“Summer afternoon—summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.”
Add a good book and a hammock, and I would have to agree with Henry James! Below, you will find your summer reading assignment for the 12th grade AP English Literature and Composition course. Please prepare for success by following these directions exactly and contacting me (letsweiler@ cdschools.org) with any questions.
1. Purchase and read How to Read Literature Like a Professor: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines, Revised Edition by Thomas C. Foster. Please buy the 2014 edition, ISBN 9780062301673, available in paperback on Amazon for $10.99. Stop on page 259. You are not required to read “A Test Case.” Annotate as desired, highlighting important passages.
2. Choose one of the following novels. You may buy a used copy since uniform page numbers are not important in this case. These texts are written for adults and include serious and sometimes devastating choices, situations, and themes. Do some preliminary research on the many available online book review sources to determine which novel will prove both engaging and appropriate for you: Boy, Snow, Bird by Helen Oyeyemi The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt Life of Pi by Yann Martel The Road by Cormac McCarthy The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien
Read and thoroughly annotate your novel according to the included instructions. You will be handing in your annotated text on the first day of school.
3. Create a typed, 3page document in which you will record your observations on how the symbols and themes discussed by Foster are at work in your chosen novel. This document will be the basis for a future essay, so keep this aspect in mind as you read and annotate the novel. How does reading and reflecting on Foster’s text enhance your experience of the novel? Arrange the notes in a singlespaced two column chart, with quotes or observations about your chosen novel in the left column and the corresponding material from Foster in the right column. Note page numbers for each entry.
4. This step should be accomplished right before school starts so that the material is fresh in your mind upon return. Read and annotate the two articles included in this packet: “It’s Tartt, But Is It Art” by Evgenia Peretz and “What is Literature: In Defense of the Canon” by Arthur Krystal. These annotated articles will be the basis of some of our first class discussions next year, so read critically with an eye for conflicts or agreement between the two.
To summarize, on the first day of school you will arrive with these items: A thoroughly annotated novel from the list above. A 3page chart noting correspondences between your novel and How to Read Literature Like a Professor. Annotated copies of the articles by Peretz and Krystal.
I’m looking forward to meeting you then!