1) How to Read Literature Like a Professor is an essential guide to the tropes of literature and will help you learn to analyze and understand the universal themes and motifs used in novels and short fiction. While there is not an assignment due when you come to class, we will have several assignments over this book during the first two weeks of school. It will be important for you to be familiar with the ideas Foster explores in this text.
2) Catcher in the Rye is the classic “coming of age” story and one boy’s struggle to define his identity during the high school years. Written from the protagonist’s point of view, the novel traces several days in the life of Holden Caulfield after he is expelled from an expensive private boarding school on the East Coast.
Your assignment is two-fold:
Part I
You will need to annotate your copy of Catcher in the Rye. You can write in the margins if it is your own book, or you can use sticky notes if it isn’t. I recommend getting your own copy, as you will be using the novel and your annotations to create a dialectical journal at the beginning of the year. Annotation will be graded based on depth of analysis and thoroughness of your work. Do not simply underline or highlight. Look for figurative devices, key quotes, symbols, character descriptions and other important elements of fiction.
Part II
Watch the movie Dead Poet’s Society and write a 1-1/2 page essay (typed, double spaced, 1” margins) comparing the themes and characters in the movie to those in the novel. This short essay is due with your annotations on the first day of class.
Your assignment is two-fold:
Part I
You will need to annotate your copy of Catcher in the Rye. You can write in the margins if it is your own book, or you can use sticky notes if it isn’t. I recommend getting your own copy, as you will be using the novel and your annotations to create a dialectical journal at the beginning of the year. Annotation will be graded based on depth of analysis and thoroughness of your work. Do not simply underline or highlight. Look for figurative devices, key quotes, symbols, character descriptions and other important elements of fiction.
Part II
Watch the movie Dead Poet’s Society and write a 1-1/2 page essay (typed, double spaced, 1” margins) comparing the themes and characters in the movie to those in the novel. This short essay is due with your annotations on the first day of class.