Literary Merit

No, you may not write about Bella and Edward
on the AP exam - sorry.

Image taken from Google Images.

The following texts possess "literary merit".  Remember, texts like Twilight, The Hunger Games, and Harry Potter DO NOT possess what the AP College Board considers "literary merit". 

It would be appropriate to write about any of the novels below for the open essay on the AP exam!  And remember, this is a mere fragment of appropriate AP literature - there is definitely more out there!  Go exploring!

1.      As I Lay Dying – William Faulkner

2.      For Whom the Bell Tolls; A Farewell to Arms – Ernest Hemingway

3.      Their Eyes Were Watching God – Zora Neale Hurston

4.      The Grapes of Wrath; East of Eden – John Steinbeck

5.      Age of Innocence – Edith Wharton

6.      Black Boy –Richard Wright

7.      Pride and Prejudice; Sense and Sensibility; Emma – Jane Austen

8.      Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad

9.      Great Expectations – Charles Dickens

10.  A Room with a View; Howard’s End – E.M. Forster

11.  Jude the Obscure; Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy

12.  Brave New World – Aldous Huxley

13.  Ulysses – James Joyce

14.  Women in Love; Sons and Lovers – D.H. Lawrence

15.  Animal Farm; 1984 – George Orwell

16.  A Room of One’s Own; Mrs. Dalloway – Virginia Woolf

17.  The Stranger – Albert Camus

18.  Crime and Punishment – Dostoyevsky

19.  Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert

20.  Siddharta; Steppenwolf – Herman Hesse

21.  The Metamorphosis – Franze Kafka

22.  Anna Karenina; War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy

23.  The Road; All the Pretty Horses – Cormac McCarthy

24.  The Things They Carried – Tim O’Brien

25.  Beloved – Toni Morrison

26.  The Shipping News – Annie Proulx

27.  The Color Purple –Alice Walker

28.  One Hundred Years of Solitude; Love in the Time of Cholera – Gabriel Garcia Marquez

29.  Don Quixote – Miguel Cervantez

30.  The Alchemist – Paulo Coelho

31.  Catch 22 – Joseph Heller

32.  Moby Dick – Herman Melville

33.  Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte

34.  Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte

35.  Vanity Fair – William Thackeray

36.  The Crucible; Death of a Salesman – Arthur Miller

37.  Frankenstein – Mary Shelley

38.  Catcher in the Rye- J.D. Salinger

39.  Fahrenheit 451- Ray Bradbury

40.  To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee

41.  The Awakening – Kate Chopin

Poetry: Love it or "Meh"?

Taken from Google Images



Journal Prompt:

Relationships are dynamic; sometimes they're blissful, and other times they are tricky and torturous.  I want you to consider yourself in a relationship at this very moment - that relationship is with Poetry.  How would you describe her (or him) when someone asked about your significant other?  What traits does she/he possess?  Overall, what would you have to say about your relationship with this Poetry person?  Have fun with this! :)

AP Madness!

Your concerns about AP English:

- test anxiety
- stronger in math and sciences
- not getting college credit
- keeping up with workload
- juggling with other AP classes
- understanding the material
- feeling prepared for the test
- poetry
- amount of homework required
- reading texts that don't interest me


What you hope to gain from AP English:

- know the "right" stuff for the test
- better my English skills
- interpret poetry better
- learn standardized test-taking skills to be faster/more efficient
- gain more knowledge in reading, writing, and test-taking
- to be able to test out of college level English
- be a better writer
- learn more about literature
- read good novels!
- have an independent reading assignment
- learn more about modern and classical literature
- improve writing skills and grammar
- write well
- expand vocabulary
- better my grammar and spelling
- prepare myself for college
- learn study tactics


What you expect of me this year:

-sufficient amount of time in completing longer assignments
- be patient with us
- prepare us for the AP exam
- be able to ask you for help
- be understanding of other classes/extra-curriculars
- explain all of the "confusing stuff"
- prepare for the test, but make class fun
- be super awesome
- give us tools and knowledge to prepare us for exam
- reasonable amounts of homework
- no boring poetry homework
- help us have an awesome senior year!
- teach the "right stuff"

Thanks for your awesome feedback, crew!  I will do my best to "learn" ya good :)