# Teaching > General Teaching >  Short Stories/Poetry Dealing with Capitalism or Communism

## Dark Lady

I have a really bright 16 year old tutee at the moment who's just started looking at discursive essays. The class are going to start writing one and she's considering writing hers on Capitalism vs Communism but was worried it might be a bit boring/dry. I told her that the key to making an essay interesting is variation (variation of sentence structure/length, variation of tone, variation of sources/information etc.) and I thought I'd try and show her all the elements she could use to bring into the essay to help.

I'll encourage her to think about current and historical examples of both systems in practice, look at the theory and bring in things like Marxism etc. but I'd also like to bring in a fictional literature element. I think this would help to make it more 'interesting' for her and also help to show how writers often use works of fiction to comment on society etc. I'd quite like a few short stories (or even poetry) to cover the subject that I could give her an overview of and she can choose to read if she wants. The obvious example that sprung to mind was 'Animal Farm'; it would help to show the relationship between actual world politics and literature. But I'm struggling to think of much else that I can easily acquire a copy of and would be accessible to her.

If anyone has any ideas I'd be really grateful.

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## The Comedian

If you're not adverse to graphic novels, you might look into Marjane Satrapi's work Persepolis, which deals with the Iranian Revolution and, both she and her parents were devoted communists who thought that revolution would be of of the communist flavor. . .

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## Jassy Melson

You've got to bring in actual examples, so this would include 1984 and to go back to the source Marx's The Communist Manifesto

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## bouquin

_The Raid_ - a short story by John Steinbeck.

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## cyberbob

The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand isn't very short but it's commonly read in high schools and the entire story is a metaphor for capitalism/individualism/rightism vs. communism/egalitarianism/leftism.

It's also a good gateway to more intellectual and philosophical reading.

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