Vacation Reading Assignment and Suggestions

Over the vacation, read a non-fiction book at least 200 pages in length, written in English (i.e., not translated from another language). I am not placing any other restrictions on your choice of a book. It may be serious, light-hearted, comic, and about any subject matter (as long as your parents won't disapprove). The week after we return from the break, you will write an in-class rhetorical analysis of your book. As you read your book, pay attention to the rhetorical strategies we have discussed all year. Below are eight suggestions that, so far, are available at the Barnes and Noble on Erie Boulevard or in Clay. (Note that the online price may be significantly less than the in-store price, and if you are ordering online, you might want to check Amazon's prices, too.) Try to keep up with reading The New York Times, too. Stay informed!

David Colbert, The Magical Worlds of Harry Potter

Jessica Kerwin Jenkins,  Encyclopedia of the Exquisite 

Michael Lewis, The Big Short
Richard Preston, The Hot Zone: A Terrifying True Story
Stacy Schiff, Cleopatra: A Life
Charles Seife, Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea
David Shields, Reality Hunger: A Manifesto
Bethlehem Shoals, et al., The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac

Before the Thanksgiving break, some students asked for a list of the books that have most influenced me.  It's an impossible list to assemble, but the following is a list of favorite and influential non-fiction books that were written in English. (At the end of the column to the right, there is a link to my Blogger profile, which has lists of some favorite movies, music, and books. I left off from that list most of the following books. I'm not sure how.)

Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition
W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk
Terry Eagleton, Literary Criticism
Gerald Early, Tuxedo Junction

Bobbito Garcia, Where'd You Get Those? New York City's Sneaker Culture, 1960-1987  

Stephen Jay Gould, The Mismeasure of Man
Stephen Greenblatt, Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare
Michael Herr, Dispatches
Gilbert Highet, The Art of Teaching
Jane Jacobs, The Death and Life of American Cities 

Russell Jacoby, The Last Intellectuals
C. L. R. James, The Black Jacobins 

LeRoi Jones, Blues People
Charles Mingus, Beneath the Underdog
George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia
Orlando Patterson, Slavery and Social Death
Orlando Patterson, Freedom in the Making of Western Culture

Russell Sherman, Piano Pieces 

Judith Shklar, American Citizenship
Art Spiegelman, Maus
The Autobiography of Malcolm X

Enjoy the vacation!