The American South

 Because you are going to be busy with college applications and essays, I don't have any formal writing assignments for this unit.  But I do want you to keep a notebook or a commonplace book. (I am going to try again with a commonplace book myself.) To review the concept of a commonplace book... you simply write down any quotes from the text that strike you as important or especially beautiful or anything that you want to remember.  You can include your own notes about the text or not.  Once a week I want you to do a written narration of what you have been reading -- typed or handwritten, and we won't revise.  This will be primarily for you to synthesize your thinking.  If you read 3 short stories, 2 poems, and part of a novel, for example, you don't have to narrate all of them unless you want to.  You could choose one of the short stories OR a poem OR the novel.  We'll also try to have some discussions about your reading -- while I'm making dinner is usually a good time.

I do think that at some point you might realize that you really do need a notebook just to really make sense and get hold of some of these stories, because many of them are very powerful and compelling but they aren't easy.  (I'm thinking of Flannery O'Connor here in particular.)  You may need to write notes just to decide what it is you really think about what you're reading.  Those notes are mostly just for you, but the practice of keeping a notebook -- commonplace book, etc -- will serve you well as you move forward in life.

To summarize...

Requirements:

1. Keep a commonplace book or notebook.
2. One written narration a week.  (A summary or something more creative inspired by your reading.)
3. Spend about 40 minutes a day reading literature, listening to or viewing any supplementary material I give you here, taking notes, and/or writing the narration. 

This unit should last 4 weeks (unless you get tired of it and want to move on).   You are free to pick and choose among writers and stories.  Since you're already reading Flannery O' Connor, I would pick a longer work from *one* of the other writers and then read short stories from the rest.

 

Week One: The American South

What Is Southern Literature?
The Evolution of Southern Gothic (Don't read this before you read Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily", if you are going to read it. Big spoiler.)
 Jack Tales from the Appalachian South
Introduction to Jack Tales (where they came from, how they evolved in the US)

Southern Writers

Flannery O' Connor --  The Complete Stories of Flannery O'Connor
 **The stories most often assigned by literature teachers are marked in red in the table of contents, but you're free to read whatever stories you choose.**

Reading Flannery O'Connor -- A long list of links and quotes.  The Circe podcast linked at the top of the article is well worth listening to.
The Displaced Person: Reading Flannery O'Connor in the Age of Islamaphobia -- If you read "The Displaced Person", you might want to read this article to see if you agree with the author's application of it to the current political and cultural environment.

Just for fun...
Flannery O'Connor's Peacocks
Flannery's Farm 

William Faulkner -- As I Lay Dying or various linked short stories
" A Rose for Emily" --  This story is whacked.  You will probably remember it forever, but the end is very disturbing.  Probably *the* classic example of Southern Gothic.

"Barn Burning"

Harper Lee -- To Kill a Mockingbird

Wendell Berry -- Fidelity, Five Stories (Five longish, interlinked stories, but you don't have to read all of them, if you choose to read any of them.  Wendell Berry is from Kentucky, but he is not exactly like the other southern writers. (He's much more optimistic.) His stories do have enormous sense of place, however. 

Eudora Welty  (Another Mississippi writer)

"Why I Live at the P.O."