December: Great Books in a Year
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| Date | Reading | Talk about it | Done |
|---|---|---|---|
| December 1 Day 335 | The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money, John Maynard Keynes Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. Under copyright: the library page has a summary and guide, not the full text. | How does the multiplier work, step by step? | ☐ |
| December 2 Day 336 | The Waning of the Middle Ages, Johan Huizinga Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What does Huizinga mean by the violent tenor of life? | ☐ |
| December 3 Day 337 | The Golden Bough (abridged edition), James George Frazer (part 1 of 3) Read: Opening to Chapter 69. Farewell to Nemi. Preface (part 9) · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What examples does Frazer give of homoeopathic magic, and of contagious magic? | ☐ |
| December 4 Day 338 | The Golden Bough (abridged edition), James George Frazer (part 2 of 3) Read: Chapter 69. Farewell to Nemi. Preface (part 10) to Chapter 69. Farewell to Nemi. Preface (part 17) · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What is Frazer's final answer to the riddle of the priest at Nemi? | ☐ |
| December 5 Day 339 | The Golden Bough (abridged edition), James George Frazer (part 3 of 3) Read: Chapter 69. Farewell to Nemi. Preface (part 18) to Chapter 69. Farewell to Nemi. Preface (part 25) · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | How does Frazer distinguish religion from magic? | ☐ |
| December 6 Day 340 | Structural Anthropology, Claude Lévi-Strauss Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. Under copyright: the library page has a summary and guide, not the full text. | Why can the avunculate not be explained by looking at the uncle and nephew alone? | ☐ |
| December 7 Day 341 | Uncle Vanya, Anton Chekhov Read: Opening to ACT IV · grades 10–12 | What exactly does Vanya think he has lost by serving the professor? | ☐ |
| December 8 Day 342 | Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad Read: I Ii Iii I to I Ii Iii I (part 3) · grades 11–12 Parent note: brutality in the Congo ivory trade and period racial epithets Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | Why does Kurtz succumb when others do not? | ☐ |
| December 9 Day 343 | The Beast in the Jungle, Henry James Read: Opening to CHAPTER VI · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What does Marcher expect the beast to be, and why does he never try to find out by acting? | ☐ |
| December 10 Day 344 | Death in Venice, Thomas Mann Read: Full Text · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: an older man's obsessive infatuation with a boy; no sexual acts. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What does Chapter II admire in Aschenbach's way of working? | ☐ |
| December 11 Day 345 | Swann's Way, Marcel Proust (part 1 of 2) Read: Full Text to Full Text (part 6) · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: adult relationships and a scene of voyeurism. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What did the narrator remember of Combray before the madeleine, and what does he remember after? | ☐ |
| December 12 Day 346 | Swann's Way, Marcel Proust (part 2 of 2) Read: Full Text (part 7) to Full Text (part 12) · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: adult relationships and a scene of voyeurism. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | How does Swann persuade himself that Odette is beautiful? | ☐ |
| December 13 Day 347 | A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce (part 1 of 2) Read: Opening to Chapter III · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: a visit to a prostitute; religious crisis. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | How does the language of the opening pages differ from that of the diary at the end? | ☐ |
| December 14 Day 348 | A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce (part 2 of 2) Read: Chapter IV to Chapter V · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: a visit to a prostitute; religious crisis. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | Why do Dante and Mr. Casey quarrel so fiercely over Parnell? | ☐ |
| December 15 Day 349 | Six Characters in Search of an Author and Other Plays, Luigi Pirandello (part 1 of 2) Read: Opening to ACT II · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: Six Characters involves a near-incestuous encounter in a brothel setting. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | Why do the characters object when the actors play their scene? | ☐ |
| December 16 Day 350 | Six Characters in Search of an Author and Other Plays, Luigi Pirandello (part 2 of 2) Read: ACT III to ACT III · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: Six Characters involves a near-incestuous encounter in a brothel setting. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | Which act does the Father fear will define him, and why does the Step-Daughter insist on it? | ☐ |
| December 17 Day 351 | Saint Joan, George Bernard Shaw (part 1 of 2) Read: Full Text to Full Text (part 2) · grades 10–12 | What does the Inquisitor fear will happen if heresy is not stopped in its pious beginnings? | ☐ |
| December 18 Day 352 | Saint Joan, George Bernard Shaw (part 2 of 2) Read: Full Text (part 3) to Full Text (part 4) · grades 10–12 | How does Joan answer when asked to submit her revelations to the Church Militant? | ☐ |
| December 19 Day 353 | A Lost Lady, Willa Cather Read: Opening to PART TWO. I · grades 10–12 Parent note: Includes an adulterous affair, treated without explicitness. | Why does the Captain refuse to shelter his property, and what does Judge Pommeroy think of the choice? | ☐ |
| December 20 Day 354 | The Prussian Officer and Other Stories, D. H. Lawrence (part 1 of 2) Read: Full Text to Full Text (part 3) · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: violence and suppressed desire. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What in the orderly provokes the Captain, and why can the Captain not admit it? | ☐ |
| December 21 Day 355 | The Prussian Officer and Other Stories, D. H. Lawrence (part 2 of 2) Read: Full Text (part 4) to Full Text (part 5) · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: violence and suppressed desire. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | How does Elizabeth's anger in the first half of the story prepare for her grief in the second? | ☐ |
| December 22 Day 356 | The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: unsettling themes; best with guidance Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What does Gregor worry about first when he wakes, and what does that reveal about his life? | ☐ |
| December 23 Day 357 | The Waste Land, T. S. Eliot Read: Opening to V. WHAT THE THUNDER SAID · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | Why does Eliot borrow Dante's line about death undoing so many for the crowd on London Bridge? | ☐ |
| December 24 Day 358 | The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald (part 1 of 2) Read: Full Text to Full Text (part 2) · grades 9–12 | What does Gatsby want from Daisy besides Daisy herself? | ☐ |
| December 25 Day 359 | The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald (part 2 of 2) Read: Full Text (part 3) · grades 9–12 | Who is responsible for Myrtle's death, and who for Gatsby's? | ☐ |
| December 26 Day 360 | To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. | What does Mrs Ramsay do at dinner to draw the guests together? | ☐ |
| December 27 Day 361 | Mourning Becomes Electra, Eugene O'Neill Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: murder, suicide, incestuous undercurrents. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. Under copyright: the library page has a summary and guide, not the full text. | What takes the place of the Greek gods and the Furies in O'Neill's version? | ☐ |
| December 28 Day 362 | Mother Courage and Her Children, Bertolt Brecht Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: Mature content: war violence. Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. Under copyright: the library page has a summary and guide, not the full text. | What is Courage doing at the moment each child is lost? | ☐ |
| December 29 Day 363 | Animal Farm, George Orwell Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 9–12 Parent note: Under copyright: the library page has a summary and guide, not the full text. | How does each commandment change, and who changes it? | ☐ |
| December 30 Day 364 | The Portable Faulkner, William Faulkner Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: violence; racial language; demanding prose Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. Under copyright: the library page has a summary and guide, not the full text. | How does fragmentation change the reader's sense of guilt? | ☐ |
| December 31 Day 365 | Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett Read: The summary, argument and lessons on the library page · grades 11–12 Parent note: Recommended for grades 11–12; read it first or together. Under copyright: the library page has a summary and guide, not the full text. | What do Vladimir and Estragon do to pass the time in Act I? | ☐ |