WAR IS PEACE FREEDOM IS SLAVERY IGNORANCE IS STRENGH

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1 IB English A2 Higher Level I First Semester, 2008 Mr. Mark Daniels-Condon (mark.condon@graded.br) Mr. Corey Watlington (corey.watlington@graded.br) Vacation Reading and Tasks WAR IS PEACE FREEDOM IS SLAVERY IGNORANCE IS STRENGH So says announces the Party of George Orwell s dystopian novel, Our cherished values of peace and freedom are turned upside down in order to prove the manipulative and pervasive power of the state is the story of one man s nightmare odyssey through a world ruled by warring states and a power structure that controls not only information but individual thought and memory is a powerful warning of the ways that we can keep and lose our humanity. Over the vacation we want everyone to do several things, and come to the first class meeting with the following completed: 1 (1) Enjoy reading George Orwell s Despite being a rich, complex meditation on fascist government policies, Orwell s story makes for exciting reading. The book is a page-turner; slow down and savor the pleasure of the stories. (2) Annotate your book. Engage with the writer. Underline important passages. Highlight or box words that you either don t know (please look them up) or words that you find provocative. In the margins ask questions or make comments. Find your own ways of annotating and breaking down texts. But make sure mark up your book. (3) In preparation for the first day of class, be sure you have identified at least three key passages from There is no need to write your notes on paper, but the first day of class you should be able to show me these passages marked and annotated in your text. You should also be prepared to use your annotations to lead a class discussion of the particular text you have chosen. Your annotations and your leading class discussion will account for 10 percent of your first quarter grade by George Orwell (Plume Books) (isbn: ) can be purchased at Livraria Cultura or Your choice. But books must be in hand for you to do the vacation assignment and with you the first day of class. 1 Please note, all of this work is foundational for the first project of the quarter (due the first day of class).

2 IB English A1 Higher Level I First Semester, 2008 Mr. Mark Daniels-Condon (mark.condon@graded.br) Vacation Reading and Tasks! Over the vacation we want everyone to do several things, and come to the first class meeting with the following completed: 2 (4) Enjoy reading Euripides Iphigenia At Aulis. Despite being a rich, complex meditation on the complexities of war and commitment, self and society, family and country, Euripides story makes for exciting reading. The play is a pageturner; slow down and savor the pleasure of the stories. (5) Annotate your book. Engage with the writer. Underline important passages. Highlight or box words that you either don t know (please look them up) or words that you find provocative. In the margins ask questions or make comments. Find your own ways of annotating and breaking down texts. But make sure mark up your book. (6) In preparation for the first day of class, be sure you have identified at least three key passages from Iphigenia At Aulis. There is no need to write your notes on paper, but the first day of class you should be able to show me these passages marked and annotated in your text. You should also be prepared to use your annotations to lead a class discussion of the particular text you have chosen. Your annotations and your leading class discussion will account for 10 percent of your first quarter grade. The Bachae by Euripides (Oxford World Classics) (isbn: X) can be purchased at Livraria Cultura or Your choice. But books must be in hand for you to do the vacation assignment and with you the first day of class. 2 Please note, all of this work is foundational for the first project of the quarter (due the first day of class).

3 English A1 HL Berg Vacation Read: Toni Morrison s Song of Solomon You will be responsible for two things with this Vacation Read:!" # $!% % &% $' % (# % ) # * +, - *,.'. 2. The novel opens with a busy and memorable scene: Perched on the roof of the hospital, the black community's insurance collector prepares to soar to his death wearing blue wings he has made himself. On the hospital steps below him a pregnant woman collapses, her basket of velvet rose petals tumbles, and sends its contents flying through the wintry air. Also on the ground, a strangely clad black woman sings an equally strange and mournful song. What do you make of this scene? Which images resonate, and continue to resonate throughout the novel? How, in this scene, does Morrison set forth the tone of the novel and its many themes? 3. Although Morrison never gives us the exact location of Milkman's hometown, she tells us that it is up north, near Lake Superior. In his search for the buried gold, Milkman travels as far south as Virginia, where he feels like a stranger amidst the black men he meets. In this example and others, how does Morrison set up comparisons between a Northern black community with the Southern black way of life? Do you sense that she values one over the other? 4. Ghosts are a common presence in Morrison's fiction. What role do they play here, whether in the apparitions both Pilate and Ruth have of their perspective fathers, or in Circe's ghostly existence in the old mansion where she worked as a maid? Are ghosts real or imagined? Why are some characters haunted by ghosts, while others are comforted by their appearance? 5. Macon Dead, Jr., seems haunted, even threatened, by his sister, Pilate's, very existence. He willingly admits that he used to love her, but now he calls her "a snake." Still, he is drawn to her house and to its music where, "near the window, hidden by the dark, he felt the irritability of the day drain from him and relished the effortless beauty of the women singing in the candlelight." Why are his emotions so passionate and so mixed? What does Pilate represent to Macon's way of life? 6. What do you think of Morrison's portrayal of romantic relationships in the novel? The only successful, satisfying relationships she portrays exist between Milkman and Sweet, who have no commitments to each other, and between the first Macon Dead and his wife, Sing, who died in childbirth. Do you think Morrison is making a comment about

4 "traditional" versus "non-traditional" unions? How important are marriage, sex, and love between men and women? 7. Guitar is Milkman's first and, for a long time, only friend. He serves as Milkman's mentor, introducing him to many of life's pleasures, especially those to be found within the walls of Pilate's home. As they grow older, the two men seem to grow apart. And, though Guitar continues to offer Milkman guidance, his advice is rarely taken. How do these two lives diverge and why? Can Milkman still benefit from Guitar's wisdom? Or do the roles become reversed? 8. What does Guitar mean when he says "everybody wants the life of a black man"? Do you think he is justified in joining the Seven Days? Why does he want Milkman's gold so desperately? And why does he end up trying to kill Milkman? 9. What is the significance of flying in the novel? How does Morrison equate the act of flying with death and with freedom? The last sentence of the novel reads: "He leaped. As fleet and bright as a lodestar he wheeled toward Guitar and it did not matter which one of them would give up his ghost in the killing arms of his brother. For now he knew what Shalimar knew: If you surrendered to the air, you could ride it." Does Milkman die in this final scene? Why does Morrison leave it ambiguous? 10. Milkman's journey south is an odyssey worthy of Homer: he is challenged physically and spiritually, faces death, and emerges a changed and happier man. Discuss this odyssey in terms of its symbolism and what Milkman learns about himself and his past. Why are these lessons so important? How does this journey help tie together the stories of Pilate, her brother, and her father?

5 A1 HL II Vacation Read: Song of Solomon Gold, he whispered, and immediately, like a burglar on his first job, stood up to pee. Life, safety, and luxury fanned out before him like the tail spread of a peacock, and as he stood there trying to distinguish each delicious color, he saw the dusty boots of his father standing just on the other side of the shallow pit. Written by the first African-American Nobel prize winner, Toni Morrison, and published in 1978 to great acclaim, Song of Soloman charts the story of Milkman Dead`s search, first for gold, then for his lost family roots at his ancestral home in Shalimar. Spanning three states, from Michigan to Virginia, and three generations of the Dead family, the saga encompasses such themes as the dehumanizing effects of racism, the opposition between oppression and liberation, ideas of love, abandonment and loss, gender division and patriarchy, the nature and meaning of family and friendship, notions of revenge and injustice, the causes of madness, to name but a few! Over the vacation I would like you to do the following: 1. Enjoy reading Morrison`s Song of Solomon. Influenced by ideas of the bildungsroman, or coming-of-age story, magical realism, classic realism of the 19 th century and oral narratives and folklore, the book provides a rich mix of different genres and styles and lends itself well to a plurality of interpretations. 2. As you read annotate your text by highlighting, underlining, circling and adding marginal notes. This is the best way to actively engage with the book and stimulate your thoughts about its construction. 3. In preparation for next semester identify three key passages of Song of Solomon and mark them up in a more detailed way. Consider such things as the context of the passage in terms of what occurs before and after i.e. the use of juxtaposition or irony; the tone and mood of the passage; the main theme/s of the passage; the characters involved in the section you have identified and what is revealed about them and how; the setting of the passage and how this might relate to theme and character; the literary devices the writer uses, including the use of particular diction or imagery (metaphors, similes etc), the use of symbols or motifs (look out here for biblical allusions, the symbolic use of names, the references to the idea of song, the use of roses, colors, especially white, and the recurring allusions to gold); any twists or turning points in the plot. Your annotations should be detailed enough to be able to lead/participate in a class discussion of the passage and will count for a certain percentage of your third quarter grade. Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison (ISBN: X) can be purchased at Livraria Cultura or Your choice but books must be in hand for you to do the vacation assignment and with you the first day of class.

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