Summer Reading Assignment AP English Language 1

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1 Summer Reading Assignment AP English Language 1 Mrs. Mary Vargas ~ C05 Toms River High School North Old Freehold Rd. Toms River, NJ mvargas@trschools.com * vargasgooden913@gmail.com * Summer phone: * eboard: mvargas *If you choose to contact me during the summer, please identify yourself at the start of the communication. I also have an inote board attached to the Summer Assignment note on my eboard which I will check from time to time Welcome to AP English Language and Composition. It is my privilege to be working with you this year as you navigate the journey toward college level writing. This will be my 8 th year teaching this course. The course objectives focus on writing sentences, paragraphs, and then essays. We will study rhetorical vocabulary, develop stronger close reading and analyzing skills and learn how to utilize three models in essay writing: classical, Rogerian, and Toulmin. We will write three types of essays: open response, rhetorical analysis, and synthesis essays each of which forwards an argument. We will also write a research paper using APA Style and participate in Socratic Seminars. In preparation for the course, I would like you to accomplish a bit of reading this summer while developing the habit of keeping a writing journal. Therefore, I am offering two different assignment options that will ask you to read three works through the summer and before we meet: Assignment Option # 1: To read and then consider the author s purpose in writing about an individual s journey in life, growing as an individual for each of the following novels. While you read, please develop a Response Journal for each novel, and bring all three journals when you return to school on September 3, Novels: J.D. Salinger ~ The Catcher in the Rye (1951) Mark Haddon ~ The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time (2003) Christopher McCandless ~ Into the Wild (1996) HOW TO APPROACH THE JOURNEY TOWARD ADULTHOOD ASSIGNMENT: Please use the Response Journal Guide to support your reading. The guide offers suggestions concerning reactions, notes, elements of interest that spark your curiosity while reading. While this assignment may take time to accomplish, the technique will continue through the year. The character s sense of isolation whether because of abandonment by friends or family or the need for separation from adults / parents (Internal conflict / external conflict). The rejection of societal norms (belief systems, political views, cultural practices, etc.) as demonstrated in language usage, physical appearance, habit patterns, and actions taken. The process of growth the character experiences what device(s) does the author engender that allows the character to reveal his or her commentary on life and society. According to the Britannica Online Encyclopedia:

2 Page No. Summer Reading Assignment AP English Language 2 Bildungsroman [is] class of novel that deals with the maturation process, with how and why the protagonist develops as he does, both morally and psychologically. The German word Bildungsroman means novel of education or novel of formation. The folklore tale of the dunce who goes out into the world seeking adventure and learns wisdom the hard way [like Pinocchio], is transformed into higher literature. The bildungsroman traditionally ends on a positive note, though its action may be tempered by resignation and nostalgia. If the grandiose dreams of the hero s youth are over, so are many foolish mistakes and painful disappointments, and, especially in 19th-century novel, a life of usefulness lies ahead. In the 20th century and beyond, however, the bildungsroman more often ends in resignation or death. Due with your return to school on September 3 st is a journal with your personal responses to the various chapters or sections of the books considering the protagonist s development. PLEASE DO NOT USE SPARK NOTES OR CLIFFNOTES TO GUIDE YOUR READING Instead please ignite your mind and react to something that gets your attention. How will you do this? Response Journal Guide: i. Divide the books up into logical sections could relate to setting since these are journey novels with patterns of epiphanies ii. Consider locations and what the protagonist learns (Extra Credit: construct a map of the journey to help you think through the protagonist s development) iii. Consider symbols and their potential meanings (Home vs. on one s own, promise vs. discouragement, repeated phrases, specific locations, colors, names or roles of characters, etc) iv. Consider how the protagonist is developing gaining or losing ground physically, mentally, or emotionally. Is he progressing toward a desired goal or hindered by a refusal to change? Is he challenged by another s advice or over reacts to change? Is he oppressed by society, if so, to what degree? Does he loose hope, if so, how does this affect him? v. Consider how these ideas relate to the overall purpose of the novel, an individual s quest for knowledge and understanding This can be structured in a graphic organizer: Graphic Organizer Quote/Text 1 You ll probably want to know what my lousy childhood was like I ll just tell you about this madman stuff that happened to me last Christmas just before I got pretty run-down and had to come out here and take it easy Book Title: The Catcher in the Rye J. D. Salinger Author s Device: Location/ Learning Symbols/Meanings Character development (see notes above) Progress in the quest Location: Setting In a resting home in California aka a psychiatric hospital. Narrator s conversation reveals typical talk therapy scenario. Your Comments: Please write your reaction to the text you selected and the device that you noted. Evasive and verbose, the narrator opens the discussion with a lead in to the events that led to his need to recover in the facility. He is defensive, opinionated, and angry. It is difficult for him to talk about his problems.

3 Summer Reading Assignment AP English Language 3 Assignment Option # 2: To read and then consider and keep a journal examining the author s purpose in writing about a dystopian society. Please select and read two (2) of the science fiction / dystopian novels, and one (1) Ayn Rand novel for the summer reading assignment. While you read, please develop a Response Journal for each novel, and bring all three journals when you return to school on September 3, Response Journal Please use the Response Journal Guide to support your reading. The guide offers suggestions concerning reactions, notes, elements of interest that spark your curiosity while reading. While this assignment may take time to accomplish, the technique will continue through the year. The Novels - While reading, please pay attention to the following topics: 1. Author s use of Diction and Allusion there must be several examples 2. The ingenuity of this work select two to three innovative aspects and discuss them. 3. The role of governmental institutions discuss their dystopian nature 4. The author s commentary on society both as it relates to their time and the world today This means, take notes in an informal manner, bulleted lists, page numbers and key events, concepts, moments as they relate to these general topics.. PLEASE DO NOT USE SPARK NOTES OR CLIFFNOTES TO GUIDE YOUR READING Instead please ignite your mind and react to something that gets your attention. The Novels: Read two (2) of these: Fahrenheit 451 (1953) ~ Ray Bradbury Ray Bradbury s internationally acclaimed novel Fahrenheit 451 is a masterwork of twentieth-century literature set in a bleak, dystopian future. Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden. Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television "family." But then he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn t live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television. When Mildred attempts suicide, and Clarisse suddenly disappears, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known. He starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is discovered, the fireman has to run for his life. First published in 1953, Fahrenheit 451 is a classic novel set in the future when books forbidden by a totalitarian regime are burned. The hero, a book burner, suddenly discovers that books are flesh and blood ideas that cry out silently when put to the torch. -- from the Publisher 1984 (Nineteen Eighty-Four) (1948) ~ George Orwell 1984 has come and gone, but George Orwell s prophetic, nightmarish vision in 1948 of the world we were becoming is timelier than ever is still the great modern classic of Negative Utopia a startlingly original and haunting novel that creates an imaginary world that is completely convincing, from the first sentence to the last four words. No one can deny this novel s power, its hold on the imaginations of whole generations, or the power of its admonitions a power that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time. Brave New World (1932) ~ Aldous Huxley Brave New World is a brilliantly satiric novel about life six centuries from now (in "632 After Ford"), the Utopian era in which science has, with juggernaut indifference, triumphed. It is on era of perfect stability, control, conformity. There are, for example, no mothers or fathers because babies ore mass-produced from chemical solutions in laboratory bottles; children are completely conditioned for their designated roles as adults in a precisely ordered society. Into this incredible world comes Bernard Marx, hatched in an excessively alcoholic prenatal solution, with ideas worthy of the primitive twentieth century. This is a shocking, fantastic novel, rich in witty entertainment and biting comment. Its status as a classic increases steadily as what seemed imaginary fiction becomes each day more of a reality.

4 Summer Reading Assignment AP English Language 4 Read one (1) of these: by Ayn Rand We the Living (1936) We the Living is Ayn Rand s first novel. Published in 1936, the story is set in Soviet Russia, from which Rand had fled to America ten years earlier. The immigrant Rand was startled by the failure of American intellectuals and politicians to uphold the American ideals of individualism and freedom, and she was horrified by the widespread acceptance, even sympathy, that greeted the spread of communism, socialism and fascism in Europe. Rand resolved to expose the noble ideal of collectivism, through the story of three young people whose lives are sacrificed by an all-powerful state. Originally titled Airtight, this unvarnished account details the methods by which the spirits of its best citizens are suffocated by the collectivist state. The first printing (3,000 copies) sold out, but the book went out of print due to a publisher s error. An edition revised by Rand was published in 1959, following the success of Atlas Shrugged (1957). Anthem (1937 /1946) Ayn Rand came of age during the ascendancy of collectivism across the globe not only in communist Russia, from which she escaped in 1926, but also in fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, and to an alarming degree in her adopted homeland, America. Rand identified collectivism the idea that individuals should be subjugated to the group and sacrificed for the common good not only as a moral evil but as the essential cause of the political evils then engulfing the civilized world. In the summer of 1937, Rand took a break from working on The Fountainhead to write the novelette called Anthem, a short, highly stylized tale of a future dystopia so saturated in collectivism that the word I has disappeared from the language. First published in England in 1938, Anthem was rejected by collectivist-dominated American publishers in the 1930s an American edition (slightly revised by Rand) did not appear until The Fountainhead What motivates a creative thinker? Is it a selfless desire to benefit mankind? A hunger for fame, fortune, and accolades? The need to prove superiority? Or is it a selfsufficient drive to pursue a creative vision, independent of others needs or opinions? Ayn Rand addresses these questions through her portrayal of Howard Roark, an innovative architect who, as she puts it, struggles for the integrity of his creative work against every form of social opposition. Initially rejected by twelve publishers as too intellectual, The Fountainhead became a best seller within two years purely through word of mouth, and earned Rand enduring commercial and artistic success. The novel was also a personal landmark for Rand. In Howard Roark, she presented for the first time the uniquely Ayn Rand hero, whose depiction was the chief goal of her writing: the ideal man, man as he could be and ought to be. Response Journal Guide: Fahrenheit 451 ~ Ray Bradbury 1. Bradbury s diction and use of allusions - Note moments in the text that are particularly vivid and clear to you. Slow your reading down when Bradbury describes background scenery and consider the colors, arrangements, & nature of the space in relation to the activity that occurs in that place. Note allusions and attempt to locate their significance to the moment in which they occur. 2. The ingenious nature Bradbury s technological advances Keep a list of fictional devices that Bradbury invents in his imagination and that have become a reality in today s world. Consider the 1950 s era and its stress on using modern conveniences 3. The role of governing institutions Consider the nature of this dystopian novel: Oppression of the individual Suppression of thought Paradoxical nature of authority figures 4. Bradbury s commentary on the position of books, reading, and the transference of ideas through the written word on the place of television in the personal lives of people on the influence of being informed through the airwaves on the human effect of these innovations 1984 (Nineteen Eighty-Four) ~ George Orwell 1. Orwell s diction and use of allusions Note moments in the text that are particularly vivid and clear to you. Note allusions and attempt to locate their significance to the moment in which they occur. Consider and take note of the nature of Orwell s writing strengths and weaknesses. 2. The ingenious nature of Orwell s governing institutions Consider whether this is a dystopian novel.

5 Summer Reading Assignment AP English Language 5 Oppression of the individual Suppression of thought Paradoxical nature of authority figures 3. Orwell s commentary Note any reactions you have to the text concerning Orwell s argument against totalitarian and socialist regimes Consider the world today in reference to Orwell s positions Page No. Brave New World ~ Aldous Huxley 1. Huxley s diction and use of allusions Note moments in the text that are particularly vivid and clear to you. Note allusions and attempt to locate their significance to the moment in which they occur. Consider and take note of the nature of Huxley s writing strengths and weaknesses. 2. The ingenious nature of Huxley s technology societal institutions Consider the hierarchy and societal rule. Compare the lifestyles of the savages and the civilized. Discuss Huxley s vision of genetic engineering and drug-numbed society 3. Huxley s commentary What ideas does Huxley present concerning preserving a perfect socialist society? While Orwell wrote Nineteen Eight-four on the eve of the cold war, Huxley wrote his novel in 1932, when the ideals of socialism and technological advances were still celebrated. Consider Huxley s dystopian society and comment on its reliance upon a caste system based upon intellectual ability. Ayn Rand s Novels: 1. Use of diction and allusions discuss author word choices and political references 2. Novelty or innovation consider setting and the idea of the collective 3. Social / Political commentary consider the author s perspective as a former Russian citizen 4. Relevance to today s world This can be structured in a graphic organizer: Graphic Organizer Quote/Text Book Title: Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury Author s Device: Diction / Allusion / Technological Advances, / Governmental Institutions / Commentary Your Comments: Please write your reaction to the text you selected and the device that you noted. 110 The men ran like cripples in their clumsy boots, as quietly as spiders These two similes placed so closely together seem weird. (or simply write paradoxical similes) While I can envision the clumsy running, the difficulty moving in cumbersome boots, I do not get quiet the clumsy/cripple men oppose the quiet, skillful spider. Why juxtapose incongruent movement? Is this effective writing or Bradbury s humor? We will discuss these topics as they relate to education and politics in our world today when we return.