Summer Reading for Advanced Placement Literature and Composition Mrs. Allen/Mrs. Rusnak
The reader became the book; and summer night was like the conscious being of the book.
~~Wallace Stevens
Dear Advanced Placement Literature and Composition Students,
For your summer reading, you will need to select a book from the list below, read it, and
complete a first-person reflective essay that recounts your encounter with the book. The list from which
you have to choose is vast, so take a minute to look into the books before you select one. Do a bit of
research. Spend a bit of time in the bookstore or library comparing a few on the list. Read the opening
chapters. See if the book grabs you.
Unlike traditional literary analysis, your essay will focus on your personal reaction to the novel
or play. You will examine why you like or dislike aspects of the book, whether you agree or disagree
with the author’s commentary, and how your reaction to the book helps you better understand your
views of the world. Although the essay is a first person account of your journey through the book, you
need to have consistent references to textual evidence in defense of your response.
While developing your essay, you should take the following into consideration—
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The essay should comply with MLA standards of writing. You can consult with Purdue OWL’s
online writing center to make sure that your essay meets MLA standards.
https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/01/
The title of the essay should be thought-provoking and original.
The introduction should include the title of the work, the author’s full name, and the main
thesis of the text.
The body of your essay should thoughtfully answer the following questions—
What does the text have to do with you, personally, and with your life (past, present, or future)?
What is the author’s commentary about the world, society, nature, identity? To what extent
does the text agree or clash with your views of the world and your sense of morals and ethics?
What characters were compelling, humorous, revolting, disturbing, inspiring, or disconcerting?
What are engaging or pivotal plot points? Why?
The conclusion should sum up your overall reaction and declare whether or not you would
recommend this book to another reader. Consider the following questions—
Did the book pass a “Who cares?” test for you? If so, what was particularly relevant? If not,
hypothesize for whom the book would matter and explain why.
What about the work is praiseworthy, timeless, or exceptional?
Your essay is due on the first day of class. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact
either or both of us. Enjoy your summer and see you in August.
Mrs. Allen
Mrs. Rusnak
[email protected]
[email protected]
Select one of the following novels or plays for your summer reading assignment.
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee
Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Lysistrata Aristophanes
A Gesture Life Chang-rae Lee
Handmaid’s Tale, The Blind Assassin by Margaret
Atwood
Doctor Faustus Christopher Marlowe
Pride and Prejudice, Emma by Jane Austen
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia
Marquez
Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy
Jayne Eyre by Charolette Bronte
The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers
Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
Atonement by Ian McEwan
The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekhov
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
The Awakening by Kate Chopin
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
Song of Solomon, Sula by Toni Morrison
Hard Times by Charles Dickens
Wise Blood by Flannery O’Connor
Crime and Punishment, The Idiot by Feodor
Dostoevski
Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys
Middlemarch by George Elliot
Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
Medea by Euripides
As I Lay Dying, Go Down Moses by William Faulkner
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster
Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier
Tess of the d’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
The Sun Also Rises, The Old Man and the Sea by
Ernest Hemingway
Empire Falls by Richard Russo
No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre
Julius Caesar, King Lear, Macbeth, The Merchant of
Venice, Richard II, Richard III, or Twelfth Night by
William Shakespeare
Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoi
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Candide by Voltaire
Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen
All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James
Joyce
A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Jo Turner’s Come and Gone, The Piano Lesson by
August Wilson
Obasan by Joy Kogawa
To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf