Hello, my AP Litters! I hope all is well and you're enjoying our heavy new read.

I'm blogging from the Weebly Classic app and it doesn't allow for too much fancy. So let's cut to the homework chase, yes?

Please reply by Monday, 11.17.

The directions have changed: You only need to reply to this thread, not a classmate (though if you chose to, that'd be cool & interesting vis discussion).

Of the first 10 stories in The Things They Carried, which is your "favorite"? (Most thought-provoking, intriguing, intense,entertaining, inspiring, and so on...)

AND

What makes TTTC great literature? How (and where) is it ambiguous, provocative, complex, and personally & emotionally challenging?

I look forward to your thoughts. Read, work, & think hard.

Slaughterhouse Five is no doubt a work of literary merit. It breaks the rules in all the right ways. It is deeply weird and incredibly famous. 

Here are some of my favorite, shiver-inducing moments: 

"Listen:
Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time."

"All there is to say about a massacre, things like 'Poo-tee-weet?'"

"The queer Earth was a mosaic of sleepers nestled like spoons."

"All moments, past, present, and future, have always existed, always will exist."

"And on and on it went --that duet between the dumb, praying lady an the big, hollow man who was so full of loving echos."

"How nice --to feel nothing, and still get full credit for being alive."

"The boots fit perfectly. Billy Pilgrim was Cinderella, and Cinderella was Billy Pilgrim."

"I've been opening the window and making love to the world."

"All he does in his sleep is quit and surrender and apologize and ask to be left alone."

"If you're ever in Cody, Wyoming...just ask for Wild Bob."

And for you? What's memorable? Why does this book endure? 

AND, what's one idea from seminar that you found most interesting or intriguing? OR, what's something you either didn't say in seminar or thought of later?

Post due by Monday, 10.26.

Hello from Morgantown! It's good to be back at my alma mater. 

This stack of books, both freebies from this week's AP training and not, is what I'm reading and picking through right now. I actually just finished TFIOS (Because I couldn't stand it anymore, and turns out everybody's right about it, ok?! It's a weeper and sort of beautiful. And who has the time to hear me wax philosophical about it, when so much is already being said?)

In my sessions this week, there has been some discussion about what you students ought to be reading in AP Lit (Divergent? Gatsby? Shakespeare other than Hamlet?), and what's considered literary merit (hello, summer reading task). My instructor this week has referred to "literature" (you know, written stuff that is  ambiguous, provocative, complex, and personally and emotionally challenging (if that doesn't sound familiar, you should definitely review the summer reading task)) as deep-dark-rich-chocolate, and I kind of love the analogy...

So, let us assume that deep-dark-rich-chocolate has nuanced flavor profiles and subtle hints of sea salt or orange zest or bacon or whatever else that can only be fully appreciated by savoring the deep-dark-rich-chocolate ounce by ounce and with our full attention to its magnificent and other-worldly detail that could make a grown man cry. And let us also assume that the best deep-dark-rich-choclate can only be crafted and produced by the best, most creative chocolatiers in the world, those who have been blessed by the chocolate gods, or those who have honed their craft through years of methodical work and fine-tuning. I mean, my instructor didn't actually say all of that, but she did call lit deep, dark, rich chocolate, so you know, let your imaginations run wild. 

Sorry, sorry. Long day.

So, what are YOU reading? Are you stuck in the middle of The Road? Are you trying to navigate the narrators' sound and fury in The Sound and the Fury? Did you also just hole yourself up in a nice room and weep with wild abandon through The Fault in Our Stars? Is what you're reading deep-dark-rich-chocolate? Or is it just watered down chocolate milk?

If you're participating in this discussion, please do so by Monday, June 23.