AP LANGUAGE SUMMER READING
First and foremost, welcome to the wonderful world of AP English Language! This is a collegelevel course focused on your ability to receive and evaluate communication, as well as to
communicate (all through the written, vocal and pictorial forms). Before one can learn to
communicate at this demanding level, one must first learn how to evaluate the author and his/her
intended outcome.
For this reason, we will be starting out with two summer readings to prepare each student for
where we (Americans) came from in our writing. We shall do so by reading a work of art from
arguably the two greatest American writers of their respective centuries: Ernest Hemingway and
Mark Twain. Though both of these masters created numerous works of art, each work contained
a specific magnificent message to the audience. For this summer’s readings, we will be analyzing
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway and Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain.
A word of caution: literature often contains situations, language, and in the case of Tom Sawyer,
racial statements and inferences that in its written time were wholly acceptable, but are highly
offensive to modern audiences. Wish as I might, I am incapable of removing the offensiveness
from these works, but these writings reflect who this nation was, how we wrote, how we spoke,
how we lived, and, ultimately, how far we progressed as a people.
Assessment:
Be prepared to be assessed over these books within the second week of school in the following
ways:
1) Before you read anything of significance, you should do a little research to know about
the writer, why the writer is writing, what the writer expects, who is the audience, etc. In
the most clinical manner, as you prepare to read, discover the following (SOAPS):
 Speaker
 Occasion
 Audience
 Purpose
 Subject
2) As you read, highlight some quotes that illustrate the writer’s style of writing (as it
pertains to offering his message), carefully consider and document important aspects of
diction and syntax.
3) Additionally, you need to have the following completed by the end of the second full
week of school:
• Choose one statement below. Decide to defend, challenge, or qualify your selected
statement.
Statement One:
“Scratch any cynic and you will find a disappointed idealist.”― George Carlin
Statement Two:
“You must make a decision that you are going to move on. It won’t happen automatically. You
will have to rise up and say, ‘I don’t care how hard this is, I don’t care how disappointed I am,
I’m not going to let this get the best of me. I’m moving on with my life.”― Joel Osteen
AP LANGUAGE SUMMER READING
• Write ONE essay using both works as support for your position. Your essay should
reflect your thoughts, observations, and analysis of the readings and may include any
other observations/life lessons, etc., but it must include sourcing from the two works
as a minimum.
• Your response should be original.
• This is not a book report, but rather your original work, written at a college level.
• Write 3 pages of typed text.
• Use double spaced, Times New Roman font, 12 point, 1" margins all around.
• If you are using textual support, a Works Cited Page is mandatory (and is NOT included
as part of your 3 pages). For additional help, visit:
https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/12/
• Due Date: End of the second full week of school (September 1, 2017).
• Make sure you save your essay, as you will need to post it to turnitin.com. We will
set this up in class.
Required Novels:
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
The quintessential novel of the Lost Generation, The Sun Also Rises is one of Ernest
Hemingway's masterpieces and a classic example of his spare but powerful writing style. A
poignant look at the disillusionment and angst of the post-World War I generation, the novel
introduces two of Hemingway's most unforgettable characters: Jake Barnes and Lady Brett
Ashley. The story follows the flamboyant Brett and the hapless Jake as they journey from the
wild nightlife of 1920s Paris to the brutal bullfighting rings of Spain with a motley group of
expatriates. It is an age of moral bankruptcy, spiritual dissolution, unrealized love, and vanishing
illusions. First published in 1926, The Sun Also Rises helped to establish Hemingway as one of
the greatest writers of the twentieth century.
250 pages
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
The classic, in all its glory – though what many forget is how well this tale of American boyhood
holds up even after nearly 150 years. Tom Sawyer, his best friend Huck Finn, his would-be
girlfriend Becky Thatcher, and his aunt Polly teach and learn about life, death, race and painting
fences in a “typical” 19th century Midwestern town that bears a striking resemblance to Twain’s
hometown of Hannibal, Missouri. On one level, this is the prototypical tale of one boy’s
innocence and how he lost it, but it’s also a profound evocation of the national character that
Twain, an odd combination of independent thinker and moralist, clearly thought needed some
analyzing.
290 pages