AP English Literature & Composition Summer Reading 2015

“Withholding theory does no favor for students, who must not only read the texts assigned in courses, after all, but find things to say about those texts that more or less sound like literary criticism. Sheltering students from theoretical discourses and debates only deprives them of the generalized language that the literature course asks them to produce—and penalizes them for not producing. This is not to deny that the reading and explication of meanings should be central to the literature class. But we cannot begin to know which meanings to explicate without an implicit theory about what things are worth talking about.”

–Gerald Graff, from the Foreword of Falling into Theory

The summer reading project for AP Literature and Composition course has two parts. For one, you need to read the great Greek tragedy Antigone by Sophocles. Because it a text from antiquity, Antigone should be easily locatable for free online. If you want a hard copy to make notes in, I suggest this also. Usually, you can get a Dover Thrift edition for about $2.50 plus tax. This would suffice.

Even though our course will be firmly anchored in British and Western European literature, we must begin with the beginning: the classics. Themes that appear in Antigone appear again and again throughout Western literature. Read critically with this fact in mind.

Nota bene: Don’t be alarmed that you have two readings this summer. Antigone is only about 50 pages long.

The second text you need to purchase is called Falling into Theory: Conflicting Views on Reading Literature, Second Edition edited by David H. Richter. You will not be required to read the entire text over the summer, but the following excerpts:

  • Introduction, “Part One: Why We Read”
  • “What We Have Loved, Others Will Love” by Helen Vendler
  • “Disliking Books at an Early Age” by Gerald Graff
  • Introduction, “Part Two: What We Read”

The Richter book is a college-level text that we will be using for supplemental readings throughout the year. While it is no longer in print, you can easily find a lightly used copy online for under $5 including shipping. Check Amazon.com or Abebooks.com for a used copy, and be sure to allow yourself enough time to receive the book in the mail in advance of the school year beginning.

Background: In Vendler’s essay she insists that the teaching of literature inherently involves the teaching of language, and that it is the instructor’s responsibility to impart their love of both to the student. Conversely, in Graff’s essay, he claims that he never truly appreciated or understood the study of literature until he was given the tools of critical theory, and the opportunity to hear others’ voices interacting with the text to make him understand it fully. This dilemma is the crux of our studies—what constitutes the study of literature? Is it the personal interaction with the text or the critical?

Writing Assignment: Reflect on your English classes so far and think about how you have developed your study and appreciation of literature. Describe a specific, revelatory moment when meaning in a text became clear to you. Use this as a launching point to detail how youthink you learn literature. Then, considerAntigone: this is an ancient text, devoid of all the usual explanations of contemporary drama to which we’re accustomed. How do you think you could best understand and appreciate this text? You don’t necessarily have to analyze it, but describe what your approach to understanding it and gaining meaning from might look like. The final reflection should be 3-5 typed, double-spaced pages in length.

Due: Monday, 3 August 2015.

AP Summer Reading Written Response Rubric

Essay Score / Address of Prompt / Grammar & Mechanics / Idea Development
Effective: 8-9 / Commanding evidence that the writer understood and addressed the entire prompt. / Mature vocabulary, sentence structure, and very few errors in diction and syntax. / Thorough development; a strong voice willing to be creative, analytical, and sophisticated in its reflection.
Adequate: 6-7 / Evidence that the writer understood and addressed the prompt. / May contain some lapses in diction or syntax, but prose is generally clear. / Adequate development, sufficient reflection, and complete explanation.
Developing: 5 / The writer understood and addressed the prompt. / May contain some lapses in diction or syntax, but usually conveys the writer’s ideas. / Developed position, but the evidence or explanation may be uneven or inconsistent.
Inadequate: 3-4 / The writer addressed the prompt. / May generally convey the writer’s ideas but may be less consistent in controlling the elements of effective writing. / Inadequate development; evidence or explanations used may be inappropriate, insufficient, or less convincing.
Little Success: 1-2 / Less clear attention to or misunderstanding of the prompt. / May demonstrate consistent weakness in writing, general grammatical errors, or a lack of organization. / Undeveloped, simplistic explanation, tangential or unrelated explanation.

Questions: Feel free to send any questions, concerns, or requests for supplementary summer reading (there’s more where this came from!) to me all summer long: . See you in July!