AP English
Literature and Composition
Summer Reading Opportunity 2016
As preparation for your AP English Composition and Literature course, you are afforded the opportunity to read some high
quality literature over the summer. The assignment requires two books to be read before school resumes, each of which
will be accompanied by activities to help you process the literature and recall the intricacy for discussion and writing in the
fall. You will need to procure the texts yourself, which also gives you the opportunity to visit the library, a local bookseller
or an online marketplace.
Book One: ​
Brave New World​
by Aldous Huxley
O wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world
That has such people in’t!
(Shakespeare, ​
The Tempest,​
Act V, scene i)
Huxley uses science, Shakespeare and a “savage”
named John to create a dystopian satire that
resonates still today. Published in 1932, B
​rave New
World​
beat Orwell’s ​
1984​
to the punch by seventeen
years and is a much more approachable tale.
Accompanying activity: Complete ten dialectical journal entries using the following format. The assignment can be
handwritten or typed.
Identify an allusion with a quotation
from the novel. Include a citation for
each quotation.
Explain the source of the allusion.
Analyze the significance of the
allusion in the context of ​
Brave New
World.​
Book Two: Choose one of the following novels.
Austen, Jane ​
Pride and Prejudice​
(1813)
Chopin, Kate ​
The Awakening​
(1899)
Faulkner, William ​
As I Lay Dying​
(1930)
Garcia Marquez, Gabriel ​
Love in the Time of Cholera
(1985)
Kesey, Ken ​
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest​
(1962)
McCarthy, Cormac ​
No Country for Old Men​
(2005)
McEwan, Ian ​
Atonement​
(2001)
Reed, Ishmael ​
Mumbo Jumbo​
(1971)
Ruiz Zafon, Carlos T
​
he Shadow of the Wind​
(2001)
Russell, Karen ​
Swamplandia! (​
2011)
Vonnegut, Kurt S
​
laughterhouse-Five​
(1969)
Walker, Alice ​
The Color Purple​
(1982)
Accompanying activity: Divide your novel into four logical sections. For each section, develop an interpretive and an
evaluative question. Write a thorough response to all eight questions.
● Interpretive​
—These “level two” questions require reading between the lines and interpreting the
meaning of the text.
● Evaluative​
—These “level three” questions require judging and evaluating validity of a concept or idea.