Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that the curriculum for all school pupils includes (a) the work of William Shakespeare and (b) the full canon of English Literature.

The National Curriculum for English aims to ensure that all pupils appreciate our rich and varied literary heritage. It encourages pupils to read a range of books, poems, and plays to encourage the development of a life-long love of literature. Pupils should be taught to maintain positive attitudes to reading and understanding of what they read by increasing their familiarity with a wide range of books, including myths, legends and traditional stories, modern fiction, fiction from our literary heritage, and books from other cultures and traditions.

The English National Curriculum applies to all state-maintained schools, but not academies or free schools. Academies must teach a broad and balanced curriculum, including English. It is a statutory requirement that maintained schools follow the English Programmes of Study. Whilst these Programmes of Study do not set out specific reading lists at secondary level, they set out the following categories from which schools should choose texts.

At Key Stage 3, all pupils in maintained schools must study: English Literature, both pre-1914 and contemporary, including prose, poetry and drama; Shakespeare (two plays); and seminal world literature. We have also strengthened the Key Stage 4 English Programmes of Study to ensure all pupils read a wide range of high-quality, challenging, classic English Literature. There is a renewed focus on the reading of whole texts. At Key Stage 4, all pupils in maintained schools must study: at least one play by Shakespeare; works from the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries; and poetry since 1789, including Romantic poetry.

Exam boards will set out a range of choices within the following categories from which schools can select texts. Those taking a GCSE in English Literature, which is the majority of Key Stage 4 pupils, must study: at least one play by Shakespeare; at least one nineteenth-century novel; a selection of poetry since 1789, including representative Romantic poetry; and fiction or drama from the British Isles from 1914 onwards.