Friday, October 31, 2008

Due 11/4 or 11/5

You will need to read the following stories AND take notes on the specified topics for each. Your notes should include page numbers and at times, some direct quotation from the text, as some thoughts about why this topic is important for the meaning of the story. Please have your notes for each story start on a SEPARATE sheet of paper. Your notes MAY be done in as a list.

"Young Goodman Brown" 93-102

Focus Idea: often times in stories, the impression characters have of other people or their behavior is shattered. Write down examples in the story of when Young Goodman Brown has his perceptions of other people destroyed. Make sure to include thoughts on why having this perception destroyed is important.

"Yellow Wallpaper" 153-164

Focus Idea: Frequently in literature, characters experience a loss of power. Write down examples from the story of how the female narrator lacks power. Make sure to include your thoughts on why her losing or lacking power is important to the meaning of the story.



Also, remember your college admissions essay assignment is due 11/6 or 11/7:

You must select a topic for either an admissions essay or a scholarship essay. Your prompt must allow for a topic that can produce an essay of at least 300-400 words. (Therefore, for many of you, short answer questions will not count.) Please do not include an essay that is significantly longer than 800 words.

If you need a prompt, go online to the Common Application site, or search for a possible scholarship topic.

You must retype the prompt at the top of the page. Then include the text of your essay and a word count. When you turn yours in, you can request comments if you're interested.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Due 10/29 or 11/3

Read the following essays:

"Cub wants to be a Pilot" (Twain)
"Once more to the Lake" (White)

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Due 10/27 or 10/28

Finish reading Swift's "A Modest Proposal."

Then read Annie Dillard's "Living like Weasels" starting on page 1568.

Friday, October 17, 2008

Fun with POETRY! Original Poem Due Tues/Wed

Your original poem should be a minimum of 14 lines and explore a topic/form of your choice. You can choose to read them in class, but you are not required to do so.

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Modern Poem Readings

Final Copy of Musee Paper Due 10/15-10/16

Also, some Modern Readings:

707 The Snake
769 First Fight, Then Fiddle
770 Constantly Risking Absurdity
800 My Son, my executioner
829 Digging

Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Victorian and Modern Readings

Ulysses 649
Channel Firing 672
Windhover 675
To an Athlete 677
Leda and the Swan 684
Sailing to Byzantium 685
Fire and Ice 695
Acquainted with the Night 699
Danse Russe 707
Ars Poetica 729
Ars Poetica 730
Anyone live in a… 733

Friday, October 3, 2008

Neoclassical and Romantic Readings Due 10/7-10/8

Poetry Prospectus Part 2 is now due on Monday, October 13 or Tuesday the 14th. Rejoice!

608 Description of Morning
609 Essay on Man
614 Clod and Pebble
619 Lines
624 She Walks…
626 Ode to the West Wind
628 When I have fears…
632 Grecian Urn

If you'd like to get started thinking about your second out of class essay, here is the poem that it will be based on:

Musee des Beaux Arts*

About suffering they were never wrong,
The Old Masters; how well, they understood
Its human position; how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:
They never forgot
That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse
Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.
In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

W.H. Auden

*Museum of fine arts

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Due 10/3 or 10/6

Please read and think about the following poems for next time:

Renaissance/Metaphysical Readings:

584- "One Day I wrote"
589- "Since there's no hope"
590- "Let me not...“
590- "My Mistress' eyes"
593-"The Canonization"
595- "The Flea"
596- "Death be not proud"
599- "To the Virgins"
601- "Easter Wings"
602- "When I consider"
605- "Dialogue between the Soul..."