Gossip Girl (2021) S1 reading list: All the books featured in the show so far

Jazz by Toni Morrison

SUMMARY: Jazz takes place in the winter of 1926. Joe Trace, a middle-aged door-to-door salesman has shot his teenage lover. It’s a tragedy marked by difference, for everywhere he went the people he encountered saw nothing but good things on the horizon. He, however, stole a life. Ending a young girl’s future.

His wife, Violet, adds to the chaos. She attacks the girl’s body at the funeral as she is mourned. Their love, their obsession, the bond that has driven them to this point, as told through the past and the present, is a reflection of their lives. From their hopes to their fears, to life in the city.

SPOTTED: The Jazz is a part of a stack of books, mainly comprised of classics, on Zoya’s table in “Just Another Girl on the MTA.”

WHERE TO BUY: Amazon | Barnes and Noble

Looking for Lorraine: The Radiant and Radical Life of Lorraine Hansberry by Imani Perry

SUMMARY: Looking for Lorraine tells of the extraordinary life of one of America’s cherished but not as well-known playwrights, Lorraine Hansberry. Her most recognizable work is A Raisin in the Sun, however, Hansberry’s contributions to the Civil Rights Movement and literature are as storied as her peers even though her name did not rise to the fame of contemporaries and friends Nina Simone, James Baldwin, Malcolm X, or Langston Hughes, to name a few prominent figures.

As Perry accounts, from her early twenties up until her death at 34, Hansberry fought against the tyranny of racism, taking Beat and Village hipster poets to task for the romanticism of such indoctrinated discrimination. She pushed the Kennedy brothers to do more for Civil Rights, backed African anti-colonial leaders, and remained under FBI surveillance for her social justice efforts.

Hansberry, a closeted lesbian who’d married and divorced a man, was also a woman in search of herself–in the comfort of her identity, in ownership of her desires, and the way she wished to present herself to the world even while actively working against the very societal structures that made such a life difficult. Perry’s biography of the playwright and activist works to showcase the woman beyond the seminal work she’s known for into the totality of who she was.

SPOTTED: Zoya is holding Looking for Lorraine while scrolling through Gossip Girl on the bus In “Hope Sinks.”

WHERE TO BUY: Amazon | Barnes and Noble

Notes on a Native Son by James Baldwin

SUMMARY: Baldwin’s essay collection, originally published in 1955, Notes on a Native Son, tells the story of America as seen through a Black man’s eyes. As Baldwin says, “The story of the Negro in America is the story of America. It is not a pretty story.”

For this writer and activist, the fire of truth bled from his pen and rose through his words as he detailed life in ’40s Harlem, the movies and novels that sparked his mind, his experience living in Paris, and what it was like being raised by a father who was a preacher.

SPOTTED: The collection is a part of a stack of books, mainly comprised of classics, on Zoya’s table in “Just Another Girl on the MTA.”

WHERE TO BUY: Amazon | Barnes and Noble

Ornament and Silence: Essays on Women’s Lives from Edith Wharton to Germaine Greer by Kennedy Fraser

SUMMARY: Comprised of 14 essays, Ornament of Silence breaks down the lives of established women in the creative arts. Fraser examines their friendships, affairs, marriages, and families to paint a picture of their lives not just as muses or artists or both but as women whose presence informed each other’s. The author’s close reading of these women’s lives also includes the ways in which the talented men a part of their stories eclipsed their narratives, rendering some of them forgotten or as footnotes in a man’s biography.

SPOTTED: Ornament and Silence is the first book we see Audrey read in Gossip Girl. It’s in her hand as she attempts to focus on Fraser’s words and Julien’s ease with Zoya on The Met steps in “Just Another Girl on the MTA.”

WHERE TO BUY: Amazon | Barnes and Noble

Paris Chic by Oliver Pilcher and Alexandra Senes

SUMMARY: Full of Pilcher’s stunning photography, Paris Chic brings life to the city of lights for the reader. On display in the coffee table book is Parisian fashion, the design of the city, the everyday hubbub that makes Paris a vibrant and inspiring force in the world, and the homes of various families showcasing the rich history of the well-known travel and arts destination.

SPOTTED: Paris Chic rests on a table near Audrey’s vanity in her bedroom. The book makes an appearance in “Just Another Girl on the MTA.”

WHERE TO BUY: Amazon | Assouline

The Paris Review #234

SUMMARY: The Paris Review, founded in 1953, is a literary magazine that champions the art of writing in both the mediums of fiction and poetry. Writers selected for inclusion, whether up-and-coming or established figures in the literary world, are considered to be some of the most promising voices in the world.

Issue 234 consists of fiction by Lydia Davis, Shirley Hazzard, and Eloghosa Osunde, and poetry by Margaret Atwood, Emma Hine, Yusef Komunyakaa, Nicole Sealey, and Gerald Stern. Two essays by Enrique Vila-Matas and Antonella Anedda on the art of fiction and poetry are also included. As well as a portfolio by Troy Michie.

SPOTTED: The collection is a part of a stack of books, mainly comprised of classics, on Zoya’s table in “Just Another Girl on the MTA.”

WHERE TO BUY: The Paris Review website

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

SUMMARY: The first book in Chinua Achebe’s The African Trilogy series, Things Fall Apart follows the life of Okonkwo. One of the strongest and wealthiest men in Umuofia, Okonkwo regards the traditions of his people with pride. The British, however, do not and as they gain more influence in the region, their missionary work and societal views begin to subsume the Umofian way of life. Though Okonkwo tries to fight this, it is without the support of his community who start to place more value in the British vision of civilization than their own.

OVERHEARD: Little Z brings up Things Fall Apart when talking to her father in “She’s Having a Maybe.” Kate Keller, also known as Gossip Girl, is having Zoya and the rest of her students act out the book in her class.

WHERE TO BUY: Amazon | Barnes and Noble

Titus Andronicus by William Shakespeare

SUMMARY: Regarded as Shakespeare’s first tragedy, and his most violent play, Titus Andronicus tells the story of the titular character a decade after he’s waged war with the Goths. Capturing their queen Tamora, he presents her to the Emperor of Rome as a slave. The Emperor, however, takes her as his wife, and from her new position of power, Tamora vows revenge on Titus for killing her eldest son. The play includes multiple killings, dismemberment, rape, and cannibalism.

OVERHEARD: Aaron, the play Gideon and the Constance St. Jude’s crew go see in “Lies Wide Shut,” is a loose adaptation of Titus Andronicus from the perspective of Aaron the Moor. Gideon mentions this to his husband and Max when they sit down for dinner.

WHERE TO BUY: Amazon | Barnes and Noble

The White Album: Essays by Joan Didion

SUMMARY: Didion’s collection of essays in The White Album examine the aftermath of the 1960s and how the events of the previous decade have shaped the world in the 1970s. The topics range from Charles Manson, the Black Panthers, the mall, and more as Didion makes sense out of mass culture through the lens of her own perspective.

SPOTTED: Audrey is carrying The White Album with her when she arrives at the Constance St. Jude’s table where Julien, Zoya, Luna, and Monet are talking in “Hope Sinks.”

WHERE TO BUY: Amazon | Barnes and Noble

This post contains affiliate links, where we may receive a percentage of any sale made from the links on this page. Prices and availability are accurate as of the time of publication.

Stay tuned to Hidden Remote for more Gossip Girl (2021) news and coverage. All six episodes of the series are available to stream now on HBO Max.