’t think of right now.
If you want to offer a fairly fresh take, you could put two similar books in conversation with each other and write an analysis based on that. (For example, the books could be thematically, historically, or geographically similar to each other.) Iirc, you only have 4,000 words, which doesn’t give you much space to write about *two* literary works, but if you’re up for a challenge, your essay could be really interesting.
Good luck!
EDIT: We also read The House of Spirits (Allende), The Glass Menagerie (Williams), and A Doll’s House (Ibsen)!