Summer Reading 2010

May 25, 2010

Dear Students:

I hope you're enjoying the start of a great summer. As you returning students remember, summer reading is part of our school-wide humanities course, which aims to promote interdisciplinary dialogue, to create shared intellectual/artistic experiences, and to integrate our experiences here at the Governor's School. One student called humanities "the glue" of the SCGSAH. Each of the readings listed below touches on topics we know are important to you: the arts and artists and their connections to the world around them. The school's faculty and staff is also deeply interested in these topics; we have enjoyed choosing the texts and we'll be reading right along with you this summer in anticipation of our discussions during the first week of school.

Over the summer, please select one reading from the list of options below (but feel free to keep going!). As you see, the readings range from essays, to photo-journalism, to novels and short stories, to letters. All readings are open to (and will be challenging for) all students. The books are widely available at public libraries. If you'd rather purchase your selection, you can also find it in bookstores and on-line. You should read your selection carefully and actively, by taking some notes or marking significant passages if you buy your own copy. To give you an opportunity to synthesize your reading, and to promote dialogue in our small-group discussions, we will begin discussion sessions with several writing prompts. You will complete this written response during the discussion session in August, and I will grade your work as part of your humanities course credit.

Reading options (one required):

Read both Emerson's "Self-Reliance" and Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience." These two essays give a valuable 19^th-century context on the independence nature of creativity. You'll find them on-line in lots of (unreliable) places. Please read the editions you find here:
Emerson: http://www.rwe.org/complete-works/ii---essays-i/ii-self-reliance
and Thoreau: http://thoreau.eserver.org/civil.html

Padgett Powell, Edisto: A Novel (1984, just re-issued 2009). As the title suggests, this novel is set here in South Carolina. The protagonist/narrator is 12-year old Simons Everson Manigault who is a reader of more than just books; he reads the adults and world around him in surprising, funny, challenging ways.

Franz Kafka, The Complete Stories. These selections set up a great set of discussions on alienation, creativity, audience, and humanity, all in the guise of fleas, cockroaches, and other "monstrous vermin." Feel free to read around in the collection. You are required to read: "Before the Law;" "The Metamorphosis;" "The Hunger Artist;" and "A Report to the Academy."

David Markson, Vanishing Point: A Novel (2004). From its first sentence-"Author has finally started to put his notes into manuscript form"-you know that this is an untraditional novel. Rather than featuring a plot, characters, and action, it is structured by sentences or short paragraphs of the Author's notes (true stories) on writers, dancers, philosophers, musicians, painters, and political leaders. It may not be for everyone, but we hope it will provoke some new approaches to form in art in general.

Yann Arthus-Bertrand, 6 Billion Others: Portraits of Humanity from Around the World (2009). The author is a photographer and the book is a collection of images and interviews with people from all over the world. One review called it "an instructive, affecting biography of modern humanity." Organized around questions like "What is your earliest memory?" and "What does home [nature, money, war] mean to you?" the text and portraits create an interesting rhythm of individuality and unity in diversity.

Anna Deavere Smith, Letters to a Young Artist: Straight-up Advice on Making a Life in the Arts-For Actors, Performers, Writers, and Artists of Every Kind (2006). From Publisher's Weekly: "Actor and playwright Smith casts her reflections on the creative process, the artist's life and the acting profession as a series of brief letters addressed to a fictitious teenager. Defining artist broadly, Smith shares advice not only from painters, dancers, writers and actors but from a bull rider, a boxer and a dentist.

Please let me know if you have any questions. Returning seniors, you are invited to join faculty for our panel discussion after small groups meet. Just let me know if your reading really gets you going about something! I can best be reached by e-mail, which I will check every few weeks this summer: jthomas@scgsah.state.sc.us. Happy reading!

Sincerely,
Jennifer Thomas, Chair
English and Humanities