Summer Reading Assignment: AP Literature and Composition
There are several assignments for you to complete during the summer months. You do not have to complete the
assignments in order. Please email Mrs. Dossett or Mrs. Goodwin if you have questions concerning the summer
reading (note: all of our books are on the approved reading list); we will be checking our email periodically over
the summer. You will be turning this in one month after you begin the 2017-2018 school year. However,
you are welcome to turn in the assignments earlier. You will be having other assignments during this time, so
you do not want to wait.
Mrs. Goodwin’s email address is [email protected]
Mrs. Dossett’s email address is [email protected]
Assignment One: Create a Literary Terms Dictionary
This must be placed in a 3 ring binder. We will be using this binder to organize all your materials for class in
order to prepare you to study for the AP test. See the website for words:
a. http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/lit_terms/
b. https://docs.google.com/a/ibaldwin.org/document/d/1_8lEzAGhNc9_JFx6YoYHajAcBV2XunYuMFgm9L
as0h8/edit?usp=sharing
Please don’t just cut and paste the definitions. Put them in your own words so you will understand their
meaning. Make sure to leave space between each term for notes you will take in class. If you do not have
Internet access at home, go to the library. They have it there! Shocking, we know.
Assignment Two: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
-all work must be handwritten in your own handwriting, written in black ink on notebook paper. Please write only on the
front of your paper.
1. Read the Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Road by Cormac McCarthy. Read five pages a day and you will know the book
well.
2. As you read, highlight examples of resilience in green, highlight any mention of fire in orange, highlight in yellow conflicts
between the father and the son, highlight in pink any information about the boy’s biological mom and his adoptive mother
and father, highlight in blue any clues about what happened to the earth.
3. Answer the following questions. All answers must be written in your own handwriting (NOT TYPED).
4. Compose the essay.
Questions:
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Cormac McCarthy has an unmistakable prose style. What do you see as the most distinctive features of that style?
How is the writing in The Road in some ways more like poetry than narrative prose?
Why do you think McCarthy has chosen not to give his characters names?
How do the generic labels of “the man” and “the boy” affect the way in which readers relate to them?
What do you find to be the most horrifying features of this world and the survivors who inhabit it?
McCarthy doesn’t make explicit what kind of catastrophe has ruined the earth and destroyed human civilization, but
what might be suggested by the many descriptions of a scorched landscape covered in ash?
7. What is implied by the father’s statement that, “On this road there are no godspoke men. They are gone and I am
left and they have taken with them the world”?
8. As the father is dying, he tells his son he must go on in order to “carry the fire.” When the boy asks if the fire is real,
the father says, “It’s inside you. It was always there. I can see it” (pg. 279). What is this fire and how is the boy
supposed to carry it?
9. The man and the boy think of themselves as the “good guys.” In what ways are they like and unlike the “bad guys”
they encounter?
10. What do you think McCarthy is suggesting in the scenes in which the boy begs his father to be merciful to the
strangers they encounter on the road?
11. The Road takes the form of a classic journey story—a form that dates back to Homer’s The Odyssey. To what
destination are the man and the boy journeying and why?
12. McCarthy’s work often dramatizes the opposition between good and evil, with evil sometimes emerging
triumphantly. What does The Road ultimately suggest about good and evil? Which force seems to have greater
power in the novel?
13. Discuss how much the son completely trusts his father. Use and cite at least three examples from the last fifty pages
of the book.
14. Discuss the reversal in the parent/child roles near the end of the novel.
15. Discuss the nature of the conflicts that arise between the father and the son. What does the father learn from these
conflicts?
16. What is revealed about the boy when he makes his decision to go with the man and his family at the end of the
novel?
17. What are at least two implications at the end of the novel that the world and mankind may survive and even thrive?
18. Compare and contrast the boy’s biological mom and his adoptive mom?
Essay:
Morally ambiguous characters—characters whose behavior discourages readers from identifying them as purely
evil or purely good—are at the heart of many works of literature. Choose a novel (you must use The Road) in
which a morally ambiguous character plays a pivotal role. Write an essay in which you explain how the character
can be viewed as morally ambiguous and why his or her moral ambiguity is significant to the work as a whole.
Avoid mere plot summary.
Things to Note When Writing the Essay:
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This essay must be handwritten. No typed essays will be accepted.
Write your essay on loose-leaf paper and staple to this packet.
Your paper must be written in black ink and on the front of your paper only.
Your paper should not be similar to any other student’s paper (will result in an automatic zero for both parties).
Introduction—include an attention grabber and an excellent thesis statement.
Body paragraphs—be sure to follow your thesis statement and use textual evidence to back your thesis
Conclusion—bring your paper full circle.
Novels/Plays Covered during the year: (this is for those of you who would want to purchase the books
ahead of time)—great websites to order from are www.half.com and www.abebooks.com
1st Semester:
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood (independent reading)
Oedipus Rex by Sophocles (in class reading)
How to Read Literature like a Professor (selections-group assignment to follow)
Hamlet by Williams Shakespeare (in class reading)
2nd Semester:
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (independent reading)
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad (independent reading)
The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde (in class reading)
1984 by George Orwell (independent reading)