AP LITERATURE AND COMPOSITION
SUGGESTED SUMMER ASSIGNMENT
2011
Course Description: The AP English Literature and Composition course engages students in the careful reading and critical analysis of imaginative literature (fiction). Through the close reading of selected texts, students deepen their understanding of the ways writers use language to provide both meaning and pleasure for their readers. As they read, students consider a work’s structure, style and themes, as well as such smaller-scale elements as the use of figurative language, imagery, symbolism and tone
Rationale: Summer reading is not required, though you are strongly recommended to use some of your time this summer to get ahead since once we return to school in the fall, we will immediately begin work on our first text. We do not read in class; it is expected that all of the reading will be done outside of class. The texts for A.P. Literature have been selected because of the rich depth of experience they provide us. Just as you notice additional elements in movies when viewing them a second (or third) time, you will need to read beyond a first draft reading of these texts. It is also important to realize that if you come into class having already read the book, you will then be able to focus on rereading sections, understanding the themes and appreciating the literary techniques, a necessary aspect of A.P. level work.
The texts that we would like for you to read this summer are:
1. The Things They Carried – Tim O’Brien (only one edition available) – due September 19
2. Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen (please buy the Modern Library Classics – Edited by Robert Kiely) – due October 24
3. A selection of poetry by an American or British author of your choice – we will have a poetry project during the first quarter.
The texts are numbered in the order that they will be studied. We would also like for you to try to purchase your own copies. This is particularly important at the A.P. level because you will need to annotate the text as we study it. Don’t forget the public library – they should have copies of all the texts. If you cannot annotate in the book itself, you may annotate on post-it notes or take notes on paper. Be sure to include page numbers on any notes so that you can easily reference the sections of the book. There is an annotation rubric on the English department website.
Additional materials for these two books will be available on the English department’s school webpage as well as the Guidance department’s school webpage. If you have questions, please see or email Mrs. Donahue; she will periodically check her email this summer.
Other novels we will study and suggest you purchase are:
· The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver) – due November 28
· Heart of Darkness (Joseph Conrad – get a version with endnotes) - due January 24
· William Shakespeare Tragedy – either Othello or King Lear – it will be selected by your individual teacher – due March 1
· The House of the Spirits (Isabel Allende) – due March 26
· Independent selection or lit circle titles to be determined
*****Novel due dates WILL NOT change in the event of school cancelations.*****
For each of the following sets of questions, students should answer in complete sentences unless otherwise indicated. Please place all answers on a separate sheet of paper.
The Things They Carried Due Date: September 19
1. Which “chapter” was your favorite episode? Explain your selection and reasoning.
2. What messages do you think O’Brien might be attempting to communicate? Provide evidence for your thoughts.
3. Chose a short passage that you consider important and/or moving. Mark it (annotate) in your text and make notes about 3-5 particular elements in the passage that you enjoyed/appreciated.
4. What did you notice about the structure of the work?
Northanger Abbey Due Date: October 24
1. Where is the novel set? What do you learn about the culture, belief system, manners and values of the society presented in the novel?
2. Which chapter did you enjoy the most? Make observations about that chapter with textual evidence to support your points.
3. What do you think Austen is saying about social class in the novel? Trace the references and suggestions she makes as you read.
4. Select a character you liked and select a character you disliked. Explain your selections and reasoning.
Rubric: To earn full credit, responses must be:
· complete – they answer all parts of the questions
· thorough – they use specific examples from the text for support
· thoughtful – show evidence of mature reading, thinking and reflecting
· well-presented – complete sentences, neat, typed or handwritten in blue or black ink
· “Notes”-free – completed without evidence of Sparknotes or Clif Notes or other such resources
A list of poets for the poetry reading assignment follows at the end of this document.
Maya Angelou
Matthew Arnold
W.H. Auden
Joseph Auslander
Elizabeth Bishop
William Blake
Robert Bly
Joseph Brodsky
Gwendolyn Brooks
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Robert Browning
George Gordon, Lord Byron
John Ciardi
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Billy Collins
Countee Cullen
E.E. Cummings
James Dickey
Emily Dickinson
John Donne
Rita Dove
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Richard Eberhart
T.S. Eliot
Robert Frost
Nikki Giovanni
Louise Gluck
Donald Hall
Thomas Hardy
Robert Hayden
Seamus Heaney
Robert Herrick
Gerard Manley Hopkins
A.E. Housman
Langston Hughes
Ranall Jarrell
Ben Jonson
John Keats
Galway Kinnell
Yusef Komunyakaa
Maxine Kumin
Stanley Kunitz
Robert Lowell
Andrew Marvell
Edgar Lee Masters
W.S. Merwin
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Czeslaw Milosz
John Milton
Pablo Neruda
Mary Oliver
Octavio Paz
Robert Pinsky
Sylvia Plath
Edgar Allan Poe
Alexander Pope
Ezra Pound
Adrienne Rich
Theodore Roethke
Christina Georgina Rossetti
Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Kay Ryan
Carl Sandburg
Ann Sexton
William Shakespeare
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Gary Soto
Wole Soyinka
Stephen Spender
Mark Strand
Wislawa Szymborska
William Stafford
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Dylan Thomas
Robert Penn Warren
Walt Whitman
Richard Wilbur
William Carlos Williams
William Wordsworth
William Butler Yeats
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