AP LITERATURE AND COMPOSITION ARE YOU READY?

Welcome to Senior Advanced Placement English!

The following information summarizes the responsibilities and opportunities afforded by our curriculum.

AP Literature and Composition is a college course. It is also an adventure we will all share.

The format for the AP Lit course is that of a seminar, and it is designed to be thought‐provoking, analytical, and challenging. However, this requires a serious and consistent commitment on your part. Being prepared for daily discussions is an ongoing responsibility. Class presentations are often required, sometimes as an individual assignment, and sometimes in group format.

It cannot be emphasized enough that this course’s value is attained by your independent, close reading and thoughtful consideration of the literature we study.

You must keep up with all reading and writing assignments and you must bring the literature and your responses to class. Careful and detailed note taking is definitely a necessity, and this will prove to be a valuable asset for reviewing for the AP exam. The quantity of reading is likely greater than you’ve experienced in the past, and you must keep up with assignments.

You must be willing to share‐‐‐and sometimes defend‐‐‐your interpretations, for this substantive and civilized interaction is the foundation of the class structure. A full third of your grade for the course is dependent on class participation. In addition to the work and reading we do as a class, you are required to write a full‐length (12‐15 pages) original, MLA‐ formatted research paper. This is a year‐long process that significantly impacts each marking period and comprises the bulk of the final quarter grade.

As instructors, we will serve mainly as facilitators, providing framework, information, guidance, moral support, and of course, feedback (grades). There will be very few circumstances of our lecturing and your listening.

In May you will be expected to take the AP Literature and Composition Exam whether or not you may receive college credit for the course. Your year of practice interpretation, analysis, and expression will prepare you to score very well on the exam. This AP course requires much of you, but also offers many opportunities.

This summer, you will begin the process by independently reading, analyzing, and writing about . Details concerning this project are contained in separate information.

We are looking forward to your analytical, thought‐provoking, participation in the upcoming year. This is an AP level course with commensurate work, but the rewards more than compensate for the work.

ARE YOU READY?

SUMMER 2011 ‐ 2011‐2012 School Year English Literature and Analysis AP Summer Reading Assignment Crime and Punishment

OBJECTIVE: To analyze significant passages from Crime and Punishment. Much of our work next year will be focusing on the author’s use of language in significant passages, noting literary techniques and then analyzing them. A major objective with this assignment is to evaluate your ability to this at the onset, to get a benchmark so to speak.

What is significant?

Significant means that the passage can stand as an excellent example or microcosm of the work, considering its use of language and how it develops a larger meaning, an overall theme of the entire work. You need to be focusing on the language, for example: figurative language (simile, metaphor, symbolism, etc.), diction, syntax, and any other language techniques you notice. It makes the most sense to read the entire book before selecting the passages. You might not recognize overall themes, and therefore the significance, at the beginning of the book.

TASKS:

1. READ Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment. 2. READ the Beyer article on Crime and Punishment 3. WRITE a Harvard Outline and then a paper that analyzes seven (7) significant passages from the novel – 1 from each part + epilogue.

Considerations:

• For at least two of the seven quote analyses, you should refer to the Beyer article. • Passages should be approximately 6 to 12 lines. • NONE OF THE QUOTES MAY BE FROM SPARKNOTES “IMPORTANT QUOTES EXPLAINED” OR OTHER SIMILAR SOURCES • You discussion should be formal and objective in tone. • You should discuss the specifics of the language of the quote and how that passage reflects an overall theme of the book. • This is a reaction paper, NOT RESEARCH. You are NOT to use outside sources—only the text and the article. Failure to adhere to this constitutes plagiarism. • The tone of the paper should be scholarly and objective (no 1st/2nd person references, etc.) • The paper should be a unified and coherent essay, in which a clear, concise introduction, body paragraphs with proper transitions, and a conclusion are clearly evident. • Follow MLA format. (see OWL.english.purdue) • 5‐7 pages, double‐spaced, 12 point font, 1 inch margins • A sample Harvard Outline and the Beyer article are available on the English Department Website o Roslyn Schools WebsiteÆHigh School PageÆEnglish Department (left side) http://dpt.roslynschools.org/hs/ela/index.htm

DUE DATES: FULL HARVARD OUTLINE ‐ THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 2011 (50% grade) FINAL COPY: WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

CRIME AND PUNISHMENT

Then he struck her [ Alyona Ivanovna] again and yet again, with all his strength, always with the blunt side of the axe. . . . The blow fell on her [ Lizaveta's] skull, splitting it open from the top of the forehead almost to the crown of the head, and felling her instantly.

— , translated by Jessie Coulton

Here with all his strength he struck a blow once and again, always with the butt end and always against the crown. . . . The blow came straight against the skull, with the cutting edge, and it immediately chopped through the entire upper portion of the forehead, almost to the crown.

— FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY, translated by Thomas R. Beyer, Jr.

Dostoevsky's CRIME AND PUNISHMENT

Most critics of Dostoevsky's novel have focused on Rodion Raskolnikov and the motive(s) for his murder of the old moneylender, Alyona Ivanovna. What seems to have been overlooked in most studies is the fact that Raskolnikov commits not one but two crimes—two murders, each of which is a unique act.

Dostoevsky provides a precise description of both murders, a fact not always expressed in translation. My own literal "word-for-word" translation points to several overlapping details, but more importantly it isolates the major distinction between the two crimes. 1 While both women are struck on the head, Alyona Ivanovna suffers several blows with the blunt portion of the axe. Lizaveta, on the other hand, has her forehead split cleanly open by a single blow with the bladed, sharp cutting edge of the axe. The full horror of this second murder 2 is emphasized in the Russian text by enclosing in commas the word "ostriem" (with the cutting edge). The single chop of the axe also points the reader to the name of the murderer, Raskolnikov.

The name, Raskolnikov, has been traditionally identified with the denotation "schismatic." The Russian word "raskol" (schism) and "raskol'nik" (schismatic) are generally used to identify the split from the Russian Orthodox Church in the seventeenth, century. The exact form "raskol'nikov" can be found in nineteenth century Russian dictionaries in the meaning "one who belongs to" or "one of the schismatics." Dostoevsky himself wishes to leave no doubt about the signification of the name. In Raskolnikov's final conversation with Porfiry, the investigator notes that Mikolka is "one of the schismatics," a phrase repeated twice in one sentence. Dostoevsky even uses a genitive plural in order that the word be identical to the hero's name: "iz raskol'nikov" (VI.2). 3 Another consideration is that Dostoevsky, at the time of the novel's composition, was keenly aware of a double axe murder in Moscow committed by Gerasim Chistov, himself a "schismatic." 4

There is, however, a possible addition to this interpretation. "Raskol" is derived from the Russian verb "raskolot'" meaning to "split" or "chop apart" or "separate into pieces." This obvious reference to the murder is reinforced by the fact that it is only when the hero enters the apartment of the old moneylender for the first time that we, the readers, learn his name, Raskolnikov. (I.1.4). A reexamination of the crime scene reveals that Dostoevsky has carefully crafted the second murder, the one clean split of Lizaveta's brow, as the real cause of Raskolnikov's own "split" from humanity.

That Lizaveta's murder is the real and perhaps only "crime" is not only consistent with the remainder of the novel, but it also helps to explain some of the ambiguity of the work. 5 One of the most famous of Raskolnikov's equivocations is "Did I murder the old woman? I killed myself, not that old creature! There and then I murdered myself at one blow, for ever! . . . But it was the devil who killed the old hag, not I. . . ." (V.4.354).

Raskolnikov's claim that he had killed himself with one blow can only refer to Lizaveta's murder. If one reviews the hero's most confident moments—the times of his greatest inner strength—a pattern emerges. The theory of the "extraordinary man" is always defined in terms of the murder and robbery of the "old woman, who nobody needs." Thoughts of the old woman serve only to reinforce Raskolnikov's arguments and his intellectual fencing with Porfiry, from which bouts Raskolnikov emerges by no means a loser. The epilogue reveals that without a confession Porfiry was powerless to bring the criminal to justice. No, it is not the old woman's murder which brings Raskolnikov to his knees at the crossroads, but the moral guilt which Raskolnikov accepts with his admission to Sonya that he killed Lizaveta.

The death of Lizaveta has an immediate effect on Raskolnikov. Lizaveta's murder interrupts his search for money. He can think only of escape. In spite of his desire to be alone as he comes to the Haymarket Square, where the fateful encounter with Lizaveta had occurred, he now feels drawn to people.

After his assertion to Porfiry that he could kill the old woman again he thinks: "Poor Lizaveta! Why had she to turn up? . . . It is strange though; I wonder why I hardly ever think of her, as though I had not killed her. (III.5.234). But, of course, Sonya, the spiritual sister of the dead woman, will not let Raskolnikov forget Lizaveta. She not only recalls her friendship with Lizaveta, but she possesses Lizaveta's cross and her New Testament, which Sonya uses for the reading of the raising of Lazarus. At this turning point in the novel, Raskolnikov promises before he departs: "If I do come tomorrow, I will tell you who killed Lizaveta." (IV.4.279). In all, the name of Lizaveta is mentioned twelve times during this first visit to Sonya.

When Raskolnikov next meets Sonya he is still unable to completely accept his burden. His confession is made in the third person. "He . . . did not want to . . . kill Lizaveta. He . . . killed her by accident. . . . He meant to kill the old woman." (V.4.346). Naturally Sonya recognizes the murderer in Raskolnikov, even as he recognizes the Lizaveta in Sonya. As in their previous meeting, the name of Lizaveta dominates the passage, occurring nine times. Still Raskolnikov refuses to accept moral responsibility for the old woman: "I only killed a louse, Sonya, a useless, vile, pernicious louse." (V.4.351). As they part, Raskolnikov is still incapable of accepting Sonya's cross. Not until their final encounter does he accept the cross, simultaneously noting its association with Lizaveta's cross which Sonya now puts on. Only then does he go and confess.

Raskolnikov's restoration to the human family comes through a spiritual renewal as opposed to a rational theory of repentence. His guide to life is Sonya, the listener, not Porfiry, the talker. And while he is certainly deeply disturbed and perhaps remorseful for his murder of Lizaveta, there is never a hint that Raskolnikov regrets the murder of the old woman. While society's sentence focuses largely on the homicide-robbery, Raskolnikov's suffering is the result of the "accidental" and "unpremeditated" murder.

Raskolnikov cut himself off from society with one blow. That one blow, with the blade of the axe, is also Dostoevsky's trump card. Dostoevsky could not allow for the triumph of evil. By introducing the innocent lamb, Lizaveta, he insures not only a miscalculation by his hero, but a miscalculation which by its emotional impact prejudices the reader against a fair trial. It is certainly ironic that the same Lizaveta who by her conversation helps to precipitate the crime is also cause for leniency in the sentencing of the criminal. Likewise, Raskolnikov's choice to kill Lizaveta or to go to Siberia, is curiously no choice at all. Dostoevsky, a master of manipulation, with one blow cuts Raskolnikov away not only from his fellow characters but from his readers. Only when Raskolnikov repents and accepts the cross does he find a place in our hearts.

—THOMAS R. BEYER, JR., Middlebury College Harvard Outline- General Guidelines

• Each time you indent, it indicates a level of more specificity. So…the topics furthest to the left are the most general, and those furthest to the right are most specific. Each topic indented to the right of a heading must be related to the ones above and to the left of it. • Alternate numbers and letters as in the example on the other side. I don’t recommend going further right than 5 levels and 4 will work for most situations A. Roman Numerals (all the below must be followed by a period) o Capital letters o Numbers o Lower case letters o Numbers followed inside parentheses o Lower case letters inside parentheses

• All levels of the outline must be carefully indented, so that the heading for the next level is below the text for the level above. A second line must be indented in the same place. Look at examples. • At all levels, if you have a 1, you must have a 2. If you have an A, you must have a B. If you do not have a second point to list then all the information goes in the level above. • Trying to balance your levels of specificity will help you to understand relationships of the topic you are writing about. Avoid using an outline to make a simple list; it is more complex than that. Writing good outlines can help you to: o Understand what you read and the relationships within the material. o Study a topic. o Write in an organized way. • Learn how to use a Harvard Outline well, but use it with judgment. A Harvard Outline is best for: o Topics that are clearly organized by hierarchical levels. o People who enjoy and are helped by clear organization. o Communicating this kind of information to others (and then it doesn’t matter if you are helped by it or not). • A Harvard Outline can be written with o Headings (one or a few words for each entry)- works well for showing simple relationships o Phrases (not sentences)- works well for notetaking

12 AP Literature & Composition

Harvard Outline

Thesis:

I The first main idea of your paper or section of the paper.

A. The textual evidence or reference (quoted or paraphrased)_ 1. An explanation or analysis of the evidence 2. Connection to the thesis

B. The second textual evidence or reference (quoted or paraphrased) 1. An explanation or analysis of the evidence 2. Connection to the thesis

II Second main idea of your paper or section of the paper

A. The textual evidence or reference (quoted or paraphrased)_ 1. An explanation or analysis of the evidence 2. Connection to the thesis

B. The second textual evidence or reference (quoted or paraphrased) 1. An explanation or analysis of the evidence 2. Connection to the thesis

III. Third main idea of your paper or section of the paper.

A. The textual evidence or reference (quoted or paraphrased)_ 1. An explanation or analysis of the evidence 2. Connection to the thesis

B. The second textual evidence or reference (quoted or paraphrased) 1. An explanation or analysis of the evidence 2. Connection to the thesis