Post modern short stories to go with Brave New World

[Bethany Cobb]

I teach dual credit English. We are doing Brave New World, and I would like some British Post-Modern short stories or poems to go with it. Anything with themes like shame, use of language to shape reality, female characters that escape authorial bounds, anti-heroes, capitalism, consumerism, etc. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[MJ Booklover]

Hello! British Post-Modern is outside my usual areas of expertise, so I can’t immediately think of good suggestions to fit your theme. One short novel comes to mind that might fit: Ishiguro’s “Never Let Me Go.” This dystopian tale about a society in which people are cloned specifically to serve as organ donors would be an interesting companion to “Brave New World,” and is short and easy to read. It is memorable and creepy, too, with lots of discussion-worthy themes about what it means to be human.

I came across this post on Mashable listing good recent British short stories, but don’t know if any of these would specifically fit your bill: https://mashable.com/2018/01/13/best-british-short-stories/.

Maybe our readers will have some other ideas! If in the meantime you have found some works to fit your “Brave New World” theme, we would love to see your list.

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