The assignments in AP Lit up to this point have not been what I expected. I thought that I would be reading heavy literature this summer and analyzing much information, so the first meeting in the class was a surprise. The material is similar to much of what I learned in previous years but it is very clear that a much higher level of reading and writing is expected of me in this course, which I am actually glad about since I would like to become a better reader and writer.
Nearly everything that we have covered so far has clicked with me, except some of the poetry.Applying what we have discussed in class and in the readings is a little more challenging. Thinking back of books that I loved as a kid, there was so much about them that I didn't understand. In his Inheritance Cycle, Christopher Paolini clearly had something that he wanted to convey about the world and I didn't really think about how it was influencing me. My religious beliefs were greatly influenced by it, which I discovered when I re-read Eldest a year ago, as I found a passage with an extremely didactic tone about religion that I connected with on a very deep level. I must have missed a lot of the more subtle facets of his writing, as I didn't think about what it meant that it was raining when the character Roran was fighting agents of the evil Empire, and I have never even stopped to think about what the significance of the name Eragon could be. Since reading Foster's book, I feel like I have been thinking much more about seemingly random aspects of literature and why the author chose to include them.
The most significant topic we covered in terms of analyzing the intent of writers will probably be the rhetorical situation, but it's only been a few days since we went over it for the first time. In both American Literature and Lit/Comp 9 rhetoric was something that we learned about and it's certainly not new to me, so I have consumed media while considering parts of the rhetorical situation for quite a while now. I hope that during this course it begins to become second nature to me, because I am much more likely to think about it when I listen to a politician speak than I am when I'm watching a movie for entertainment.
I hope to apply the writing skills from Nuts and Bolts in my college applications, speaking of which, I have something that I need to work on....
The most significant topic we covered in terms of analyzing the intent of writers will probably be the rhetorical situation, but it's only been a few days since we went over it for the first time. In both American Literature and Lit/Comp 9 rhetoric was something that we learned about and it's certainly not new to me, so I have consumed media while considering parts of the rhetorical situation for quite a while now. I hope that during this course it begins to become second nature to me, because I am much more likely to think about it when I listen to a politician speak than I am when I'm watching a movie for entertainment.
I hope to apply the writing skills from Nuts and Bolts in my college applications, speaking of which, I have something that I need to work on....
Well first of all I LOVE that college apps joke at the end! I have to get to work on those too!
ReplyDeleteI shared your prediction about this class having tons of heavy reading and writing requirements over the summer, however, like you I was surprised to find that instead of lots of reading, I had to do only a little bit, but in a whole new way. I also agree with your thought about the rhetorical situation and how people think about it more in certain situations more than others.
I also like how you use a specific anecdote about how you look at the book Eragon in a whole new way, especially how you now see it is criticizing modern religious institutions,a level of meaning which is probably only visible if you look for certain symbols and archetypes as presented in Foster's book.
I wonder, however, which aspects of poetry gave you problems? I think talking more about that would allow you to better connect with what you found challenging in class, and help you to improve in case those aspects of poetry ever show up again.
I am definitely in the same boat as the two of you, I need to write my essays!
ReplyDeleteI didn't really have a prediction of what this class was going to contain, so I didn't really expect there to be a lot of reading, however, it was strange for me to read books about english. I had never read a book about reading or a book about writing, so that was a new experience. I agree that Foster's book helped to open my mind up to new ways of reading. I notice a lot more things when I'm reading now that I did last year. I never realized the importance of religion in Eragon. Maybe I should re-read it now and see what new things I can discover in it!
Although I agree that there are lots of things in writing that mean something, do you think that everything we talk about in literature is there for a reason? Do authors really think about every single detail that they put into their writing? What if an author chose the color red for something, not to symbolize anger and passion, but because it was his/her favorite color? I don't know, what do you think?
I fully agree with you Chris, this class is nothing like I expected or had read about. My thoughts of the class had to read a lot. From Brit lit we always had an independent reading book for every quarter. On the list of books a lot of them had stars, which meant they were read in AP Lit. The number of stared books was quite high and I had feelings that when I walked into the class, a book would be slapped in my face and I’d have to start annotating. Thankfully I was and I think many were pleasantly surprised. I agree with you on the fact that Foster’s book enlightened a reader on how to read a book. This reading had a profound effect on me and it brought out new things I would never have thought about to be in a book. It showed writing is at a deeper level.
ReplyDeleteOne question, what of the poetry gave you problems? I share the same thoughts as John. But given that it was only the first week of the class, I’m sure the poetry problems will get ironed out and you will have no difficulty thereafter.