This course provides high school students with college-level instruction in active, close reading, and analysis of imaginative literature. Through the close reading of works of literary merit, students learn to consider how a work’s style, figurative language, theme, and other literary elements contribute to its meaning and cultural significance. This approach to analyzing prose and poetry allows students to establish connections, make observations about textual details, and sharpen their understanding of these nuances through their own writing. This course will effectively prepare students for the AP Exam and beyond by enabling them to read and analyze complex texts. Texts include Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri, The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, Hamlet by William Shakespeare, and The Awakening by Kate Chopin. Students will also have a list from which to choose another novel with authors such as Margaret Atwood, Nnedi Okorafor, Luis Alberto Urrea, James Joyce, Jesmyn Ward, Khaled Hosseini, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and others.
Prerequisite: Minimum of a B in English Language Arts 9 and 10 (or equivalent).