A Level English Set Texts
Browse a comprehensive list of A level English set texts across all major UK boards. Find classic and modern novels, plays and poetry, from Austen and Shakespeare to Atwood, Morrison and Ishiguro.
Recommended reading books for primary & secondary aged children in the UK
Jean Rhys was a British novelist and short story writer, best known for her novel Wide Sargasso Sea. Born Ella Gwendolen Rees Williams in Dominica, she moved to England at the age of sixteen. Rhys attended the Perse School for Girls in Cambridge and later the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. She worked as a chorus girl and model before turning to writing.
Rhys began publishing short stories in the 1920s. Her first collection, The Left Bank and Other Stories, was published in 1927. She went on to write several novels, including Postures (published as Quartet in the UK, 1928), After Leaving Mr Mackenzie (1931), Voyage in the Dark (1934), and Good Morning, Midnight (1939). Her work often explores themes of displacement, identity, and the experiences of women in a patriarchal society.
After a period of obscurity, Rhys returned to prominence with the publication of Wide Sargasso Sea in 1966. This novel serves as a prequel to Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, telling the story of Antoinette Cosway, the woman who becomes Bertha Mason. Wide Sargasso Sea received critical acclaim and won the WH Smith Literary Award in 1967.
Jean Rhys’s work is recognised for its distinctive style and its exploration of postcolonial and feminist themes. Her final collection, Sleep It Off Lady, was published in 1976.
Browse a comprehensive list of A level English set texts across all major UK boards. Find classic and modern novels, plays and poetry, from Austen and Shakespeare to Atwood, Morrison and Ishiguro.
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