Substitute for The Animal Farm

[TechWife]

I'd like some suggestions for a substitute for The Animal Farm. It has landed on my son's reading list for the second year in a row & I'd like for him to get some variety. I have ruled out 1984 as a substitute. Any book recommendations that deal with socialism and/or totalitarianism would be appreciated.

 

Thanks

[klmama]

Would One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich work? Gulag work camp.

[MicheleinMN]

Watership Down

Brave New World

The Giver

Hunger Games

Lord of the Flies

The Time Machine

Fahrenheit 451

Ender's Game

The Iron Heel

 

I highly suggest pre-reading or at minimum reading reviews/excerpts of these books before assigning any of them.

 

And maybe Utopia as a contrast?

[Sebastian (a lady)]

I'd like some suggestions for a substitute for The Animal Farm. It has landed on my son's reading list for the second year in a row & I'd like for him to get some variety. I have ruled out 1984 as a substitute. Any book recommendations that deal with socialism and/or totalitarianism would be appreciated.

 

Thanks

 

Ivan Denisovich

Grey is the Color of Hope or In the Beginning by Irina Ratushinskaya (Soviet poet who was in the gulag)

Red Scarf Girl (This is a young adult book, but is chilling in its representation of the Cultural Revolution)

 

Escape from Camp 14 is a newly published book about a young man who was born in a North Korean prison camp and eventually escaped. I haven't read it yet, but here is a review.

Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea is a travelogue of a trip to N. Korea that shows many of the facets of life there.

[Skadi]

Watership Down

Ender's Game

Anthem (it's Ayn Rand's shortest work and her best, in my honest opinion)

[goldberry]

Another vote for Fahrenheit 451.....I love me some Ray Bradbury....!

 

We're doing Something Wicked This Way Comes this year, I didn't think she would "get" Fahrenheit yet.

[Harriet Vane]

I agree with many of the other suggestions.

 

You might consider adding two books, one that is representative of communism in its ugly reality, and another that is pro-utopian society, like Utopia, by Thomas More. It's an old book but very readable, and can be interesting to compare to historic reality.

 

Also, I highly recommend reading The Communist Manifesto. It's not that long (25 pages??), and is actually somewhat well written. It's a fascinating look at the mindset.

[AngieW in Texas]

My English teachers didn't talk to each other apparently. We covered Animal Farm in 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th grades. The 12th grade teacher was going to assign it too. It was actually in 1984 and we lobbied hard to read 1984 instead and convinced her to switch books.

[Candid]

Do you really want another utopian/communist novel or would it be better to substitute in some other 20th century work that wont make it to a list? I ask because I think sometimes we get stuck on one meme when picking and substituting and we don't expand enough.

 

As an example, I think it is a shame that high school reading lists rarely include a lot of good 20th century drama even though there is tons of it. Yes, you'll get The Glass menagerie and maybe Godot (sometimes a smart teacher will swap that out for R & G Are Dead), but that's as far as it goes. The 20th century has much to offer so it might be wise to think about substitutes more expansively.

[flyingiguana]

I thought that Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China was a way better book than Red Scarf Girl. It's an autobiography, so if you're looking specifically for fiction you might not want it. But I thought it did a much better job of describing China than Red Scarf Girl.

 

Ivan Denisovich is both a quick read and a real slog. Kind of depends on how dedicated the reader is. The author is trying to show the deadliness of prison life, which makes the book rather difficult to read because it's so real and gritty and, frankly, boring. Because that's what he was trying to show life was like. I mean, it's an *important* book, and it does a very good job of showing that reality, but you might run into difficulties of getting it finished if your reader isn't really on board with the idea. You might want to point this out before handing it over to your son so he's not expecting a thriller or anything.

 

I had the impression that The Communist Manifesto was longer than 25 pages. Maybe classes usually only assign parts of it? My daughter just read part of this for a college class last year and I know it was only a portion. We tried reading the rest of it and found it wasn't as pertinent to today's politics, so I understand now why people only read excerpts.

[flyingiguana]

Watership Down

Brave New World

The Giver

Hunger Games

Lord of the Flies

The Time Machine

Fahrenheit 451

Ender's Game

The Iron Heel

 

I find it interesting that I've had my kids read most of these books, or at least try them. They hated almost all of them. Of the lot, I think Fahrenheit 451 garnered an "it's ok" rating, while The Time Machine was passably interesting.

 

I think the problem with The Giver and The Hunger Games is that they were just too juvenile. There wasn't enough depth to really discuss anything. Ender's Game, while it had an ending that was worth getting to, was just too much slog through video game-land to get there. Would have made a good short story (although I've been told the short story the book was based on doesn't actually get to the point that the book does). Watership Down drove them crazy because the bunnies were, well, a bit on the dumb side for not having bothered to rescue any females when they ran away from their warren. And the females were basically just breeders when they did show up (this might not bother a boy reader, although I think it should).

 

Lord of the Flies might have been the best at presenting a dystopian situation in a somewhat realistic setting, but my kids just didn't believe it. It didn't jibe with human nature as they know it. I can kind of see their point, in that kids might not act with such brutality if they were in a situation where they had to be the authority figures. But of the ones my kids read in this genre, I think this book did at least give them the most to think about.

 

My kids have not yet read Brave New World, so I can't give their take on it. I have read it (and most of the others), and thought it was maybe the most thought provoking of them all. (Although I haven't read The Iron Heel, so that's not in the running.) I'm still trying to get Brave New World into my kids' reading list.

 

However, as another poster pointed out, you can overdo dystopian.

[AngieW in Texas]

Watership Down

Brave New World

The Giver

Hunger Games

Lord of the Flies

The Time Machine

Fahrenheit 451

Ender's Game

The Iron Heel

 

I've read all the books on your list aside from The Iron Heel (never heard of that one before). I really didn't like Lord of the Flies.

 

The only book in this list that my oldest finished was The Giver, which she loved, but she read it in 7th grade. She only got a few chapter in to Hunger Games and then abandoned it.

 

My middle dd has read about half of the books on your list. She enjoyed The Time Machine, loved Hunger Games, was upset with the lack of an ending to The Giver, and hated Lord of the Flies (didn't believe it could happen and though it was more posturing by adult about worthless teenagers). Brave New World, Ender's Game, 1984, and Farenheit 451 are all on her list for this year (scifi/fantasy literature).

[SailorMom]

Look into Ella Minnow Pea. It sounds silly, but the statement the author makes is a strong one. I really enjoyed it, and the vocabulary could stand alone as a year of SAT prep, lol.