English Department
Summer Reading
2010
For students entering
Grade 11
Dear Student,
If you plan to enroll in the American Literature (Regents) class, you are
required to read one selection from the following
list.
If you plan to enroll in the American Literature and Analysis (Honors) class,
you are required to read two
selections from the list.
During the month of September, you will be asked to respond to an
in-class assignment based on your book.
You will receive a grade which will be part of your first quarter
average.
Sincerely,
Eleventh Grade English Teachers
FICTION
Atwood, Margaret
The Handmaid’s Tale
Set in the near
future, America has become a puritanical theocracy and Offred tells her story
as a Handmaid under the new social order.
Danticat,
Edwidge
Breath,
Eyes, Memory
Sophie Caco, a child who was born of rape, leaves Haiti at twelve
to join her mother in New York City, where they both battle with the results of
sexual abuse.
Doctorow,
E. L.
Billy Bathgate
In the Bronx of the 1930s, 15-year-old Billy
Bathgate hooks up with a legendary mobster, Dutch Schultz. Schultz becomes an
unlikely surrogate parent to the boy, introducing him to the ways of the world
and training Billy to follow in his footsteps.
The
March
A historical novel that
centers around William Tecumseh Sherman's march through Georgia and the
Carolinas and those he encounters along the way, including a freed slave girl
named Pearl; a Union regimental surgeon, Colonel Sartorius; Emily Thompson, the
daughter of a Southern judge; and two misfit soldiers.
The Waterworks
Newspaper editor McIlvaine
investigates the disappearance of freelance journalist Martin Pemberton and
uncovers a macabre scientific experiment that involves Pemberton's supposedly
dead father and several other wealthy old men.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott
Tender Is the Night
This
novel explores the moral failure of a group of Americans living in Europe
between the two World Wars. Through
them, Fitzgerald illustrates the tragedy of wasted lives and abandoned dreams.
Greene, Graham
Set
in Mexico during the era of anticlerical violence by revolutionaries, the story
depicts the martyrdom of the last Roman Catholic priest, who is being hunted by
a police lieutenant. The "whisky priest" has broken most of his vows,
but nevertheless insists upon performing his duties until his capture and
execution.
Hamill, Pete
Altar
boy Michael Devlin befriends a Rabbi in the late 1940's, and a deep friendship,
with vast consequences, develops between them.
Hemingway, Ernest
A Farewell to Arms
An
American ambulance driver serving on the Austro-Italian front becomes entangled
with an English nurse and deserts to join her after the retreat of Caparetto.
Hesse, Herman
Steppenwolf
A
man searches for self-discovery in this semi-autobiographical novel, set with
fantastic overtones.
Irving, John
A Prayer for Owen Meany
This
novel tells the story of Owen Meany, who believes he is God’s instrument, and
of his friendship with John Wheelwright , whose mother
Owen killed when he hit a foul ball
during a Little League game in 1953 when Owen was eleven.
McCullers, Carson
A Clock without Hands
Set
in Georgia on the eve of court-ordered integration, A Clock without Hands
is a poignant statement on race, class, and justice. A small-town druggist
dying of leukemia calls himself and his community to account for its racism.
Oates, Joyce Carol
We Were the Mulvaneys
The
Mulvaneys, at first a close and very lucky family,
drift apart over the years, until the youngest son, Judd, discovers the secret
of their downfall and sets out to help reunite the family.
Joseph O’Neill
Netherland
Hans van den Broek, the Dutch-born narrator of O'Neill's dense,
intelligent novel, observes of his friend, Chuck Ramkissoon,
that he never quite believed that people would sooner not have their
understanding of the world blown up, even by Chuck Ramkissoon. The image of
one's understanding of the world being blown up is poignant—this is Hans's fate
after 9/11.
Steinbeck, John
Tortilla Flat
Above
the town of Monterey on the California coast lies the
shabby district of Tortilla Flat where Danny and his colorful group of friends
live. Their revelry recalls the exploits
of King Arthur’s knights.
Pudd'nhead Wilson
A young slave woman exchanges her light-
skinned child with her master's, in this engrossing story of reversed
identities in the 19th century South.
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
This is Mark Twain's
first novel about Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer, and it has become one of the
world's best-loved books. It is a fond reminiscence of life in Hannibal,
Missouri, an evocation of Mark Twain's own boyhood along the banks of the
Mississippi during the 1840s.
Vonnegut, Kurt
Cat’s Cradle
In
this satirical science fiction novel, a group of grotesque people find
themselves on the imaginary island of San Lorenzo, where they learn about
ice-nice and espouse a new religion of Bokononism.
Breakfast of Champions
"We are healthy
only to the extent that our ideas are humane." So reads the tombstone of
downtrodden writer Kilgore Trout. Health versus sickness, humanity versus
inhumanity--both sets of ideas bounce through this challenging and funny book.
NON- FICTION
Alvarez, Julia
How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents
This
is the story of four sisters and their family as they become Americanized after
fleeing the Dominican Republic in the 1960’s.
.
Barbash, Tom
On Top of the World: Cantor Fitzgerald, Howard Lutnick, & 9/11: A Story
of Loss & Renewal
In the attacks of September 11, 2001, 658 of New York brokerage firm Cantor
Fitzgerald's 1,000 New York employees were killed. Immediately following the
events, author Tom Barbash traveled to
In
this autobiographical account of his time as an infantry officer in Vietnam,
Caputo describes what the experience of the war meant to this young college
graduate, an enlisted 'gung-ho' lieutenant in the Marine Corps.
Feig, Paul
Kick Me: Adventures in Adolescence
A humorous memoir in which Paul Feig, the creator of the
television series Freaks and Geeks recalls some of the more humiliating
experiences of his public school career during the 1970’s.
Hemingway,Ernest
A Moveable Feast
Hemingway beautifully
captures the fragile magic of a special time and place, and he manages to be
nostalgic without hitting any false notes of sentimentality. "This is how
Paris was in the early days when we were very poor and very happy," he
concludes in this memoir.
Irving, John
The Imaginary Girlfriend
The Imaginary
Girlfriend
is a miniature autobiography detailing Irving’s parallel careers of writing and
wrestling. . . . Tales of encounters with writers are intertwined with those
about his wrestling teammates and coaches. With humor and compassion, [Irving]
details the few truly important lessons he learned about writing
Obama, Barack
Dreams of My Father
Born in 1961 to a
white American woman and a black Kenyan student, Obama was reared in Hawaii by
his mother and her parents, his father having left for further study and a
return home to Africa. So Obama's not-unhappy youth is nevertheless a lonely
voyage to racial identity.
PLAYS
Durang, Christopher
The Marriage of Bette
and Boo
In this black comedy,
Obie Award-winning playwright Christopher Durang tackles some of the saddest
and most emotionally devastating issues in life. Focusing on the marriage of
Bette and Boo ,he shows them apparently following the examples of their
families, as they marry without a lot of thought, and then suffer.
Foote, Horton
A Trip to Bountiful
In an attempt to
recapture the happiness she knew in the past, an elderly woman journeys back to
the small town where she raised her children.
Lucas, Craig
Prelude to a Kiss
After a whirlwind
courtship, Rita and Peter marry. Following their storybook wedding, an elderly
man congratulates Rita with a kiss. But it is no ordinary kiss. By a quirky
twist of fate, the kiss effects a soul switch.
McNally, Terence
Frankie and Johnny in
the Clair de Lune
This modern fairy tale
about a waitress scarred by an abusive relationship and a short-order cook with
a past personifies the possibility that a one-night stand can metamorphose into
a real and soul-healing relationship.
Norman, Marsha
‘Night, Mother
The play probes deeply
into the mother-daughter relationship while making a disturbing statement about
responsibility and courage
Simon, Neil
Brighton Beach Memoirs
In Neil Simon s darkly
funny memoir of his family in 1930 s Brooklyn, fourteen year-old Eugene is
preoccupied by his passion for the Yankees and his lust for his beautiful
cousin, Nora. Eugene s comic growing pains contrast with the darker issues
troubling his family: poverty, illness and the growing Nazi threat to relatives
in Europe.
Wasserstein,Wendy
The Heidi Chronicles
The Heidi Chronicles is a perceptive and funny play that
charts the 1965 through 1980s experiences of a feminist art historian and her
friends and lovers.
Wilson, August
The Piano Lesson
The play is part of
Wilson's cycle about African-American life in the 20th century. The action
takes place in Pittsburgh in 1936 at the house of a family of African-Americans
who have migrated from Mississippi. The conflict centers around a piano that
was once traded by the family's white master for two of the family's ancestors.
Wilson, Lanford
Fifth of July
Traumatized and
bitter, Ken struggles to find meaning in his life. As he contemplates selling
the farmhouse, old friends and family members descend for a vacation.
Playwright Lanford Wilson paints a bittersweet portrait of the rock 'n roll
generation at the precise moment they realize the fireworks ended yesterday.