"Beginning" classic books?

[Peaceseeker]

Can someone help me out with some recommendations for which classics would be good to start an average 8th-9th grader with?  It's a girl if that matters- but she dislikes romance right now so I am thinking no Jane Austen yet, lol..  This would be a student who gravitated towards YA books, dystopic series, and comic books/graphic novels during middle school.   Last year we did Lightning Lit 8 and all of that was fine although I think the language in Dicken's was a little bit of a slog.

I don't have a theme or time period.  I am just looking for a few classics to ease into more challenging reading without it being too overwhelming.  Hopefully nothing with super heavy or very mature themes just yet either.  It has been so long since I read most of my classics collection and I am just not sure where to start this journey.  I don't want to begin with a  lot of dsytopic classics, as I think she is starting to tire of the genre from all the YA books and would like a break.  I thought about maybe starting with some gothic novels but I am not sure now.

Thanks in advance for any ideas and suggestions.

[HomeAgain]

My picks would include these if she hasn't read them:

-A Tree Grows In Brooklyn.  There are a few mature points - a man exposes himself to a young girl, her aunt works in a rubber factory that makes toys as a blind, but the story itself follows a girl and her family from her childhood to young adulthood.
-Huck Finn
-The Sketchbook of Jeffery Crayon.  This contains the short stories of The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow and Rip Van Winkle, but also introduces the student to Irving's writings in short bites through other little stories like the observation of two families in town.
-Peter Pan.  It's funny, and an older student gets the humor much better than a younger one who only grasps the surface story.

I'd also, if you can find it, get the audio book of Catch-22.  The book itself is daunting in size, but the man who reads it in the audio version made us want to read the rest on our own after our 3 week library check out was up and we'd only made it half through.
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[Kendall]

I would suggest the Moonstone by Wilkie Collins and then To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis.  to Say Nothing of the Dog has lots of allusions to literature and history and reading it first would give away the Moonstone. Otherwise the two books are not related.

I also have my kids first read Three Men in a Boat and some Jeeves stories, but that isn't necessary to do before To Say Nothing of the Dog

Also, I guess they technically are romance(?), but I really don't see Pride and Prejudice as a romance in the YA sense of the word. My sons and daughters have all liked it and none were into reading romance.

Just reread your post, maybe only the Moonstone would be considered in the classics realm. It is contemporary with Dickens, but not as difficult of a read. If you are looking for reading that is new and not necessarily classic then what I mentioned above would be great. 

Other newer adult fiction (but appropriate for 8th grade) for free reading (which I realize you didn't ask for) - The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax (and then others if she likes that one).  The Thirty Nine Steps by Buchan.

 

 

 

 

[egao_gakari]

I'm not sure where "classic" ends in terms of time period, but some of Ray Bradbury's stuff is nicely sci-fi/dystopic while also verbally rich. The Martian Chronicles or Fahrenheit 451.

I love Dorothy L. Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey series of detective novels; "Whose Body?" is the first one that introduces most of the major characters, and I think the general consensus is that "Strong Poison" is the best. They are packed with cultural references to 1920's-30's Britain, but as I recall from being an 8th-grader, I just skimmed over most of them without much concern. Classic whodunits that really keep you guessing!

L.M. Montgomery's Emily trilogy might be worth a look, if your DD already read and enjoyed Anne. I think those would be good "transitional" books leading into material that was written for adult audiences. They are darker than Anne in the sense that the main character has a gloomier personality and becomes a witness to certain sad/grim events, but it all ends up happily.

Jules Verne might be fun. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea? Edgar Allen Poe's short stories for that Gothic flavor. I've never read The Scarlet Pimpernel, but the other English teacher at my school taught it and kids seemed to enjoy it.

Thinking back to 9th grade English, I loved The Old Man and the Sea. (Perhaps I'm the only one.) I also loved East of Eden and To Kill a Mockingbird, but you mentioned preferring not too heavy thematically. 

Agree on Huck Finn and Jane Austen. Doesn't have to be Pride and Prejudice. Emma and Sense and Sensibility would also be good starting points. 

In terms of methodology, I am a big believer in reading at least the first chapter of a classic novel aloud to the student. It gets the "author's voice" in their head and helps them interpret unfamiliar/old-fashioned syntax. From there, my strong reader reads it all to himself... my not-so-strong reader, we switch off reading aloud chapter by chapter until she gains enough confidence to try a chapter independently, then we wean off the reading aloud until she's reading the last few chapters of each book independently.

[hollyhock2]

I would suggest Anne of Green Gables, Little Women and Little Men, the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, maybe some Jules Verne if she's interested in that. A Christmas Carol is an easier Dickens. I loved Jane of Lantern Hill. The Story of my Life by Helen Keller is pretty interesting. The Prisoner of Zenda was a hit here. Daddy-Long-Legs, although there is some romance in it. Those are all easier classics, IMO.

[Bluegoat]

I would agree with a lot of the above.  Though you could look at other LM Montgomery stuff besides Anne.

I'd also suggest: Puck of Pook's Hill; The Hobbit; maybe Frankenstein; Gulliver's Travels. A Room With A View.

If she's read or likes Twilight, you might try Wuthering Heights.  

ETA: If you want to go to older works, you might try some of the Greek comedies, especially if you can find some productions of them on video or in person.  

[Lori D.]

Your DD might enjoy doing Literary Lessons from the Lord of the Rings (LLftLotR) next year, esp. since she just did LL8, with includes The Hobbit. It is a 1-year study focused on Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy, plus you can optionally add in some additional classics: The Odyssey or The Iliad, Beowulf, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, a Shakespeare play (Macbeth or Midsummer Night's Dream), as LLftLotR has units that each dig a bit into these works (the first three), or mention the works (the 2 Shakespeare plays) and their influence on Tolkien. See samples here.

re: Pride and Prejudice
Watch a film version first, to get the people/relationships straight, then read. I do recommend either P&P or Northanger Abbey, as they are shorter than Emma, and Northanger Abbey is much lighter/more amusing and is like watching the relationship antics of high schoolers, but set in the early 1800s. JMO!

Ideas for "gentle start" classics:
- Anne of Green Gables (Montgomery)
- Adventures of Tom Sawyer (Twain)
- Something Wicked This Way Comes (Bradbury) - modern gothic
- The Graveyard Book (Gaiman) - YA gothic
- The Sword in the Stone (White) -- first of 4 "books" that make up T.H. White's version of the King Arthur legend
- Watership Down (Adams) - fantasy quest adventure
- Ivanhoe (Scott)
- Treasure Island (Stevenson)
- Call of the Wild (London) -- the language may be a slight slog, but it's short, and an adventure
- To Kill a Mockingbird (Lee) - yes, some serious themes, but also a lot of humor
- Sherlock Holmes short stories (Doyle)
- Tanglewood Tales; Wonderbook (Hawthorne) -- short story retellings of ancient myths
- Animal Farm (Orwell) - serious themes, but not done in a "heavy" way
- The Old Man and the Sea (Hemingway)
- Life With Jeeves (Wodehouse) -- humorous
- Pygmalion (Shaw) -- humorous; the play that the musical film My Fair Lady was based on
- The Importance of Being Earnest (Wilde) -- humorous; play
- Tuck Everlasting (Babbitt) - YA that is a fast/easy read, but lots of literary elements and themes for discussion
- The Book Thief (Zusak) - YA with serious themes
- The Outsiders (Hinton) - serious themes, but 8th/9th graders often really resonate with this book

[Kareni]

I'll second the suggestions of:

Stories by Poe

Sherlock Holmes stories

The Scarlet Pimpernel

Regards,
Kareni

[Farrar]

We've done short stories by a lot of classic authors for awhile.

Our starters for 8th grade included Call of the Wild, To Kill a Mockingbird, Fahrenheit 451, and The Time Machine. Some of the children's classics mentioned above, like Treasure Island, were done aloud or on audiobook at some point in late elementary or early middle school.

We also read lots of children's classics - older Newbery winners, things like The Outsiders, A Wrinkle in Time, etc. at various points in middle school. For high school we may still read a few required YA novels, but they'll more likely be recent ones.

[katilac]

On 7/26/2018 at 11:09 AM, hollyhock2 said:

I would suggest Anne of Green Gables, Little Women and Little Men, the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, maybe some Jules Verne if she's interested in that. A Christmas Carol is an easier Dickens. I loved Jane of Lantern Hill. The Story of my Life by Helen Keller is pretty interesting. The Prisoner of Zenda was a hit here. Daddy-Long-Legs, although there is some romance in it. Those are all easier classics, IMO.

 

Most of these are well under grade level for 8th/9th, if that matters to the OP. 

 

On 7/26/2018 at 9:33 AM, egao_gakari said:

 Agree on Huck Finn and Jane Austen. Doesn't have to be Pride and Prejudice. Emma and Sense and Sensibility would also be good starting points. 

1

 

The constant dialect in Huck Finn can make for a tough read, it's not where I'd start with a student who found Dickens a tough slog due to the unfamiliar language. I'd consider it to have both very dark and mature themes as well. 

Just for fun, my dd's reaction after starting Emma: Wait, wait, wait - do Mr. Knightley and Emma get together in this? Gross! He's a creeper, I'm not finishing this! 

Perhaps we cautioned her too much about older men ?

OP: dystopian, YA but not romance, and graphic novels seem to indicate a leaning toward adventure. Ancient myths can be a fantastic intro to classics; lots of adventure, fighting against great odds, acts of great heroism and acts of terrible revenge. They are fairly episodic, so it's less daunting to read a myth than to plunge into a long novel. You can pick and choose to avoid the darkest themes. 

My kids liked the Greek and Roman myths, and some of the Celtic ones. They found the Norse myths a bit too disgusting, but that will appeal to other kids, lol. 

They liked Gilgamesh well enough, and it's nice and short and a pretty easy read. We all cried when . . . the really sad thing happens. 

And, while I wouldn't call these easy by any means, my kids (and some others that I taught) liked Dante's Inferno and loved Paradise Lost. We read some in plain English so we could get through more of it, and of course some with the more difficult and beautiful language.  Many teens are fascinated with the idea of punishments that fit the crime in Inferno, and probably most teens sympathize with the devil preferring to rule in hell rather than serve in heaven in PL, lol. 

Overall, my kids preferred ancient and medieval literature and didn't have a lot of love for adult classic novels, not even the ones mom loved (hmph), with the odd exception of Crime and Punishment for youngest.  

[Peaceseeker]

Thanks for some ideas to get me going.  We keep going back to the gothic idea so I think I am just going to start there.  We have read a good bit of the titles listed here in middle school so maybe we are more prepared than I think.  I am trying to wrap my brain around a high school literature plan- where to start and where I want to end up!

[Lori D.]

On 7/28/2018 at 9:18 PM, CaliforniaDreamin said:

...We keep going back to the gothic idea so I think I am just going to start there...

classic gothic titles:
Hound of the Baskervilles (Doyle) -- novella; mystery/gothic
The Moonstone (Collins) -- more mystery, less gothic
Fall of the House of Usher (Poe) -- novella
Jane Eyre (Bronte) -- less gothic
Wuthering Heights (Bronte) -- more gothic
Northanger Abbey (Austin) -- Jane Austin's humorous spin on gothic novels
The House of Seven Gables (Hawthorne)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Hugo)
Rebecca (du Maurier)
Frankenstein (Shelley)
The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Stevenson)
Phantom of the Opera (Leroux)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (Wilde)
Dracula (Stoker)
The Turn of the Screw (James) -- novella; unreliable narrator

contemporary titles with gothic elements
The Graveyard Book (Gaiman) -- YA
The Thirteenth Tale (Sutterfield) -- contemporary novel/setting that is like a Bronte novel

short stories
Masque of the Red Death; The Black Cat (Poe)
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (Irving)
The Hand (de Maupassant)
The Monkey's Paw (Jacobs)
The Bottle Imp (Stevenson)
The Signal Man (Dickens) -- more ghost story
Legend of Sleep Hollow (Irving)
Frritt-Flacc (The Storm) (Verne)
Queen of Spades (Pushkin)
The Pomegranite Seed (Wharton) -- more ghost story
The Minister's Black Veil, Young Goodman Brown, Rappaccini's Daughter (Hawthorne) -- short stories
some of Grimm's fairy tales -- Bluebeard, for example

resources
"Suggestions for a Gothic Lit. class?" -- past thread with more title ideas and links to classes/study guides
"Gothic short story to use with Northanger Abbey" -- past thread with more Lit. ideas
Gothic Literature Study Guide -- very short free guide

Edited August 4, 2018 by Lori D.

[Peaceseeker]

Thank you for that awesome list Lori D!!