AP English Reading List (Updated September 8, 2016)
The list below includes all of the major literary works listed on the open-ended questions of the AP English Literature and Composition Exams from 1981-2017. The 1998 exam did not include a list of suggested literary works. This list includes the title of the literary work, the author’s name, and the year(s) in which the work appeared as one of the choices on the AP Exam.
Absalom, Absalom by William Faulkner (’00, ’07, ’10, ’12)
Adam Bede by George Eliot (’06)
The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow ('13)
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (’82, ’85, ’86, ’87, ’91, ’92, ’94, ’95, ’96, ’99, ’05, ’06, ’08, '13)
The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton (’97, ’02, ’05, ’08, ’12, '14)
Agnes of God by John Pielmeier (’00)
Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood (’00, ’04, ’08)
All My Sons by Arthur Miller (’85, ’90)
All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren (’00, ’02, ’04, ’07, ’08, ’11)
All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy (’96, ’06, ’08, ’10, ’11, '13)
The American by Henry James (’05, ’10)
An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser (’82, ’95, ’03)
America is in the Heart by Carlos Bulosan (’95)
Angel of Repose by Wallace Stegner (’10)
Another Country by James Baldwin (’95, ’10, ’12)
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (’91, ’99, ’02, ’03, ’06, ’08, '16)
Antigone by Sophocles (’90, ’94, ’99, ’03, ’11, '14)
The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz by Mordecai Richler (’94)
Antony and Cleopatra by William Shakespeare (’91)
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner (’89, ’90, ’94, ’01, ’06, ’09)
As You Like It by William Shakespeare (’92, ’05, ’06, ’10, '16)
Atonement by Ian McEwan (’07, ’11, '13, '16)
The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man by James Weldon Johnson (’02, ’05)
The Awakening by Kate Chopin (’87, ’88, ’91, ’92, ’95, ’97, ’99, ’02, ’07, ’09, '14)
The Bear by William Faulkner (’94, ’06)
Beloved by Toni Morrison (’90, ’99, ’01, ’03, ’07, ’09, ’10, ’11, '14, '16, '17)
A Bend in the River by V. S. Naipaul ('15)
Benito Cereno by Herman Melville (’89)
Billy Budd by Herman Melville (’81, ’83, ’85, ’99, ’02, ’05, ’08, '15)
The Birthday Party by Harold Pinter (’89, ’97)
Black Boy by Richard Wright (’06, '13, '15)
Bleak House by Charles Dickens (’94, ’00, ’09, ’10)
Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya (’96, ’97, ’05, ’06)
The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood (’07, ’11, '16)
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison (’95)
The Bonesetter’s Daughter by Amy Tan (’06, ’07, ’11, '16)
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (’89, ’05, ’10, '17)
Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat ('13)
Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh (’12)
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (’90, ’08)
Brown Girl, Brownstones by Paule Marshall ('13)
The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout ('16)
Candide by Voltaire (’96, ’04, ’10)
The Caretaker by Harold Pinter (’85)
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams (’00)
The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger (’01)
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller (’82, ’85, ’87, ’89, ’94, ’01, ’05, ’08, '13, '15, '16)
A Yellow Raft in Blue Water by Michael Dorris ('16)
The Zoo Story by Edward Albee (’82, ’01)
Zoot Suit by Luis Valdez (’95)
In 1993, the open-ended question did not include the titles of particular literary works. Instead, it included a list of suggested authors from which to choose. This is the only year that the question was handled in this manner. The names of the authors from the 1993 question are listed below.