"Recitatif" by Toni Morrison

Directions:

1)  Please read the following "Recitatif" by Toni Morrison.

2)  Take notes.  Read slowly, and try to visualize the characters. When you read, how do you view Twyla? Roberta? Most importantly, explain why. If major changes occur, please take immediate note of the direct quotation(s) that shifted your thinking?  How does our discussion of "The Danger of the Single Story" impact your reading of this story?

3)  Discuss your reading of the text (using the aforementioned questions above) in a blog response  here.  Use direct evidence from the text.  As before, engage with each other.  Take note of how others in the class read the story.

"Recitatif" by Toni Morrison

https://www.cusd80.com/cms/lib/AZ01001175/Centricity/Domain/1073/Morrison_recitatifessay.doc.pdf

Due Tuesday, September 10th - "The Danger of the Single Story" and the Importance of Becoming Global Citizens

Overview:  Every story is just a piece of the larger story of our lives.  Yet, we tend to judge people's lives on moments.  We do the same with literature.

Directions:  Please view "The Danger of a Single Story" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and comment on the ways in which we judge others/authors/characters by a single story.  Think about people that you have judged by one moment. How do you define them?  Now, think about novels.  How have you judged authors/characters by a single reading?  Have you had any experiences where your opinion changed for people and authors?

Next, peruse my global website.  Please comment on something you found interesting and would like to ask me for more information.

"The Danger of a Single Story"

by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Culture. The word originated with the definition"to cultivate land," and evolved into a "cultivation of the mind." Today the word is ambiguous, referring to our attachment to a place, traditions, and beliefs. It also has ominously been used to discuss an "otherness" through stereotypes.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie shares her experiences with the notion of culture in "The Danger of a Single Story" in an important TED Talk that will explain the importance of global intelligence.

"Mr. P. Goes Global"

by Eric Pellerin

https://ericdpellerin.wixsite.com/globalclassrooms

Telling a Story . . . How Does it End?

Overview:  In "The Zebra Storyteller," Spenser Holst states that the purpose of stories is to prepare us for the unexpected. Though the storyteller thinks he is just spinning stories out of his own imagination, in order to amuse, his stories prove to be practical. 

Other storytellers make the function of fiction less extraordinary. According to them, fiction enables readers to avoid projecting false hopes and fears and shows them what they can actually expect in their everyday lives, so that they can prepare themselves.  

What else do you see in this symbolic piece of meta-fiction?

In "Happy Endings," Margaret Atwood (author of The Handmaid's Tale) addresses our need for closure as we read fiction.  What makes for an appropriate ending to a work of fiction?  What are we looking for?  What should we be looking for? Atwood suggests how and why.  

What does she mean by that?

Directions:  Please read and study the following pieces of short fiction. Next, in this blog space, please discuss an idea from Holst and an idea from Atwood using one of the summer reading selections.  Engage with each other.  Use the text.  Be genuine and authentic.  Think about the value of words by being concise.  Think about your audience.  Also, revisit the blog.  Read and respond to your fellow classmates.  Get a dialogue going.  Challenge each other.  Be bold.  Be brilliant.

"The Zebra Storyteller"

by Spencer Holst

Once upon a time there was a Siamese cat who pretended to be a lion and spoke inappropriate Zebraic.

That language is whinnied by the race of striped horses in Africa.

Here now: An innocent zebra is walking in a jungle and approaching from another direction is the little cat; they meet.

"Hello there!" says the Siamese cat in perfectly pronounced Zebraic. "It certainly is a pleasant day, isn't it? The sun is shining, the birds are singing, isn't the world a lovely place to live today!"

The zebra is so astonished at hearing a Siamese cat speaking like a zebra, why-he's just fit to be tied.

So the little cat quickly ties him up, kills him, and drags the better parts of the carcass back to his den.

The cat successfullyhunted zebras manymonths in this manner, dining on filet mignon of zebra everynight, and from the better hides he made bow neckties and wide belts after the fashion of the decadent princes of the Old Siamese court.

He began boasting to his friends he was a lion, and he gave them as proof the fact that he hunted zebras.

The delicate noses of the zebras told them there was really no lion in the neighborhood. The zebra deaths caused many to avoid the region. Superstitious, they decided the woods were haunted by the ghost of a lion.

One day the storyteller of the zebras was ambling, and through his mind ran plots for stories to amuse the other zebras, when suddenly his eyes brightened, and he said, "That's it! I'll tell a story about a Siamese cat who learns to speak our language! What an idea! that'll make 'em laugh!"

Just then the Siamese cat appeared before him, and said, "Hello there! Pleasant day today, isn't it!"

The zebra storyteller wasn't fit to be tied at bearing a cat speaking his language, because he'd been thinking about that veryt hing.

He took a good look at the cat, and he didn't know why, but there was something about his looks be didn't like, so he kicked him with a hoof and killed him.

That is the function of the storyteller.

"Happy Endings" 

by Margaret Atwood

John and Mary meet. What happens next? If you want a happy ending, try A. 

A. 

John and Mary fall in love and get married. They both have worthwhile and remunerative jobs which they find stimulating and challenging. They buy a charming house. Real estate values go up. Eventually, when they can afford live-in help, they have two children, to whom they are devoted. The children turn out well. John and Mary have a stimulating and challenging sex life and worthwhile friends. They go on fun vacations together. They retire. They both have hobbies which they find stimulating and challenging. Eventually they die. This is the end of the story. 

B. 

Mary falls in love with John but John doesn't fall in love with Mary. He merely uses her body for selfish pleasure and ego gratification of a tepid kind. He comes to her apartment twice a week and she cooks him dinner, you'll notice that he doesn't even consider her worth the price of a dinner out, and after he's eaten dinner he fucks her and after that he falls asleep, while she does the dishes so he won't think she's untidy, having all those dirty dishes lying around, and puts on fresh lipstick so she'll look good when he wakes up, but when he wakes up he doesn't even notice, he puts on his socks and his shorts and his pants and his shirt and his tie and his shoes, the reverse order from the one in which he took them off. He doesn't take off Mary's clothes, she takes them off herself, she acts as if she's dying for it every time, not because she likes sex exactly, she doesn't, but she wants John to think she does because if they do it often enough surely he'll get used to her, he'll come to depend on her and they will get married, but John goes out the door with hardly so much as a good-night and three days later he turns up at six o'clock and they do the whole thing over again. Mary gets run-down. Crying is bad for your face, everyone knows that and so does Mary but she can't stop. People at work notice. Her friends tell her John is a rat, a pig, a dog, he isn't good enough for her, but she can't believe it. Inside John, she thinks, is another John, who is much nicer. This other John will emerge like a butterfly from a cocoon, a Jack from a box, a pit from a prune, if the first John is only squeezed enough. One evening John complains about the food. He has never complained about her food before. Mary is hurt. Her friends tell her they've seen him in a restaurant with another woman, whose name is Madge. It's not even Madge that finally gets to Mary: it's the restaurant. John has never taken Mary to a restaurant. Mary collects all the sleeping pills and aspirins she can find, and takes them and a half a bottle of sherry. You can see what kind of a woman she is by the fact that it's not even whiskey. She leaves a note for John. She hopes he'll discover her and get her to the hospital in time and repent and then they can get married, but this fails to happen and she dies. John marries Madge and everything continues as in A. 

C. 

John, who is an older man, falls in love with Mary, and Mary, who is only twenty-two, feels sorry for him because he's worried about his hair falling out. She sleeps with him even though she's not in love with him. She met him at work. She's in love with someone called James, who is twenty-two also and not yet ready to settle down. John on the contrary settled down long ago: this is what is bothering him. John has a steady, respectable job and is getting ahead in his field, but Mary isn't impressed by him, she's impressed by James, who has a motorcycle and a fabulous record collection. But James is often away on his motorcycle, being free. Freedom isn't the same for girls, so in the meantime Mary spends Thursday evenings with John. Thursdays are the only days John can get away. John is married to a woman called Madge and they have two children, a charming house which they bought just before the real estate values went up, and hobbies which they find stimulating and challenging, when they have the time. John tells Mary how important she is to him, but of course he can't leave his wife because a commitment is a commitment. He goes on about this more than is necessary and Mary finds it boring, but older men can keep it up longer so on the whole she has a fairly good time. One day James breezes in on his motorcycle with some top-grade California hybrid and James and Mary get higher than you'd believe possible and they climb into bed. Everything becomes very underwater, but along comes John, who has a key to Mary's apartment. He finds them stoned and entwined. He's hardly in any position to be jealous, considering Madge, but nevertheless he's overcome with despair. Finally he's middle-aged, in two years he'll be as bald as an egg and he can't stand it. He purchases a handgun, saying he needs it for target practice-this is the thin part of the plot, but it can be dealt with later--and shoots the two of them and himself. Madge, after a suitable period of mourning, marries an understanding man called Fred and everything continues as in A, but under different names. 

D. 

Fred and Madge have no problems. They get along exceptionally well and are good at working out any little difficulties that may arise. But their charming house is by the seashore and one day a giant tidal wave approaches. Real estate values go down. The rest of the story is about what caused the tidal wave and how they escape from it. They do, though thousands drown, but Fred and Madge are virtuous and grateful, and continue as in A. 

E.

Yes, but Fred has a bad heart. The rest of the story is about how kind and understanding they both are until Fred dies. Then Madge devotes herself to charity work until the end of A. If you like, it can be "Madge," "cancer," "guilty and confused," and "bird watching." 

F. 

If you think this is all too bourgeois, make John a revolutionary and Mary a counterespionage agent and see how far that gets you. Remember, this is Canada. You'll still end up with A, though in between you may get a lustful brawling saga of passionate involvement, a chronicle of our times, sort of. 

You'll have to face it, the endings are the same however you slice it. Don't be deluded by any other endings, they're all fake, either deliberately fake, with malicious intent to deceive, or just motivated by excessive optimism if not by downright sentimentality. The only authentic ending is the one provided here: 

John and Mary die. John and Mary die. John and Mary die. 

So much for endings. Beginnings are always more fun. True connoisseurs, however, are known to favor the stretch in between, since it's the hardest to do anything with. That's about all that can be said for plots, which anyway are just one thing after another, a what and a what and a what. 

Now try How and Why.

"The Introduction to Poetry" by Billy Collins

I ask them to take a poem                                                                     

                                          

and hold it up to the light

like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem

and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem's room

and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski

across the surface of a poem

waving at the author's name on the shore.

But all they want to do

is tie the poem to a chair with rope

and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose

to find out what it really means.

The "Art" of Fiction

Welcome to A.P. English!

Mission and Philosophy: 

We will be creating a literary community through reading, writing, and blogging; discovering classic literature from the past and present through voices from around the world.  I want you to learn how literature makes us know that we are not alone; we are spiritually connected and can feel safe.

How will we do this?

Advanced Placement English Literature & Composition has traditionally been a preparatory course, culminating in an exam to be taken in the spring for college credit. However, to those of us who teach language arts, this course is more about teaching students to read and write with greater insight, as well as a chance to help students develop a genuine sense of empathy through literature.

This course hopes to re-examine the entire idea of “A.P.” by implementing global citizenship into every aspect of the curriculum, making it a richer experience and creating a model for curriculum at Andover High School.  Each section of the unit will have three components:

1) Global Citizenship

2) Well-chosen literary selections which connect to the former and an element of fiction

3) Experiences where students find connections in literature to themselves and the world.

The framework of the course will consist of a series of existential questions from Dr. William Gaudelli’s research.  Each question, piece of literature, and overall learning experience will build on the next. Toward the end of term two, students will be having experiences where they combine all these elements and have direct contact with students from another country, students from an adjoining city, and share their work in a public forum.

In addition, I hope to rethink “grading” this year. I will reimaging my grading system focusing on the big picture, the student’s personal growth, enthusiasm, participation, authenticity, and passion for the ideas we discuss. 

I hope you enjoy the course, and I look forward to sharing in this journey with all of you.

Beginnings:  The Art of Fiction

·       “Happy Endings” by Margaret Atwood

·       “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin

·       Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri

·       In a Lake of the Woods by Tim O’Brien      

·       The Hours by Michael Cunningham        

·       “The Danger of the Single Story” by Chimamanda Adichie

·       Unity (2015)

·       “Killing the Animals” by Weslet McNair

·       “Introduction to Poetry” Billy Collins

·       “Poetry” by Marianne Moore

·       “Reading Gatsby” by Eric Pellerin

·       “Sonnet 116” by William Shakespeare

·       "Sonnet 292" from the Canzoniere by Francesco Petrarch, translated by Anthony Mortimer

Plot:  Telling a Story

·       “Social Security” by Terrence Winch

·       “Lines” by Martha Collins

·       “Sonny’s Blues” by James Baldwin

·       “On the Death of a Colleague” by Stephen Dunn                            

·       “Only Goodness” by Jhumpa Lahiri, Only Goodness

·       “Going to Meet the Man” by James Baldwin

·       “The Student Theme” by Ronald Wallace

·       ​“A Barred Owl” by Richard Wilbur

·       “The History Teacher” by Billy Collins

·       I Am Not Your Negro (2016)

·       “Recitatif” by Toni Morrison

·       “Numbers” by Mary Cornish

·       “Beautiful Black Men” by Nikki Giovanni

·       “Mathematics” by Mos Def

·       “Where I’m From” by Jay Z

·       “White People Can’t Dance” by Eric Pellerin

·       13th (2016)

·       “Fifth Grade Autobiography” by Rita Dove

·       “The First White President” by Te-Nehisi Coates

·       “Plagiarism” by Eric Pellerin

·       Beloved Toni Morrison

·       “Margaret Garner: Defying the Fugitive Slave Act” by Levi Coffin

​ Narration:  Who is Telling the Story?

·       “First Hour” by Sharon Olds

·       “Don’t Ask Me Where I’m From, Ask me Where I’m Local?” by Taiye Selasi

·       “Hills Like White Elephants” by Ernest Hemingway

·       “The House of Kronenstrasse” by Shira Nayman

·       “Unaccustomed Earth” by Jhumpa Lahiri,

·       The Stranger Albert Camus

·       Won’t You Be My Neighbor (2018)

·       “Death of a Moth” by Virginia Woolf

·       “Animals” by Miller Williams

·       “Holy Sonnet X: Death be not proud” by John Donne

·       “Unholy Sonnets” by Mark Jarman

·       “God Says Yes to Me” by Kaylin Haught

·       “The Bell” by Richard Jones

·       The Cord” by Leanne O’Sullivan

·       “The Summer I was Sixteen” by Geraldie Connolly

·       Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

·       “The Poem of Chaulk” by Philip Levine

·       “Sax’s and Selves” by Mark Halliday

·       “Praise Song” by Lucille Clifton

·       “Advice from the Experts” by Bill Knott

·       The Hours (2002)

·       “It’s a Woman’s World” by Eavan Boland

·       “Barbie’s Ferrari” by Lynne McMahon

·       “Dover Beach” by Matthew Arnold

·       “My Life” by Joe Wenderoth

·       “Where is She” by Peter Cherches

Characterization:  Who am I?

             

·       “Autobiographia” by G.E Patterson                                                   

·       “The Overcoat” by Nikolai Gogol,                         

·       “Gogol” by Jhumpa Lahiri,         

·       “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” by William Wordsworth                          

·       The Namesake Jhumpa Lahiri,

·       “Loud Music” by Stephen Dobyns

·       “Goodbye to the Old Life” by Wesley McNair

·       “My Two Lives” by Jhumpa Lahiri,

·       “Mid-term Break” by Seamus Heaney

·       “Acting” by Suzanne Cleary

·       A Doll House by Henrik Ibsen

·       “The Space Heater” by Sharon Olds

·       “No Return” by William Matthews

·       “The Panic Bird” by Robert Phillips

·       “Happy Marriage” by Taslima Nasrin

·       The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde

·       “I Finally Managed to Speak to Her” by Hal Sirowitz

·       “Coffee in the Afternoon” by Alberto Rios

·       “Sonnet 94: A woman’s face” by William Shakespeare

·       “Sonnet 53: What is your substance” by William Shakespeare

·       The Decay of Lying: An Observation by Oscar Wilde

·       “Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young” by Oscar Wilde

·       “A Few Maxims for the Instruction of the Over-Educated” by Oscar Wilde

·       “The Selfish Giant” by Oscar Wilde

·       “The Happy Prince” by Oscar Wilde

·       “A Dialogue Between the Body and Soul” by Andrew Marvell

·       “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T.S, Eliot

Setting:  Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?

·       “A Choice of Accommodations” by Jhumpa Lahiri

·       “Ladies and Gentlemen in Outer Space” by Ron Padgett               

·       Einstein’s Dreams by Alan Lightman. 

·       Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce

·       “What He Thought” by Heather McHugh

·       “Church Going” by Philip Levine

·       “Golden Retrievals” by Mark Doty

·       “My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke

·       “The Green One Over There” by Katia Kapovich

·       “The History of Poetry” by Peter Cooley

·       Amadeus Peter Shaffer

·       “The Farewell” by Edward Field

·       “The Fathers” by Elizabeth Holmes

·       “Hawk Roosting” by Ted Hughes

·       In a Lake of the Woods by Tim O’Brien

·       “The Old Liberators” by Robert Hedin

·       “Lesson” by Forrest Hamer

Symbol: What Do You See? What Do Others See?

·       “A Wreath to the Fish” by Nancy Willard

·       “A Metaphor Crosses the Road” by Martha McFerren

·       “Ballplayer” by Evie Shockley

·       The Writing Life by Annie Dillard

·       “A Hunger Artist” by Franz Kafka          

·       “Nipple Jesus” by Nick Hornby

·       “Hell-Heaven” by Jhumpa Lahiri

·       “Mrs. Midas” by Carol Ann Duffy

·       Ghosts Henrik Ibsen

·       “Beyond Recall” by Sharon Bryan

·       “Grammar” by Tony Hoagland

·       “Alzheimer’s” by Bob Hicok

·       “Message: Bottle #32” by J. Allyn Rosser

·       “Not Bad Dad, Not Bad” by Jan Heller Levi

·       “Little Father” by Li-Young Lee

·       Hamlet William Shakespeare

·       Selections from: Henry V, Titus Andronicus, and Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare

·       “Beyond Recall” by Sharon Bryan

·        “What I Would Do” by Marc Pattersen

·       “The Meadow” by Kate Knapp Johnson

·       “Only One of My Deaths” by Dean Young

·       “May” by Bruce Weigel

·       “The Death of a Toad” by Richard Wilbur

·       “Hamlet Off-Stage: Laertes Cool” by D.C. Berry

·       “The Dead” by Susan Mitchell

Assessments:

Class Participation, Blogs, and Homework 70%:  Every night you will read a selection from the works above and compose a blog response. If you are absent, please view the blog and respond when you are able. Criteria and rubrics for the above will be made available. 

Writing & Major Assignments 30%:  This category includes all major writing assignments, in-class essays, and final projects.  Criteria and rubrics for the above will be made available.

Aspen:  Grades and progress reports will be consistently posted on Aspen.  It is your responsibility to track your progress.

Classroom Behavior:

Students must adhere to the rules of conduct outlined in the Andover High School Student Handbook 2018-2019 edition.   If you act like an authentic adult, you will be treated in kind.