Exam set texts · England

OCR A Level English Literature set texts 2026 to 2027

69 books set by OCR, each with its first edition, the points that identify it and what it is worth where sales are recorded.

All reading lists

OCR A Level English Literature set texts for 2026 to 2027: 69 books in 7 groups. We have identified the first edition of 60 of them and hold recorded values for 2. A school or study copy of any of these is a reprint worth a few pounds; the first printing of the first edition is the copy collectors pay for. The list comes from the official source, read on 22 October 2026.

OCR's A level is built from three parts. The first exam paper covers a Shakespeare play, studied on its own, and then a pairing of a pre-1900 play with a pre-1900 poetry text, compared under exam conditions. The second paper is organised by topic: a school chooses one of five, from American literature between 1880 and 1940 to the immigrant experience, and students answer on an unseen extract before writing a comparative essay on two whole texts, at least one from the short core list. Both papers are sat without the books. The third part is coursework on three texts published since 1900, which schools choose for themselves.

That topic structure gives OCR one of the longest reading lists of any A level board. The core lists are short, Gatsby or The Grapes of Wrath for American literature and Nineteen Eighty-Four or The Handmaid's Tale for dystopia, but the second text can come from a long suggested list, so a dystopia class might read Brave New World and another Fahrenheit 451. The Shakespeare options shifted for 2027, when King Lear, Othello and The Taming of the Shrew came in, and the pre-1900 drama list changes again for exams from 2029.

For collectors the core texts are a strong group. Sense and Sensibility (Thomas Egerton, 1811) came out in three volumes credited only to "A Lady". Nineteen Eighty-Four (Secker and Warburg, 1949) is found in red and green jackets, and The Grapes of Wrath (Viking, 1939) is a cornerstone American first. Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber (Gollancz, 1979) is a modern first still found at sensible prices. The suggested lists add many more: Brave New World (Chatto and Windus, 1932), Fahrenheit 451 (Ballantine, 1953, with a small issue bound in asbestos), A Clockwork Orange (Heinemann, 1962) and The Bell Jar (Heinemann, 1963), first published under the pseudonym Victoria Lucas.

None of that applies to the paperback a student uses, which is a reprint worth a few pounds. Each row links to the book's page, with the first edition identified against two sources and a value band once we hold recorded sales of that printing.

Set texts

Component 01: Shakespeare (one)

  1. 1623 Coriolanus by William ShakespeareLast examined 2026 First edition not yet identified
  2. 1603 Hamlet by William Shakespeare First edition: N.L. and Iohn Trundell 1603
  3. 1608 King Lear by William ShakespeareFrom 2027 First edition: Printed for Nathaniel Butter 1608 points listed
  4. 1623 Measure for Measure by William ShakespeareLast examined 2026 First edition not yet identified
  5. 1622 Othello by William ShakespeareFrom 2027 First edition: Printed by N. Okes. for Thomas Walkley, and are to be sold at his shop, at the Eagle and Child, in Brittans Bursse 1622
  6. 1597 Richard III by William Shakespeare First edition not yet identified
  7. 1623 The Taming of the Shrew by William ShakespeareFrom 2027 First edition: Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount 1623
  8. 1623 The Tempest by William Shakespeare First edition: Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount 1623
  9. 1623 Twelfth Night by William ShakespeareLast examined 2026 First edition: Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount 1623
Set texts

Component 01: pre-1900 drama (one)

  1. 1598 Edward the Second by Christopher MarloweExamined until 2028 First edition not yet identified
  2. 1640 The Duchess of Malfi by John WebsterExamined until 2028 First edition not yet identified
  3. 1773 She Stoops To Conquer by Oliver GoldsmithExamined until 2028 First edition not yet identified
  4. 1889 A Doll's House by Henrik IbsenExamined until 2028 First edition not yet identified
  5. 1899 An Ideal Husband by Oscar WildeExamined until 2028 First edition: L. Smithers 1899
Set texts

Component 02: American Literature 1880 to 1940

  1. 1925 The Great Gatsby by F. Scott FitzgeraldCore set text First edition: Scribner 1925 points listed
  2. 1939 The Grapes of Wrath by John SteinbeckCore set text First edition: Viking 1939 points listed
  3. 1881 The Portrait of a Lady by Henry JamesSuggested second text First edition: Houghton Mifflin 1881
  4. 1884 Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark TwainSuggested second text First edition: Chatto & Windus 1884 points listed
  5. 1900 Sister Carrie by Theodore DreiserSuggested second text First edition: Doubleday, Page & Company 1900
  6. 1918 My Ántonia by Willa CatherSuggested second text First edition: Houghton Mifflin 1918
  7. 1920 The Age of Innocence by Edith WhartonSuggested second text First edition: D. Appleton and Company 1920
  8. 1929 The Sound and the Fury by William FaulknerSuggested second text First edition: J. Cape, H. Smith 1929 points listed
  9. 1929 A Farewell to Arms by Ernest HemingwaySuggested second text First edition: Scribner 1929 points listed
  10. 1929 Passing by Nella LarsenSuggested second text First edition: Knopf 1929
  11. 1940 Native Son by Richard WrightSuggested second text First UK edition: Gollancz 1940
Set texts

Component 02: The Gothic

  1. 1979 The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories by Angela CarterCore set text First edition: Gollancz 1979
  2. 1897 Dracula by Bram StokerCore set text First edition: Archibald Constable & Co 1897 points listed
  3. 1836 Vathek by William BeckfordSuggested second text First edition not yet identified
  4. 1818 Frankenstein by Mary ShelleySuggested second text First edition: Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mayor & Jones, Finsbury Square 1818
  5. 1890 The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar WildeSuggested second text First edition: Ward, Lock 1891
  6. 1932 Light in August by William FaulknerSuggested second text First UK edition: Chatto & Windus 1933
  7. 1938 Rebecca by Daphne du MaurierSuggested second text First edition: Gollancz 1938
  8. 1968 Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthySuggested second text First edition: Random House 1968 points listed
  9. 1984 The Wasp Factory by Iain BanksSuggested second text First edition: Macmillan 1984
  10. 1987 Beloved by Toni MorrisonSuggested second text First edition: Knopf 1987
  11. 1797 The Italian by Ann Radcliffe First edition: printed for T. Cadell jun. and W. Davies 1797
Set texts

Component 02: Dystopia

  1. 1985 The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret AtwoodCore set text First edition: McClelland & Stewart 1985
  2. 1949 Nineteen Eighty-Four by George OrwellCore set text First edition: Secker & Warburg 1949 points listed £405 to £4,000
  3. 1895 The Time Machine by H. G. WellsSuggested second text First edition not yet identified
  4. 1932 Brave New World by Aldous HuxleySuggested second text First edition: Chatto & Windus 1932 points listed
  5. 1953 Fahrenheit 451 by Ray BradburySuggested second text First edition: Ballantine Books 1953
  6. 1962 A Clockwork Orange by Anthony BurgessSuggested second text First edition: Heinemann 1962 points listed £450 to £888
  7. 1962 The Drowned World by J. G. BallardSuggested second text First edition: Berkley 1962
  8. 1974 The Memoirs of a Survivor by Doris LessingSuggested second text First edition: Octagon Press 1974
  9. 1992 The Children of Men by P. D. JamesSuggested second text First edition: Faber & Faber 1992
  10. 1993 Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. ButlerSuggested second text First edition: Four Walls Eight Windows 1993
  11. 2006 The Road by Cormac McCarthySuggested second text First edition: Knopf 2006 points listed
Set texts

Component 02: Women in Literature

  1. 1811 Sense and Sensibility by Jane AustenCore set text First edition: Printed for the author by C. Roworth, and published by T. Egerton 1811
  2. 1925 Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia WoolfCore set text First edition: L. & V. Woolf at the Hogarth Press 1925
  3. 1847 Jane Eyre by Charlotte BrontëSuggested second text First edition: Smith, Elder 1847
  4. 1860 The Mill on the Floss by George EliotSuggested second text First edition: William Blackwood and Sons 1860
  5. 1891 Tess of the D'urbervilles by Thomas HardySuggested second text First edition: James R. Osgood, McIlvaine 1891 points listed
  6. 1920 Women in Love by D. H. LawrenceSuggested second text First edition: Priv. print. for subscribers only 1920 points listed
  7. 1937 Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale HurstonSuggested second text First edition: Lippincott 1937
  8. 1963 The Bell Jar by Sylvia PlathSuggested second text First edition: Heinemann 1963
  9. 1970 The Bluest Eye by Toni MorrisonSuggested second text First edition: Holt, Rinehart and Winston 1970
  10. 1985 Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette WintersonSuggested second text First edition: Pandora 1985
  11. 2019 Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine EvaristoSuggested second text First edition: Penguin Books 2019
Set texts

Component 02: The Immigrant Experience

  1. 2007 The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin HamidCore set text First edition: Penguin Books 2007
  2. 1935 Call It Sleep by Henry RothCore set text First edition: Robert O. Ballou 1935
  3. 1906 The Jungle by Upton SinclairSuggested second text First edition: Doubleday, Page & Company 1906
  4. 1956 The Lonely Londoners by Samuel SelvonSuggested second text First edition: Wingate 1956
  5. 1959 Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories by Philip RothSuggested second text First UK edition: Andre Deutsch 1959
  6. 2003 The Namesake by Jhumpa LahiriSuggested second text First edition: Houghton Mifflin 2003
  7. 2003 Brick Lane by Monica AliSuggested second text First edition: Doubleday 2003
  8. 2004 Small Island by Andrea LevySuggested second text First edition: Review 2004
  9. 2005 The Secret River by Kate GrenvilleSuggested second text First edition: Canongate 2005
  10. 1982 Sour Sweet by Timothy Mo First edition: Deutsch 1982
  11. 2006 Terrorist by John Updike First edition: Alfred A. Knopf 2006
Changes

What changed

Shakespeare changed for exams from 2027: King Lear, Othello and The Taming of the Shrew replaced Coriolanus, Measure for Measure and Twelfth Night, which were last examined in 2026. The pre-1900 drama list shown runs to 2028; from first teaching in 2027 and examination in 2029 Doctor Faustus, The Rover and The Importance of Being Earnest replace Edward II, She Stoops to Conquer and An Ideal Husband, and the pre-1900 poetry texts are refreshed too. Component 02 lists both core set texts and OCR's suggested second texts; five suggested texts (Passing, Rebecca, Parable of the Sower, Girl, Woman, Other and The Lonely Londoners) were added in 2022 and first examined in 2024. The pre-1900 poetry texts (Chaucer, Milton, Coleridge, Tennyson's Maud and Rossetti) are omitted, as this list covers novels and plays only, and the non-exam component has no set texts.

More lists

Other exam set texts lists

Questions collectors ask

Frequently asked questions

What books are on the OCR A Level English Literature set texts for 2026 to 2027?

69 books: Coriolanus, Hamlet, King Lear, Measure for Measure, Othello, Richard III, The Taming of the Shrew, The Tempest, Twelfth Night, Edward the Second, The Duchess of Malfi, She Stoops To Conquer and more. The full list on this page comes from the official source, dated.

Which OCR A Level English Literature set texts books are valuable as first editions?

By recorded sales, Nineteen Eighty-Four (Secker & Warburg 1949, £405 to £4,000); A Clockwork Orange (Heinemann 1962, £450 to £888). Values depend on condition and the dust jacket.

Is my school copy worth anything?

No: school and study editions are reprints made in huge numbers and sell for a few pounds. The copy that carries value is the first printing of the first edition, which each row links to with its points.

What changed on the OCR A Level English Literature set texts?

Shakespeare changed for exams from 2027: King Lear, Othello and The Taming of the Shrew replaced Coriolanus, Measure for Measure and Twelfth Night, which were last examined in 2026. The pre-1900 drama list shown runs to 2028; from first teaching in 2027 and examination in 2029 Doctor Faustus, The Rover and The Importance of Being Earnest replace Edward II, She Stoops to Conquer and An Ideal Husban

Sources

Where these facts come from

The list is the official one; the first editions, points and values come from our catalogue and are listed only where two sources agree. Checked 22 October 2026. Reviewed by Harriet Ellis; read how we check facts.

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