Two-Column Notes Journal for How to Read Literature Like a Professor
Chapter 1 due July 8th via email
Completed journal due July 29th via email
You are only to read a selection of chapters from the revised edition of How to Read Literature Like a
Professor. Of course feel free to read more. You only need to complete a journal on the following
chapters:
Chapter 1
Every Trip is a Quest (Except When It’s Not)
Chapter 2
Nice to Eat with You: Acts of Communion
Chapter 3
Nice to Eat You: Acts of Vampires
Chapter 4
Now, Where Have I Seen Her Before?
Chapter 9
It’s More Than Just Rain or Snow
Chapter 11
…More Than It’s Gonna Hurt You: Concerning Violence
Chapter 12
Is That a Symbol?
Chapter 14
Yes, She’s a Christ Figure, Too
Chapter 18
If She Comes Up, It’s Baptism
Chapter 19
Geography Matters . . .
Chapter 20
. . . So Does Season
Chapter 22
He’s Blind For a Reason, You Know
Chapter 23
It’s Never Just Heart Disease . . . And Rarely Just Illness
Chapter 24
Don’t Read with Your Eyes
Chapter 25
It’s My Symbol and I’ll Cry If I Want To
For each chapter, you need to select a number of quotations that you find meaningful. Be sure to
cite each quotation and then identify the context of the quote in the left hand column. In the
right hand column, you are responding to these quotations with your own comments, questions,
connections, reactions, disputes, etc. You should have at least four ideas for each chapter—
things you find interesting, things with which you agree, things with which you do not agree,
things you do not understand, things that remind of a book you have read.
Example of ONE Idea/Quote and Response
for Chapter 1 of How to Read Literature Like a Professor
Author’s Ideas
Response
Although protagonist set out on a quest “The
real reason for a quest is always selfknowledge.” (3) After questers “… go because
of the stated task, mistakenly believing that it
is their real mission. We know, however, that
their quest is educational. They don’t know
enough about the only subject that really
matters: themselves.” (2)
Is this just another way of saying that most
stories are simply coming of age journeys? The
idea of young folks advancing along with the
adventure is prevalent in almost every piece of
literature that adolescents are presented with.
And usually this is hand in hand with the actual
moral of the piece. In Harry Potter, Harry
learns to always fight for good, and in turn the
audience learns this as well. When Frodo
carries the ring to Mordor in The Hobbit, we as
observers learn to never give up. We as readers
are encouraged to identify with the protagonist,
and we often want to for they are given noble
characteristic. Through this authors are able to
trick us into learning with the characters. We
see our selves as Harry, loyal and moral, and
therefore we learn with him.
The College Essay (The ideal length is 1.5 pages or 500 words)
Completed draft due on September 7th or 8th
Discuss an experience that has shaped the person that you are today. Avoid overdone topics such
as your parents’ divorce, the death of a relative, the big game, or how breaking your ankle
changed your life. Please work on revising your essay over the summer. Experiment with
different topics and different ideas! Email any questions that you have and send drafts along for
review.
Below I have given you a list of guidelines to help you write your essay; consider them carefully as
you embark on the great write–the college essay.
1. Be sure to provide the reader with, above all, a sense of who you are. When he/she is
done with your essay there should be something that stands out about you. Reveal some
perspective, some experience, or some insight that differentiates you from your peers.
2. Show the admissions board something about yourself that cannot be found on any other
part of the application. Avoid writing your essay about how you learned to be a team player
by being on the basketball team. The college will see that you were on the team and assume
this about you. Also, the college will receive a lot of essays about the athlete who learned to
be a team player; you do not want your essay to be the same as everyone else’s.
3. Consider a poignant anecdote or a childhood experience that represents a moment when
you learned a valuable lesson that has helped to shape the person that you are today. The
first time you remember learning something that surprised you about life.
4. Be careful about trying to be funny. It may not be funny on paper or to someone that
doesn’t know you.
5. Don’t try to show off your vocabulary–or use a thesaurus–just write like the person that
you are. Be genuine to your voice and your personality is likely to come through.
6. Never give your essay any kind of negative spin. Don’t ever insult or blame someone–it
will just make you look bad.
7. Make sure that you stay within the length that is requested.
8. Make sure that you are answering the prompt.
Book of Choice
Chosen title due August 5th via email
Reading and annotations due Sept 7th or 8th
Please select a work of fiction from the AP Book List below.
As you read annotate the text for the following:
– Interesting ideas/themes
– Powerful/beautiful diction
– Questions that you have
– Connections to Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor
AP LIT BOOK LIST
1984 by George Orwell
Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Rabbit, Run by John Updike
Black Boy by Richard Wright
Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko
Small Island by Andrea Levy
The Cider House Rules by John Irving
Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevski
Sula by Toni Morrison
Flight by Sherman Alexie
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
How the Garcia Girl Lost Their Accents by Julia Alvarez
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
White Teeth by Zadie Smith
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
A Yellow Raft in Blue Water by Michael Dorris
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri