CLARKE Grade 11

W. T. CLARKE HIGH SCHOOL
2020 Summer Reading List
Grades 11

Students must complete the summer assignment found here.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
Written at the end of American Civil Rights movement, this autobiography explores the isolation and loneliness faced by Angelou, and the attributes of her character that helped her cope with the prejudices of society.

Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
The author describes his spring 1996 trek to Mt. Everest, a disastrous expedition that claimed the lives of eight climbers, and explains why he survived.

Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo
In 1918 a soldier is badly wounded and has both his arms and legs amputated. Plunged into a chilling nightmare, we hear the young war victim’s thoughts.

Seabiscut: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand
The story of one horse’s journey from also-ran to national luminary. Seabiscuit: an American legend is an inspiring tale of unlikely heroes, a classic story of three embattled individuals overcoming the odds in the Great Depression.

Shoeless Joe by W.P. Kinsella
Motivated by his fanatical love of baseball, Ray Kinsella is inspired to build a baseball stadium in his corn field, dedicated to his hero, the legendary Shoeless Joe Jackson, in a novel that became the inspiration for the film Field of Dreams.

Mandatory Reading 11AP Language

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
When Huck escapes from his drunken father and the ‘sivilizing’ Widow Douglas with the runaway slave Jim, he embarks on a series of adventures that draw him to feuding families and the trickery of the unscrupulous ‘Duke’ and ‘Dauphin’.

Voluntary Reading US History R, H, AP

Echoes from the Infantry by Frank Nappi
A synthesized tale based on the true accounts of World War II veterans from the author’s Long Island community follows the experiences of a veteran who comes to terms with the factors that shaped his father and endures harrowing combat by drawing strength on the love he shares with his fiancée back home.

Freedom Road by Howard Fast
The tale of a Southern black who became a congressman during the Reconstruction period that followed the American Civil War.