Curriculum Highlights
English 10, 6.0
It was a year
filled with
memorable
characters!
We broke our literary units down by THEME:
Faith
 Life of Pi
 The Epic of Gilgamesh
 The Ramayana
 The Bible
 “What Men Live By”
 Inferno
Life of Pi
 I don’t know what your worst
nightmare is, but I can’t imagine
anything scarier than being
stuck in a boat with a tiger.
 In Life of Pi we met Piscine
Molitar Patel (named for a
swimming pool!), whose parents
decide to move continents,
bringing their zoo along with
them.
Life of Pi continued…
 Pi and Richard Parker develop a mutual
respect for one another, and Pi relies on a
combination of 3 faiths and practical
wisdom to navigate rough waters (both in
and out of the boat).
 However, his story is so unbelievable that
he re-interprets his experience into a more
practical, realistic shipwreck tale.
 Which do you prefer?
 BTW: Maybe it wasn’t a tiger; maybe it was
Pi’s internal conflict with his faith journey!
Dante’s The Inferno
 If you are ever kicked out of
the country for political
reasons, the best way to get
revenge is to write a long poem
about Hell and put all of your
enemies there!
 Dante was also a romantic; he
fell in love with a woman he
only met twice and wrote her
into his work as his guide
through Heaven, though our
studies focused on Virgil as his
guide through Hell.
The Inferno continued . . .
 In The Inferno, a medieval scholar travels into Hell,
where the sinners are divided up and sentenced to
suffer according to their gravest sin. For example, the
lustful, swept away by their passions in life, are
caught in a perpetual roaring whirlwind.
 Dante’s character learns about the punishment for sin
and the price one pays for earthly pleasures.
Honor
 “Old Milon”
 A Tale of Two Cities
 “Federigo’s Falcon”
 A Doll’s House
 Cyrano de Bergerac
“Old Milon”
 Remember him? The feisty old
French farmer killed 16 Prussian
soldiers in retaliation for his father
and son’s deaths.
 His pride, wit, determination, and
cunning nature sends him to the
firing squad with no regrets.
A Tale of Two Cities
 Vive la France! We learned
about the French Revolution!
 Juxtaposition of the
Manettes’ quiet English
home to France’s bloodthirsty mobs.
 Violence, love, resurrection,
revenge – Dickens would
have been a great writer of a
soap opera!
A Tale of Two Cities continued…
 You met Sydney Carton and
Charles Darnay. They
represent the two sides of
one personality, one city,
one historical moment; this
is a novel that is aptly titled.
 Sydney Carton is one of
Dickens’ most complex and
interesting characters.
Cyrano de Bergerac
 The man can improvise verse and fence at the same time. What
more could a person want?
 Romanticism at its finest – Cyrano’s pride and assumption that
his spirit will never trump his gigantic nose leads to a humorous
yet tragic love triangle.
Cyrano de Bergerac continued…
 In spite of Cyrano’s daring swordfights,
impromptu ballads, and romantic balcony
scenes, Christian seems to win out, but his
idiocy fails to impress Roxane, who
ultimately realizes she desires a poetic soul
over a rockin’ body.
 Romanticism and romantic hero
A Doll’s House
 Victorian Era bliss…
 Nora’s decision to leave her husband
and family was controversial in its day,
and it still has a powerful impact. The
characters are incredibly real and
complex.
 As a former student once said of
Torvald (from the movie), “No wonder
he went on to become Hannibal Lecter
and eat people.”
 Realism & Allegory
Self-Discovery
 All Quiet on the Western Front
 The Catcher in the Rye
 “Dead Men’s Path”
 “Half A Day”
 “Counting in Sevens”
 Oedipus the King
All Quiet on the Western Front
 Summer Reading! What joy!
 In this novel, you explored the grisly,
realistic portrayal of World War I written
by a guy who’d been there, done that.
 Remarque’s main character, Paul Baumer,
and his comrades touched upon the themes
of instinct, loss, and identity that soldiers
from all wars during all time periods have
struggled with.
AQWF continued…
 The trench warfare tactics, along
with the vivid descriptions of the
struggles of the soldier cemented
this novel as “The Greatest War
Novel of All Time.”
 Though the characters are German,
this book is not about nationality
but humanity.
The Catcher in the Rye
 Oh, Holden, why so angry?
Through this character study, we
explored the teenage angst and
extreme emotions a young man
went through as he tried to
navigate that perilous adolescent
time that bridges childhood and
adulthood.
It doesn’t help that his kid brother
Allie died.
The Choices We Make
 Oedipus The King (yes, it fits into 2 of our units)
 “Perceval: The Grail”
 “A Problem”
 “The Guest”
Oedipus the King
 If you thought the Greeks were boring,
think again! (But don’t defy the gods!)
 Oedipus is a tragic hero. He murders his
father and marries his mother…without
realizing it until it is far too late.
 Oedipus’s hubris is realized, but not until
after his wife/mother has committed
suicide, and his brother-in-law agrees to
banish him.
 Tragic Hero, Hamartia, and Hubris
“A Problem”
 Sasha, what is your deal?
 Ethos, Pathos, Logos – how to win
an argument!
 Sasha chooses to live the life of a
profligate – “I am not a crook.”
 His uncles choose to help him out
and salvage the family name.
 Sasha asks for a party to celebrate –
“Oops, I guess I am a crook.”
“The Guest”
 No one wants to be handed the keys to
a criminal’s handcuffs and put in
charge of his future.
 What would you do, if you truly felt
pity for the man? What would you do
if you knew the country’s turmoil
would put you in danger if you
delivered him to his prison?
 And yet – if you do the right thing,
they threaten you anyway. Oh, the
irony.
What a year!
Our studies have
taken us from
the ancient
past…
to imaginary
realms we can
only dream of!
Overall,
 Your learning this year focused on:
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The theme of UNIVERSALITY
Authors’ TONE
Literary ANALYSIS
CRITICAL WRITING skills
I hope you had as much fun exploring these concepts as
I did!