World Literature in 9th grade?

[arwen]

This will be my daughter's first year in high school, and she hasn't done any real literary analysis yet.  Writing is also a bit of a weakness, so I want to put extra attention on that.  She wants to do literature that is related to our Ancient History studies, so I was planning on using a world literature anthology or textbook.  But will that be too hard as an introduction to studying literature?

[Lori D.]

Ancient Lit. can be difficult at any age, as it involves:
1.) reading a translation rather than original language
2.) understanding of a culture so distant in time/place as to be very alien to the reader's contemporary culture and experience
3.) understanding of the literary conventions of the time (example: Greek epics written in the poetic form of that time, which is completely different from poetic forms of today)

All that said, there's no reason to fear doing Ancient Lit. in 9th grade to go along with your Ancient History studies, esp. since you are planning on using a resource (anthology or textbook) that will likely walk you through those above 3 difficulties. Having a student's "buy-in" or high interest helps a LOT in jumping potential hurdles! (:D

One thing you might consider doing is including a little bit of contemporary literature alongside the Ancient lit. as "relief", but especially for practice of literary analysis (and possibly for writing practice of literary analysis essays or reader responses). Short stories and/or highly-discussionable Young Adult (YA) literature are a great place to start with analysis and discussion, and Figuratively Speaking is a handy resource for learning literary devices, the "tools" of literary analysis. This past thread: "Figuratively Speaking paired with short stories", has several posts (scroll down in the thread) which suggest literature to go along with the 40 different literary devices covered in Figuratively Speaking. (BTW -- Figuratively Speaking is also available at Amazon -- I just linked where you could see the table of contents and sample pages.)

Also, it can be nice to transition slowly into formal literature studies and the reading of classics, so including some YA works that would be of high interest to a 9th grader makes the whole process more engaging.

OR... if needing more of a "stepping stone" in to analysis and discussion, you might consider doing the program Movies As Literature as a second credit or partial credit (an Elective, perhaps), which guides you through analyzing and discussing films. Sometimes it is easier to start by *seeing* cinematic elements and how they reveal/support a theme, and then translate that to reading literature and picking up on how literary elements reveal/support a theme.

Edited June 1, 2019 by Lori D.

[arwen]

Thank you!  Part of my frustration is that I can't actually SEE the textbooks I'm considering as the publishers don't put samples on the web/they're no longer published.  My original plan was actually to use Figuratively Speaking, and maybe How to Read Literature Like a Professor, and try to pair ancient lit with modern lit inspired by it.  Or I could incorporate ancient lit into history readings, and do a standard literature textbook for literature.  

[Garga]

When my son was in 9th grade, we didn’t quite do literary analysis, but we did read World Literature.  He, also, is weak in writing, so I spent that year using The Lost Tools of Writing (LTW) combined with our World Lit books to teach him how to write a basic essay.  I mean, he’d been taught before, but nothing about writing comes easily or naturally to him, so he still needed instruction on how to take his essay writing to the next level. 

So, we didn’t really have to think about true literary analysis.  He read the books, and then would write an essay on it based on the LTW essay style.  He didn’t really delve into true literary analysis until 11th grade.

With all that said, I had him read the Stephen Mitchell translation of Gilgamesh.  Of all the books my son has read, including popular books like Harry Potter, etc, he says that Gilgamesh is his favorite book.  

We also read the Odyssey that year and that book was ok, except we did have to stop and consider the culture of the time and place, because Odysseus and his crew often felt like the bad guys to our modern sensibilities, what with all their pillaging and stealing, but they were supposed to be the good guys.  We read the translation by Stanley Lombardo.

I’m telling you about the translators for each book because I purposely chose translations that are very easy for us to read today.  I wanted my son to understand the stories and to be able to write about them and discuss them, without getting bogged down in an older style of writing.  The translations we read aren’t as poetic as older translations, but they are accessible.  Tossing that out there as something to consider when you choose translated books.  Some people purposely choose older translations because they like the word-play or poetry in it, but we were specifically avoiding all that and just wanted to get to the meat of the story.  The translation makes a difference based on your goals in reading the work. 

Also, when we finally did do official literary analysis in 11th grade, we used Windows to the World, which does have some samples if you’d like to check it out:  https://iew.com/shop/products/windows-world-introduction-literary-analysis-teacherstudent-combo.  It would be fine to use in 9th grade, though you’d want to break down the writing assignments into small chunks.  I broke them down into small chunks for my son because writing is so painful to him.  But I’ve had to do that with every writing curric we’ve used, simply because writing doesn’t come naturally to him.  (He’s a mathy kid.). I’m just mentioning WTTW as an option to consider in case you haven’t heard of it. 

Edited June 1, 2019 by Garga

[Garga]

Also: we studied World Lit from Gilgamesh through to the 1970s. When I was picking what books to study, I had the extra challenge of a very sensitive son.  A lot of World Lit is pretty brutal—somewhat literally.  Lots of murder and rape and infanticide, etc.  I found it a challenge to find books that weren’t too depressing.  I did find ones that I was pleased with.  They’re listed on my laptop, so if you have the same issue I have (sensitive child), let me know and I’ll fire up the laptop and give you the titles.  But a number of the titles we studied would move quickly past ancient times and might not be useful to you.

I remember that we studied Arabian Nights stories.  Those aren’t depressing, but I was surprised to learn that a number of the more famous ones were written by Europeans in the 1800s in the Arabian Night style and aren’t actually stories from Arabia.  I made sure that we read a couple of the famous European ones, but also made sure we read original Arabian Night stories.

If you get an anthology, you won’t have control over what books/stories you read, but that might be ok with you.

 

And I just realized, that Windows to the World, while a good introduction to literary analysis, isn’t based on ancient lit.  It’s based on short stories written in the 18 and 1900s. 

Edited June 1, 2019 by Garga

[Farrar]

I really, really like this vintage textbook. The questions and assignments are excellent. It's a monster tome. You could easily just use the ancient lit.

World Masterpieces from Prentice Hall:
https://www.amazon.com/Prentice-Hall-Literature-World-Masterpieces/dp/0134146247/ref=sr_1_5?crid=9OXBR4LI6GT7&keywords=prentice+hall+literature+world+masterpieces&qid=1559352800&s=gateway&sprefix=world+masterpieces+pr%2Caps%2C126&sr=8-5

 

[Roadrunner]

12 minutes ago, Farrar said:

I really, really like this vintage textbook. The questions and assignments are excellent. It's a monster tome. You could easily just use the ancient lit.

World Masterpieces from Prentice Hall:
https://www.amazon.com/Prentice-Hall-Literature-World-Masterpieces/dp/0134146247/ref=sr_1_5?crid=9OXBR4LI6GT7&keywords=prentice+hall+literature+world+masterpieces&qid=1559352800&s=gateway&sprefix=world+masterpieces+pr%2Caps%2C126&sr=8-5

 

 

Do you by any chance have a TOC? 

[Farrar]

4 minutes ago, Roadrunner said:

 

Do you by any chance have a TOC? 

Yes... I own three copies of this book (ahem... it's a component of the curriculum I wrote with the link in my sig, but you can totally use it on its own). I'll snap photos in a few minutes.

[Farrar]

 

[Farrar]

Sorry they’re sideways 🤷‍♀️ They weren’t on my phone.

Above is the oldest edition- there are a couple of newer ones with a little bit more content, but it’s marginal.

Edited June 1, 2019 by Farrar

[Lori D.]

1 hour ago, Garga said:

... we didn’t really have to think about true literary analysis.  He read the books, and then would write an essay on it based on the LTW essay style.  He didn’t really delve into true literary analysis until 11th grade.

Agree.

Original Poster (OP): When you're just getting started, it's absolutely *fine* to have casual discussion about the works. Don't feel you have to go into heavy depth with every book -- or even ANY book! (:D 
 

1 hour ago, Garga said:

... I had him read the Stephen Mitchell translation of Gilgamesh... my son... says that Gilgamesh is his favorite book...
...We also read the Odyssey... the translation by Stanley Lombardo...
...translators for each book... as something to consider when you choose translated books... The translation makes a difference based on your goals in reading the work... 

Agree. Different translations will "click" with different students.

OP: Also, you may want to consider an abridged (shortened) version or a "retelling" (modernized/re-writing), rather than a full translation, if it makes it more readable -- for example, we used Jennifer Westwood's abridged prose retelling of Gilgamesh -- very readable, AND it also contained several Babylonian myths for us to further enjoy with our ancient History studies.

 

1 hour ago, arwen said:

Thank you!  Part of my frustration is that I can't actually SEE the textbooks I'm considering as the publishers don't put samples on the web/they're no longer published.  My original plan was actually to use Figuratively Speaking, and maybe How to Read Literature Like a Professor, and try to pair ancient lit with modern lit inspired by it.  Or I could incorporate ancient lit into history readings, and do a standard literature textbook for literature.  

What textbooks are you considering (as we might be able to help you find sample pages or at least a table of contents)?

Edited June 1, 2019 by Lori D.

[Roadrunner]

4 minutes ago, Farrar said:

Sorry they’re sideways 🤷‍♀️ They weren’t on my phone.

Above is the oldest edition- there are a couple of newer ones with a little bit more content, but it’s marginal.

 

Wow! Thank you for the TOC. I am impressed! 

[arwen]

15 hours ago, Farrar said:

I really, really like this vintage textbook. The questions and assignments are excellent. It's a monster tome. You could easily just use the ancient lit.

World Masterpieces from Prentice Hall:
https://www.amazon.com/Prentice-Hall-Literature-World-Masterpieces/dp/0134146247/ref=sr_1_5?crid=9OXBR4LI6GT7&keywords=prentice+hall+literature+world+masterpieces&qid=1559352800&s=gateway&sprefix=world+masterpieces+pr%2Caps%2C126&sr=8-5

 

That's one of the ones I was looking at.  Also McDougal's Language of Literature, or the Longman Anthology from Pearson.  Or using Humanistic Traditions for part of history reading.

[Farrar]

1 hour ago, arwen said:

That's one of the ones I was looking at.  Also McDougal's Language of Literature, or the Longman Anthology from Pearson.  Or using Humanistic Traditions for part of history reading.

Language of Literature is more generalized, isn't it? The Longman Anthology is a lot for a high schooler - though it could be right for you. It definitely has more in it, though I can't recall if it has assignments? I think if it does, they're geared toward higher ed. I haven't seen seen Humanistic Traditions. World Masterpieces is nice because it's incredibly comprehensive for "world lit" - leaves out most British and American. But it's also very much high school aged. The questions are really good too and there's a wide variety of assignments and levels of assignments.