Want to help me develop our ideas for my HSer's Great Books study?

[Crissy]

He will be in 9th grade this fall, and we're knocking around some thoughts for his English/Literature studies throughout high school.

We will be using TWEM as the guide for his work, and basing the writing and vocabulary components of each course on the selected books.

So far we think we may split each year into the following categories.

 

9th grade: The novel

10th grade: The autobiography

11th grade: Epic poetry

12th grade: The play

 

We would like to cover 8 to 10 works each year. I have a few selections I would like to include, and he feels strongly about a couple as well.

What do you think? What would you absolutely include in any or all of these categories, and what are you certain you would leave for another time in life?

 

Any other thoughts or suggestions?

[Needleroozer]

We will be using TWEM as the guide for his work, and basing the writing and vocabulary components of each course on the selected books.

So far we think we may split each year into the following categories.

 

9th grade: The novel

10th grade: The autobiography

11th grade: Epic poetry

12th grade: The play

 

We would like to cover 8 to 10 works each year. I have a few selections I would like to include, and he feels strongly about a couple as well.

 

 

Can you tell us what books you have already chosen?

 

My Boy has loved using TWEM as his base for literature.

[Crissy]

Silly of me not to inlcude those. :001_huh:

 

I don't have the notebook in front of me (he took it with him this morning to discuss the idea with his favorite librarian) but I know he wants to read Steinbeck and Twain during our novel year.

I recall him being interested yet equally disgusted at the idea of reading Mein Kampf in the autobiography year.

When we get to epic poetry he wants to include Nibelungenlied and finally, plenty of Shakespeare in his senior year.

[HollyinNNV]

This is an interesting idea.

 

9th grade: The novel

10th grade: The autobiography

11th grade: Epic poetry

12th grade: The play

 

 

I think that I would enjoy the 9th grade year. However, I, personally, would not want to spend a year reading any of the other categories exclusively. (especially epic poetry!) I would do a mix of all those each year. Maybe I'd focus on one category-but I personally could not spend a year reading plays exclusively. I also think that each year kids get better at reading and understanding. So, I'd hate to have my highest level of thinking year NOT include novels and poetry. How about something like:

 

9th grade 20 weeks novels, 5 weeks autobio., 5 weeks poetry, 5 weeks play, 5 weeks essays

 

10th grade 20 weeks autobiography, 5 weeks novels, 5 weeks poetry, 5 weeks plays, 5 weeks essays

 

11th grade 20 weeks Poetry, 5 weeks novels, 5 weeks autobio., 5 weeks essays

 

12th grade 20 weeks plays, 5 weeks novels, 5 weeks poetry, 5 weeks essays

[Closeacademy]

As a lit major but one without my books right now because they are borrowed out:

 

Novel--

Would not use The Mill on the Floss by George Elliot but I hear her other novels are not as anger-inducing.

 

But would use Utopia

one of Jane Austen's novels

something by Thomas Hardy

something by Mark Twain

The Great Gatsby

The Sun Also Rises Hemmingway

Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neal Hurston is a powerful book

The Chosen by Hiam Potak

And A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

 

Epic Poetry--

Either the Illiad or the Odyssey

Beowulf

and Paradise Lost.

 

Plays--

Oedipus Rex,

 

I don't have my books with me right now but I would do the Greek play about the women who shut the men out of the town until they agree to give off warfare.

 

Something fun by Shakespeare and something serious (As You Like it and Hamlet are both good)

 

A lighter play by Tennesee Williams such as "A Glass Menagerie."

 

Just some of my ideas on good literature.

[Crissy]

This is an interesting idea.

 

I I also think that each year kids get better at reading and understanding. So, I'd hate to have my highest level of thinking year NOT include novels and poetry.

 

An excellent point, Holly. I like your scheduling suggestions.

Thank you.

[Crissy]

As a lit major but one without my books right now because they are borrowed out:

 

Novel--

Would not use The Mill on the Floss by George Elliot but I hear her other novels are not as anger-inducing.

 

But would use Utopia

one of Jane Austen's novels

something by Thomas Hardy

something by Mark Twain

The Great Gatsby

The Sun Also Rises Hemmingway

Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neal Hurston is a powerful book

The Chosen by Hiam Potak

And A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

 

Epic Poetry--

Either the Illiad or the Odyssey

Beowulf

and Paradise Lost.

 

Plays--

Oedipus Rex,

 

I don't have my books with me right now but I would do the Greek play about the women who shut the men out of the town until they agree to give off warfare.

 

Something fun by Shakespeare and something serious (As You Like it and Hamlet are both good)

 

A lighter play by Tennesee Williams such as "A Glass Menagerie."

 

Just some of my ideas on good literature.

 

These are wonderful suggestions, thank you Christy.

[kate in seattle]

I agree with Holly that all of one kind in a year might be a bit much. Also, it makes the reading very unequal. Three epics (Illiad, Odyssey, Aeneid) probably equal 20 or more plays as far as reading is concerned.

 

I would not do poetry as a separate unit. I would read my main focus for the year (plays or novels or whatever) chronologically and then add in a few poems a week which correlate time-wise).

 

Are you thinking "history of novel" or just "classic novel"?

 

I would schedule the dramas (better word than play) around what you can see. So check out the schedule for ACT, Seattle Rep, SCT, Intiman, 5th Ave, Paramount, etc. and read what you can go see. Drama was meant to be SEEN and if you are going to seriously study it, you need to see it. don't forget to add in Greenstage, Wooden O and Seattle Shakespeare. I would read those plays, see them, and then watch movie versions of them. How do different directors bring out different parts of Shakespeare - great material there for essays.

 

I would definitely add the Aeneid to your epic list. It is actually (according to my Aeneid class prof) the most quoted 'ancient' work in Medieval and Renaissance times. Because Greek was 'lost' to most of Western Civ for quite a while, the Latin Aeneid was a much more familiar work. You see it again and again - Inferno, Paradise Lost are two huge examples. Alan Rawn of the Northwest Classics Society does some UW Experiemental College classes in the epics. Those are a fun way to go through them. And the Vandiver Teaching company tapes are not-to-be-missed.

 

Well, that is already probably more than you want to know. I always have something to say about book lists.

 

BTW - you haven't been blogging much lately!

 

kate in seattle

[Crissy]

I always have something to say about book lists.

 

kate in seattle

 

Kate, you're a gem!

I'm making notes of all of the above to go over during our next "What the heck are we going to do?" session.

 

Thank you!

[Nissi]

Thanks Eliana. This is very helpful.

 

Nissi

[Anne/Ankara]

Are you considering doing this approach in addition to the Ancients Literature plan of WTM? I would like to do that, but I'm afraid I won't have enough time next year (ninth grade) for both, so I'm thinking instead of doing the ancient literature ( Homer, Sophocles, Ovid and the rest) and then just doing separate reading of novels on the side...

[Crissy]

Are you considering doing this approach in addition to the Ancients Literature plan of WTM? I would like to do that, but I'm afraid I won't have enough time next year (ninth grade) for both, so I'm thinking instead of doing the ancient literature ( Homer, Sophocles, Ovid and the rest) and then just doing separate reading of novels on the side...

 

 

Yes. That is one more thing I should have mentioned. This is in addition to the regular WTM literature/history schedule.

My son is a voracious reader (over 150 books in a year's time), and has recently been reading a lot of, well, less than stellar selections. I want to see him reduce the quantity and increase the quality of his reading. We agree that a more structured approach is worth a try.

[Crissy]

I don't know what your student has already covered, but I think that starting 9th grade literature with a short story unit can be very valuable. It is a great way to take literary discussions to a deeper level for the first time.

 

I agree with the others who have suggested mixing things up a bit. I like to do an intro to genres in 8th or 9th grade - short stories, essays, drama, poetry, and novels.

 

I like to spend a year each on American and British literature and I plan to have 12th grade be an opportunity to bring together all the things we've been learning and studying. I have seen some fascinating AP Lit syllabi - and their organizing themes can be so fascinating!

 

Some specific recommendations:

 

*Middlemarch - Eliot (Everyone should read this! It is an incredible novel.)

Tale of Two Cities - Dickens

*an Austen novel (probably Pride and Prejudice or Emma)

Count of Monte Cristo - Dumas

Tenant of Wildfell Hall - Anne Bronte

Lord Jim - Conrad

*Remains of the Day - Ishiguro

Scarlet Letter - Hawthorne

Washington Square or Portrait of a Lady - James

Death Comes for the Archbishop - Cather

Rise of Silas Lapham - Howells

*Brothers Karamazov - Dostoyevsky

Anna Karenina - Tolstoy

To the Lighthouse - Woolf

This Earth of Mankind - Toer (Indonesian)

Palace Walk - Mahfouz (Egyptian)

Huckleberry Finn - Twain

 

Drama:

 

Shakespeare, as much as possible! Lear and Hamlet are better, imho, for the older grades, Much Ado About Nothing, Henry V, Midsummer Night's Dream, and Julius Casear earlier.

 

When you do Hamlet, you should try to do Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (by Stoppard) as well.

 

Cyrano de Bergerac - Rostand (the best translation I know of, I have from the translator (commissioned for our local Shakespeare company), but it isn't available to the public. The next best option is to use Burgess's translation - which is lovely - and supplement, perhaps with the Hooker translation, for Roxanne's visit to the battlefield. (Burgess changed the story for that part :mad:)

 

All My Sons - Arthur Miller (I think Death of a Salesman, fabulous though it is, is less meaningful to younger readers/viewers than this powerful play.)

 

Antigone - both Anouilh's and Sophocles' (I think this is a better selection for high school that Oedipus Rex, *much* better.)

 

Not About Heroes - MacDonald

 

Glass Menagerie - Williams

 

Andersonville Trial - Levitt

 

Wit - Edson (Don't miss the incredible film production with Emma Thompson.)

 

a Moliere play - the Miser, perhaps, or Tartuffe or the Misanthrope.

 

A Chekhov play - Cherry Orchard or Three Sisters, perhaps

 

The Importance of Being Earnest - Wilde

 

Waiting for Godot - Beckett

 

 

If you have one or more good theater companies near you, I would see what they are showing, and if at least one could be worked into the syllabus for the year.

 

Short stories:

 

See my lists in this post.

 

Poetry:

 

I'm not going to try listing all my favorite poets here, but I will list some of my favorite resources for teaching poetry:

 

 

• • • Sound and Sense (I prefer the much older editions of his books.)

    • How Does a Poem Mean (I have an earlier edition of this one too)

    • UnderstandingPoetry(I have a different edition, which was much cheaper!)

    • A Poetry Handbook (and sequel)

    • The Prosdy Handbook

    • Poetic Meter and Poetic Form

 

 

 

 

 

 

What an incredibly helpful post, Eliana. Thank you.

[cajun.classical]

Novel--

Would not use The Mill on the Floss by George Elliot but I hear her other novels are not as anger-inducing.

 

AAHH! You're killing me! :ack2: I wrote my thesis on Mill on the Floss and it still remains one of my favorites. Why do you consider it "anger-inducing"?

[Needleroozer]

Aarrgghh. I wanted to participate in this thread, but ran out of time and energy! Here is a list of what the Boy read last year, and here is this year's plan.

 

We have the same issue here with quality versus quantity. This has been a good thread- you have been given some great ideas. Let us know what your list ends up looking like.