Reviews two books by Ivan Doig: "This House of Sky: Landscapes of a Western Mind" and "English Creek." Notes that both books provide a picture of life in the American West that is not pervaded by Western stereotypes of cowboys and Indians. (MM)

Traces the development of an interdisciplinary course in eleventh-grade history and literature. Highlights historical and literary content of the course and provides insight into the team teaching relationship and students' learning as the course developed. (JDH)

Noting that Washington Irving's classic tale of the Headless Horseman has lately become a Halloween favorite, this lesson plan helps students explore the artistry that helped make Irving the United States' first literary master, and ponders the mystery of what happened to Ichabod Crane. Its 4 lessons seek to make students able to: (1) summarize…

Intended to impart the basic ways a poem is constructed, this concise handbook is a prose guide to writing poetry. The handbook talks about meter and rhyme, form and diction, sound and sense, iambs and trochees, couplets and sonnets, and how and why this should matter to any person writing or reading poetry. Interspersing history and analysis with…

Monsters have haunted the literary imagination from earliest times (e.g., the Cyclops, Grendel, etc.), but a particular interest in horror and the Gothic form dates back to the 18th and early 19th centuries. Taking their name from the Gothic architecture that often served as a backdrop to the action, these novels present supernatural events in…

By examining the works of classic American authors, this book presents the idea that individual human beings can break free of the structures of thought into which they are born and that, by reimagining the world, can change it. In chapters on Herman Melville, Henry David Thoreau, Edith Wharton, Richard Wright, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Abraham…

In this three-part lesson, students examine structure and characterization in the short story and consider the significance of humor through a study of Mark Twain's "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County." In Part I, through skits and storytelling, students first examine the structure of Twain's story and the role he creates…

This lesson plan introduces students to one of the most widely-read genres of 19th-century American literature and an important influence within the African American literary tradition today. The lesson focuses on the "Narrative of William W. Brown, An American Slave" (1847), which, along with the "Narrative of the Life of Frederick…

This handout is a guide to library resources in the J. Murrey Atkins Library at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, for the study of 20th-century American author William Faulkner. The guide is intended to help readers find critical and biographical information on Faulkner. It explains important reference sources in the Atkins library…

Discusses difficulties in teaching/reading "depressing" twentieth-century American literature. Suggests that the underlying themes are not depressing, and illustrates this assertion with examples from Edith Wharton's "Ethan Frome" and F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby." Provides an annotated list of 25…

Describes a six-week project in a high school American literature class on Studs Terkel's book "Working" (which explores the work lives of a cross-section of Americans). Describes how students wrote about personal work futures, wove together dramatic scenes from their favorite parts of the book, and carried out their own extended…

This handout is a guide to library resources in the J. Murrey Atkins Library at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte for the study of the 19th-century American authors Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville. The guide details resources in Atkins library for biographical and critical material on the two authors. The guide is in four…

This 32-page teaching guide accompanies a 55-minute documentary film, structured to be viewed in 1 or 2 classroom sessions. The film relates the story of the 1842 mutiny and hangings aboard the "U.S. Brig Somers." The guide recommends the film for grades 5-8, high school, college, and general audience. It suggests that the film material…

This handout is a guide to library resources in the J. Murrey Atkins Library at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte for the criticism of Romantic (19th century) American literature. The guide explains important reference sources in the Atkins library reference collection and how to find biographical and critical information in books and…

This handout is a guide to library resources in the J. Murrey Atkins Library at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte, intended to help students find sources of criticism on literature (long fiction, short fiction, poetry, and drama) by American authors. The guide explains important reference sources in the Atkins library reference collection…