AP English IV: Literature and Composition
Mr. Dustin Pace
Room 29
dpace@salmon.k12.id.us
Literature is where I go to explore the highest and lowest places in human society and in the human
spirit, where I hope to find not absolute truth but the truth of the tale, of the imagination and of the heart.
-Salman Rushdie
Class Syllabus
Welcome, brave souls, to Advanced Placement Senior English. You are about to embark on a
challenge most choose to forego. The journey will be difficult, and you may experience a few
bumps and bruises along the way, but the rewards are great. In addition to possibly earning
college credits, you will emerge as stronger writers and critical thinkers. In this course, we will
explore different genres of literature and schools of literary criticism, investigating how literature
defines us as human beings and unites us across time and space.
Course Objectives
From the English Literature and Composition Course Description, in accordance with which the
course is constructed:
Introduction
An AP English Literature and Composition course engages students in the careful reading and
critical analysis of imaginative literature. Through the close reading of selected texts, students
deepen their understanding of the ways writers use language to provide both meaning and
pleasure for their readers. As they read, students consider a work’s structure, style and themes,
as well as such smaller-scale elements as the use of figurative language, imagery, symbolism and
tone.
Goals
The course includes intensive study of representative works from various genres and periods,
concentrating on works of recognized literary merit…. The pieces chosen invite and reward
rereading and do not, like ephemeral works in such popular genres as detective or romance
fiction, yield all (or nearly all) of their pleasures of thought and feeling the first time through.
The AP English Literature and Composition Development Committee agrees with Henry David
Thoreau that it is wisest to read the best books first; the committee also believes that such
reading should be accompanied by thoughtful discussion and writing about those books in the
company of one’s fellow students.
Texts
The reading for this course, in accordance with the AP guidelines, will consist of in-depth
analysis of a wide breadth of literature from around the world. It will both build on and
complement reading done in previous English courses. While we will study many works, the
reading will be careful and deliberate in order to better understand the form and complexity of
the texts.
Instructional Materials
The Bedford Reader
The Bedford Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms
Raffel, Burton. How to Read a Poem.
Foster, Thomas C. How to Read Literature Like a Professor.
Although by no means an exhaustive list, the texts covered will likely include a selection of the
following:
Drama
Sophocles. Oedipus Rex and/or Antigone.
Aeschylus. Prometheus Bound.
Shakespeare, William. Macbeth and The Tempest.
Ibsen, Henrik. The Doll’s House.
Wilde, Oscar. The Importance of Being Earnest.
Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman or The Crucible.
Williams, Tennessee. A Streetcar Named Desire or The Glass Menagerie.
Beckett, Samuel. Waiting for Godot.
Stoppard, Tom. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead or Arcadia.
Fiction
Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver’s Travels.
Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein.
Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre.
Hardy, Thomas. Tess of the d’Urbervilles
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor. Crime and Punishment.
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “The Yellow Wallpaper.”
Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness.
Joyce, James. Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and/or selections from Dubliners.
Kafka, Franz. Metamorphosis.
Steinbeck, John. The Grapes of Wrath.
Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart.
Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man.
Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World.
Vonnegut, Kurt. Slaughterhouse Five.
Rhys, Jean. Wide Sargasso Sea.
McCarthy, Cormac. Blood Meridian.
Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaid’s Tale.
Ondaatje, Michael. The English Patient.
Morrison, Toni. Beloved or Jazz.
Poetry
Epic works:
Homer. The Odyssey.
Chaucer, Geoffrey. Canterbury Tales.
Some other poets we will study include:
Andrew Marvell, John Donne, William Shakespeare, John Milton, Alexander Pope, John Keats,
William Blake, Alfred Lord Tennyson, William Wordsworth, Lord Byron, Elizabeth Barrett
Browning, Robert Browning, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Edgar Allan Poe, Walt Whitman, Emily
Dickenson, Robert Frost, William Butler Yeats, T.S. Elliot, William Carlos Williams, Langston
Hughes, Leonard Cohen, Sylvia Plath, Derek Walcott, Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje,
Leslie Marmon Silko, and Seamus Heaney
Expository Prose
Some selections may include:
Aristotle. Poetics.
Swift, Jonathan. “A Modest Proposal.”
Mill, John Stuart. “On Liberty.”
Thoreau, Henry David. Walden and Civil Disobedience.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. “Self-Reliance”
Woolf, Virginia. A Room of One’s Own.
Ellison, Ralph. Shadow and Act.
Baldwin, James. Notes of a Native Son.
Hohn, Donovan. “Moby Duck: or, the synthetic wilderness of childhood.”
Selections from Best American Essays of the Century.
Units
I.
Meaning is in the Mind of the Book-Holder
Writers tend to garner a great deal of attention in literature courses, and rightfully so. After
all, there would be little to study without them. There is, however, another integral
participant in the reading process who tends to remain undervalued: the reader (namely,
you!). In fact, the study of literature and the ubiquitous presence of the literary critic are
entirely dependent upon the varying interpretations different readers bring to a text. In this
unit we will investigate how readers interact with a text to create meaning.
II.
Genre Studies
While genre classifications are often reductive and oversimplified, they are often valuable
in categorizing the way we think about and discuss literature. There are four (oftenoverlapping) genres we will study in this course: poetry, drama, fiction, and expository
writing (“non-fiction”). The majority of the class will be spent reading and discussing texts
in each of these genres (whether in this unit or others). Of course, as author Rick Moody
observes, classifying literature into completely autonomous genres is often difficult:
“Literature precedes genre. Genre is a bookstore problem, not a literary problem.” Most
early drama and fiction is also poetry and much fiction contains elements of non-fiction
and vice versa. As a result, we will investigate both the differences and points of
convergence of the genres, as well as the overabundance of subgenres in each.
III.
Text and Subtext
Literature, of course, contains overt meaning readily available on the surface of the text.
The complex selections we will be reading, though, also contain meaning on the subtext,
including symbolism, motifs, and archetypes. In this unit, we will explore these underlying
psychological and philosophical issues while providing a theoretical background by
reading well-known philosophical and psychological theories integral in literary criticism.
IV.
Everyone’s a Critic
As long as there have been authors, there have been literary critics. From Ancient Greek
philosophers such as Plato and Aristotle to postmodern theorists such as Jacques Derrida
and Michel Foucault, critics have been debating the purpose, meaning, value, and social
implications of literary texts for millennia. In fact, well-known literary critic Harold
Bloom goes so far as to consider criticism a genre of literature: “I have never believed that
the critic is the rival of the poet, but I do believe that criticism is a genre of literature or it
does not exist.” In this unit, you will be introduced to some of the most prominent schools
of literary criticism and the cultural contexts behind them. In addition, we will study the
influence of such schools of thought on the evolution of the literary canon (books thought
worthy of being considered “literature”). Ultimately, building on the skills accumulated
throughout the course, you will be asked to join the dialogue and become critics
yourselves.
Course Requirements
Group Discussion
Since we all extrapolate different meanings from any given text, group discussions are integral in
both challenging and defending our own understandings. For discussions to be effective, though,
everyone must participate. Students will be asked to bring a few questions to each discussion
and will rotate as “discussion leaders.” I will grade discussions on participation and whether or
not students come prepared with questions.
Supplementary Reading
Students will be required to select one book a month from a list of texts frequently taught by
colleges and universities. You may not choose books we are reading in class or that you have
read previously. At the end of each month, I will choose from the following means of
assessment: (1) an in-class quiz, (2) an in-class essay, or (3) a presentation to the class.
Journals
Students will be required to keep a journal throughout the year. This is your “rehearsal space,” a
place to organize your thoughts and cultivate your opinions. You may “accessorize” your
journal as you wish (photos, sketches, stickers, etc.), but you are expected to use the same
notebook for the entire year and bring it to class each day. The journals will be graded on
completion only. Therefore, spelling, grammar, and organization WILL NOT count against you.
However, though I may not be able to read every entry, I will check to ensure that the proper
prompts are addressed and the entries relate to the texts we are reading. Diligent journaling will
benefit you as you approach larger written assignments.
Weblog
In order to foster discussion in a twenty-first century medium, I will be administrating a course
weblog on blogspot.com. Students will be asked to create a free account and join the online
discussion surrounding the class material. The purpose of the weblog is to utilize a prevalent
online venue in a positive, academic environment, providing students with life-skills applicable
far beyond the classroom. I will periodically post new threads, on which the students may
respond. In addition, I will assign a different “lead blogger” each week. This individual will be
responsible for posting a thread for the week relating, at least tangentially, to the class objectives
and material; the other students (and I) will then weigh in on the discussion. As in classroom
discussions, students are expected to RESPECT THE THOUGHTS AND OPINIONS OF
OTHERS. Furthermore, all posts must use language and content that is school appropriate.
ANYTHING DEEMED INAPPROPRIATE, DISRESPECTFUL, OR OFFENSIVE WILL
BE DELETED AND DISCIPLINARY ACTIONS MAY BE TAKEN AGAINST THE
AUTHOR.
Exams
To better prepare you for the AP Exam and track improvement, each semester’s midterm and
final exam will be an AP exam which will be graded according to the AP grading schedule.
Significant Writing
From the English Literature and Composition Course Description:
Writing is an integral part of the AP English Literature and Composition course and exam.
Writing assignments focus on the critical analysis of literature and include expository, analytical
and argumentative essays. Although critical analysis makes up the bulk of student writing for the
course, well-constructed creative writing assignments may help students see from the inside how
literature is written. Such experiences sharpen their understanding of what writers have
accomplished and deepen their appreciation of literary artistry. The goal of both types of writing
assignments is to increase students’ ability to explain clearly, cogently, even elegantly, what they
understand about literary works and why they interpret them as they do.
Following the AP guidelines listed above, students will be asked to compose several written
pieces, both creative and analytical. All sources must be cited in MLA format, which we will
review. The deadlines for the essays will be presented well in advance, and students will have a
selection of prompts from which to choose. Since writing is a procedural art, no draft is ever
final. I will require at least one rough draft to be handed in at a specified date prior to the “final”
draft. When the latter draft is submitted, the early draft should be attached to demonstrate
alterations and improvements. Since the ultimate goal of the writing assignments is to help
students improve as writers and critical thinkers, I will accept revised papers after the final draft,
providing (1) it was turned in on time, (2) the earlier drafts are attached, and (3) significant
revisions are made. If you meet the aforementioned criteria, you may improve your grade on a
paper by further revising it.
I will require a final paper at the end of the second semester in which students incorporate all the
elements learned in the class while joining a critical discussion surrounding a text of their
choosing. This will require developing a strong thesis, research to support the main claim/refute
opposing arguments, and engaging with the opinions of other critics.
Other assignments will include but will not be limited to quizzes, presentations, and
multimedia productions.
Class Expectations
The class will be challenging, but if you follow these basic expectations, you WILL succeed:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
BE HERE.
Come to class on time and prepared to learn.
Respect yourself, your classmates, and the teacher.
Participate.
Do not leave a mess.
Be positive.
DO YOUR WORK, AND TURN IT IN ON TIME!
Grading Policy
Attendance 10%
Participation 10%
Class Assignments and Essays 40%
Quizzes and Tests 40%
Late Assignments
Late Assignments will be penalized 15% per day late and 20% for each weekend day late. In
cases of planned absences, missed assignments are due BEFORE you leave.
Grade Scale
90 – 100% = A
80 – 89% = B
70 – 79% = C
60 – 69% = D
0 - 59% = F