What's Going On?

* College Essay (either a new draft or same as last quarter) Due 12/19

* Blog posts about the plays (Ibsen, Lorca, Irish, USAmerican) Due 12/19 (unless you use a letter, then due 1/5)

* Compare and Contrast Bildungsroman Essay Due 12/19 (unless you use a letter, then due 1/5)

* Personal Poetry Anthology Due dates and directions here

* Memorize and be able to analyze a sonnet (look here here and here) for the midyear exam (D-block 12/22, F-block 12/23) (Notes: On Monday 1/5 F-block should be prepared to "teach" the two sonnets you have read and taken notes on. Both classes will also do a fun activity on Monday with Sonnet 130 and a postmodern poem by Harryette Mullen called "Dim Lady".)

* Learn several literary terms for the exam. (Look here for last year's list and student-researched definitions. More on this after break.)

* Read something that you don't have to. I recommend The Best American Nonrequired Reading. It's put together by high schoolers in the Bay Area of California and new edition comes out every year.

* If you're feeling up for some intellectual stimulation. I will be giving a lecture on Charles Olson's Maximus Poems called Polis is What? on Saturday, January 3 at three in the afternoon at the Cape Ann Museum on Middle Street.

Personal Poetry Anthology

AP English Literature and Composition

Personal Poetry Anthology

Due:
1. Email me your theme over vacation.
2. Bring typed copies of seven of the fifteen poems to class on Tuesday, January 6, 2009 (the epiphany, twelfth night)
3. Bring a draft of one of your own poems to class on Monday, January 12, 2009
4. Bring a draft of the introduction to class on Monday, January 12, 2009
5. Completed project is due Friday, January 16, 2009 (no extension letters will be accepted)

Theme: ___________________________________

For this assignment, you will prepare a poetry anthology. For our purposes, poetry will include song lyrics. The anthology will be unified by a common theme, and must consist of the following minimal requirements:

Criteria

1. A late sixteenth or seventeenth

century poem (Elizabethan,

Metaphysical, Cavalier)

2. A nineteenth century poem

(Romantic, Gothic, Victorian)

3. A twentieth century poem

(modern or post-modern)

4. A twenty-first century poem

(post-modern)

5. Lyrics to song
6. A sonnet (or poem written in

another traditional form: sestina,

terza rima, rondeau, villanelle, etc.)

7. A poem translated

from another language

8. A poem that you have written

containing an allusion

9. A poem that you have written

using a traditional or invented form

10. A poem that you have written

that is a strict, loose, or homophonic translation

11. A poem that you have written

in any form

12. Free choice
13. “ “
14. “ “
15. “ “

You must include:

1. A title page with MLA information (See Compass page 54.)
2. A dedication and epigraph page
3. An introduction (300-500 words introducing the theme, briefly explaining the relationship between the poems and the theme, and reflecting upon the theme.)
4. A table of contents with titles and authors
5. A minimum of fifteen (15) separate poems/songs.
6. A Works Cited page, including discography (MLA format See Compass page 56-58)

You may include:

1. More of your own poems
2. Illustrations and/or photograph (Art taken from other sources much be cited)
3. More than one song lyric
4. A mixed-CD/mixed-tape with the song(s) and poems

Approaches to Poetry

"Prepare" one of the remaining poems for tomorrow's class discussion.
D-Block: "To a Friend Whose Work Has Come To Triumph," "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus," "Musee des Beaux Arts," or "O Daedalus, Fly Away Home"
F-Block: "To a Friend Whose Work Has Come to Triumph," "Musee des Beaux Arts," or "O Daedalus, Fly Away Home"

By "prepare" I mean take read, reread, and takes notes on the poem, using one or more of the mnemonic devices (say-play-imply, SOAPSTone + Theme, and/or TP CAST + Theme).

1. Say, play, suggest; or, say, play, imply …

What does the poem say literally?

How does the poem play with language and conventions? (How does it use or shape language in a particular way? Think of sounds and rhythm. Think of syntax—the shape of sentence—and diction—the level of the language: formal, conversational, slangy, etc. Think of line breaks and stanza breaks.)

What does the poem suggest or imply? Think of suggestive images. Think of the mood. Think of figurative language (metaphors, similes, metonymies, personifications, etc.) Think of the connotations of the particular word choices. Think of the tone of the speaker.

2. TP CAST + Theme

Title: Read and think about the possible meaning of the title of the poem.

Paraphrase: "Translate" the literal meaning of the poem into your own words. (Denotative level)

Connotation: Analyze the figurative, associative, implied, and suggestive meaning of the poem (Connotative level)

Attitude: Analyze the tone of the poem. What is the speaker's attitude/tone? What is the poet's attitude/tone?

Shifts: Note shifts in the poem: Shifts in setting (time and place), in language (diction and syntax), in structure (length of lines, rhythm, rhyme scheme, etc.), in tone, in meaning. Shifts in meaning are often indicated by transitional words (but, yet, etc.), by juxtaposition, by changes in form/structure.

Title: Take a second (or third and fourth) look at the title. Think about the title in relation to the literal/denotative level, the connotative/implied level, and the poem as a whole.

Theme: What does the poem suggest or imply about human nature(s), human society (-ies), human struggles, etc.?

3. SOAPSTone + Theme

Speaker: Who is speaking the poem? What do you know? What can you infer?

Occasion: What is the occasion for the poem? The time and the place? What do you know? What can you infer?

Audience: Who is the audience for the poem? What do you know? What can you infer?

Purpose: What is the speaker's purpose? What is the poet's purpose? What do you know? What can you infer?

Subject: What is the subject of the poem? What is it about? Literally? Figuratively? What do you know on the surface? What can you infer?

Tone: What is the tone or attitude of the speaker? of the poet? What are the clues?

Theme: What does the poem suggest or imply about human nature(s), human society (-ies), human struggles, etc.?

Landscape with the Fall of Icarus

Click on the image to see the whole...
Pieter Brueghel De Val van Icarus (painted around 1558)
Here's a link to an interesting commentary on the painting that expands our discussion yesterday.