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The set texts your child is studying

AQA gives schools a list of texts for each part of the Literature exams, and the school picks one from each. The full list for 2027, what to buy, and where to read and listen for free.

Quick guide for parents and carers · 3 minute read

For GCSE English Literature, your child studies a Shakespeare play, a 19th-century novel, a modern play or novel and a group of 15 poems. AQA sets a list for each, and the school decides which ones your child studies. The quickest way to find out is to ask the English teacher.

AQA’s lists for exams in 2027

  • Shakespeare (Paper 1): Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, The Merchant of Venice, Much Ado About Nothing or Julius Caesar.
  • A 19th-century novel (Paper 1): The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, A Christmas Carol, Great Expectations, Jane Eyre, Frankenstein, Pride and Prejudice or The Sign of Four.
  • A modern play (Paper 2): An Inspector Calls, Blood Brothers, DNA, A Taste of Honey, Princess & The Hustler or Leave Taking.
  • Or a modern novel or story collection (Paper 2): Lord of the Flies, Animal Farm, Anita and Me, Pigeon English, My Name is Leon, or Telling Tales, AQA’s own anthology.
  • Poetry (Paper 2): one cluster of 15 poems from AQA’s anthology, Poems Past and Present. The clusters are Love and Relationships, Power and Conflict, and Worlds and Lives, which was first examined in 2025.
  • Unseen poetry (Paper 2): nothing to choose and nothing to learn in advance. The two poems are printed on the paper.

If an older brother or sister studied The History Boys, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time or Never Let Me Go, those texts had their last AQA exam in 2024.

The texts our resources cover

Our resources are written for Macbeth, A Christmas Carol, An Inspector Calls, the Power and Conflict poems and unseen poetry, and for both English Language papers. Our revision packs cover the same texts.

Buying a copy

For Macbeth, A Christmas Carol and An Inspector Calls, any complete edition works. The exam prints any extract it uses and everything else comes from memory, so page numbers do not matter. Avoid abridged or retold versions, because the quotations your child learns have to be the writer’s own words.

AQA names a particular version of a few other texts on its lists: the 1831 Frankenstein, the 1867 Great Expectations and the musical version of Blood Brothers. If your child is studying one of those, ask the school which edition to buy.

The poems are in AQA’s anthology. Nine of the fifteen Power and Conflict poems are still in copyright, so if there is no anthology at home, ask the English department how your child can get one.

A Christmas Carol and Macbeth are long out of copyright, so free copies and recordings are easy to find.

  • Project Gutenberg has free ebooks of A Christmas Carol and Macbeth, to read online or download.
  • The Folger Shakespeare Library puts the whole of Macbeth online, scene by scene with the lines numbered.
  • LibriVox has free recordings made by volunteers. A Christmas Carol takes about three and a quarter hours to hear. A full-cast Macbeth takes about two and a quarter, with one file for each act.
  • The National Theatre Collection of 70 filmed productions, including Macbeth, is free for UK state schools, and students at those schools can watch it from home for free. Ask the school for the login.

Listening with the book open is a good way through Dickens’s long sentences and Shakespeare’s verse.

An Inspector Calls is still in copyright, so your child needs their own copy. The play has three acts and takes place in one room on one evening. Reading it aloud in parts at home works well.

For questions that get a teenager talking about a character or a scene, see Talking about the set texts at home.

Sources

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