Six Degrees of Lord of the Rings

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Six Degrees of Lord of the Rings
or Why Lord of the Rings can be central to a
secondary AP English curriculum
(the three year plan)
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• The AP English canon
• Background of my school and teaching situation
• My goals over the next three years
• Build a curriculum centered around Lord of the
  Rings
  
• Evaluate connections and differences between Lord
  of the Rings and every major piece of literature
  we cover
  
• Essays on
• modernism and Lord of the Rings
• the splintered individual (co-author Tim
  Costello)
  
• Gollums near - redemptive experience

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Lord of the Rings
Beowulf (the Heroic Code)
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Lord of the Rings
Beowulf (the Heroic Code)
The Quest
The Awakening Grapes of Wrath
Great Gatsby Their Eyes Were
Watching God Crime and Punishment Woman Warrior
Frederick Douglass Heart of Darkness
Of Mice and Men Huck Finn The Odyssey The Color
Purple
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Lord of the Rings
Corruption of Power 1984 King Lear Catch -22
Antigone The Crucible Julius Caesar Heart of
Darkness
Beowulf (the Heroic Code)
The Quest
The Awakening Grapes of Wrath
Great Gatsby Their Eyes Were
Watching God Crime and Punishment Woman Warrior
Frederick Douglass Heart of Darkness
Of Mice and Men Huck Finn The Odyssey The Color
Purple
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Dystopias 1984 Brave New World Animal Farm Han
dmaids Tale
Lord of the Flies
Lord of the Rings
Corruption of Power 1984 King Lear Catch -22
Antigone The Crucible Julius Caesar Heart of
Darkness
Beowulf (the Heroic Code)
The Quest
The Awakening Grapes of Wrath
Great Gatsby Their Eyes Were
Watching God Crime and Punishment Woman Warrior
Frederick Douglass Heart of Darkness
Of Mice and Men Huck Finn The Odyssey The Color
Purple
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The Reluctant and/or Anti-Hero
Hamlet Death of a Salesman
Macbeth Antigone 1984 Catch
-22 The Crucible Grendel Enders Game
Huck Finn Wuthering Heights H
eart of Darkness
Dystopias 1984 Brave New World Animal Farm Han
dmaids Tale
Lord of the Flies
Lord of the Rings
Corruption of Power 1984 King Lear Catch -22
Antigone The Crucible Julius Caesar Heart of
Darkness
Beowulf (the Heroic Code)
The Quest
The Awakening Grapes of Wrath
Great Gatsby Their Eyes Were
Watching God Crime and Punishment Woman Warrior
Frederick Douglass Heart of Darkness
Of Mice and Men Huck Finn The Odyssey The Color
Purple
8
The Reluctant and/or Anti-Hero
Hamlet Death of a Salesman
Macbeth Antigone 1984 Catch
-22 The Crucible Grendel Enders Game
Huck Finn Wuthering Heights H
eart of Darkness
Dystopias 1984 Brave New World Animal Farm Han
dmaids Tale
Lord of the Flies
Modernism
Lord of the Rings
Corruption of Power 1984 King Lear Catch -22
Antigone The Crucible Julius Caesar Heart of
Darkness
Beowulf (the Heroic Code)
The Quest
The Awakening Grapes of Wrath
Great Gatsby Their Eyes Were
Watching God Crime and Punishment Woman Warrior
Frederick Douglass Heart of Darkness
Of Mice and Men Huck Finn The Odyssey The Color
Purple
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Elements of Modernism found in Lord of the Rings

• Modernists were fascinated by myth
• They also wanted to reintroduce the epic, large
  stories that tell the history of a nation or race
  
  
• Modernist writers often created fragmented works
  
  
• The literature of this period valued imagination
  and perception over external reality
  
• Modernist writers made radical experiments with
  new forms
  
• Time was treated differently in modernist
  literature
  
• The development of the modern anti-hero

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The Reluctant and/or Anti-Hero
Existentialism
Hamlet Death of a Salesman
Macbeth Antigone 1984 Catch
-22 The Crucible Grendel Enders Game
Huck Finn Wuthering Heights H
eart of Darkness
Crime and Punishment The Things They Carried Wai
ting for Godot
Grendel King Lear Hamlet Catch-22
Dystopias 1984 Brave New World Animal Farm Han
dmaids Tale
Lord of the Flies
Modernism
Lord of the Rings
Corruption of Power 1984 King Lear Catch -22
Antigone The Crucible Julius Caesar Heart of
Darkness
Beowulf (the Heroic Code)
The Quest
The Awakening Grapes of Wrath
Great Gatsby Their Eyes Were
Watching God Crime and Punishment Woman Warrior
Frederick Douglass Heart of Darkness
Of Mice and Men Huck Finn The Odyssey The Color
Purple
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The Reluctant and/or Anti-Hero
Existentialism
Hamlet Death of a Salesman
Macbeth Antigone 1984 Catch
-22 The Crucible Grendel Enders Game
Huck Finn Wuthering Heights H
eart of Darkness
Crime and Punishment The Things They Carried Wai
ting for Godot
Grendel King Lear Hamlet Catch-22
Dystopias 1984 Brave New World Animal Farm Han
dmaids Tale
Lord of the Flies
Modernism
Relationships
Lord of the Rings
Woman Warrior Lord of the Flies Death of a Sa
lesman Pride and Prejudice Wuthering Heights
Crime and Punishment The Sound and the
Fury The Things They Carried Fences King Lear
Corruption of Power 1984 King Lear Catch -22
Antigone The Crucible Julius Caesar Heart of
Darkness
Beowulf (the Heroic Code)
The Quest The Awakening Grapes of W
rath Great Gatsby Their Eyes We
re Watching God Crime and Punishment Woman Warrio
r Frederick Douglass Heart of Darkness Of Mice a
nd Men Huck Finn The Odyssey The Color Purple
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Frodo Raskolnikov

• Both are on a quest
• Frodo to destroy the ring
• Raskolnikov to prove his theory of the
  ubermensch lose his guilt
  
• Each has a friend to help carry the burden
• Frodo has Sam
• Raskolnikov has Razumikhin
• Split identity/emotional duality
• Internal conflict between good and evil
• Each has a shadow double
• Frodo has Gollum
• Raskolnikov has Svidrigailov
• Both characters are obsessed with an evil piece
  of jewelry
  
• A woman provides guidance for the main character
• Frodo has Galadriel
• Raskolnikov has Sonya
• So does a wise older man
• Frodo has Gandalf
• Raskolnikov has Porfiry
• Surrounded by family/friends yet isolated from
  them spiritually, psychologically, and
  physically
  

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In addition to plays and novels

• Poetry
• World War I poets
• T.S. Eliot (The Wasteland, Prufrock)
• Williams, Auden
• Robert Frost
• Coleridge, Wordsworth
• John Donne
• Shakespeares sonnets
• Sestinas
• Pablo Neruda
• John Keats, Blake
• George Herbert
• Seamus Heaney

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In addition to plays and novels

• Non-fiction (focus of AP Lang)
• Memoirs World War I
• Speeches FDR, Churchill, MLK, JFK
• Current columnists
• Swift (satire)
• Francis Bacon
• Samuel Johnson
• Annie Dillard
• Immigration narratives
• Tolkiens essays

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Understanding of Self AP Lit/Seniors
Return of the King Crime and Punishment 1984
King Lear Death of a Salesman Wuthering Heights
Pride and Prejudice Grendel Beowulf by
Heaney Awakening The Things They Carried OTHE
R THEMES The anti-hero Alienation Dystopias
The Individual and Society Honors Sophomores
Fellowship of the Ring Tale of Two Cities Anti
gone Julius Caesar Grapes of Wrath Lord of the
Flies Enders Game Book of the Dun Cow Beowulf
by Kennedy OTHER THEMES Corruption of power
Variations of Family The Quest
Relationships with Others AP Lang/Juniors
The Two Towers Macbeth Their Eyes Were Watchin
g God The Sound and the Fury Huck Finn The Cruc
ible Fences Great Gatsby To Kill a Mockingbird
Glass Menagerie OTHER THEMES The American
Dream
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Why Lord of the Rings?
It can be used in the regular classroom
and
It has a HAPPY ENDING, darn it!!
(well, almost)