AP English Literature and Composition

6 sections available · 29 chapters available

Free AP English Literature and Composition revision notes for AP (Advanced Placement) students. Each chapter covers a key topic with worked examples and practice prompts you can take straight into the thinka app.

Short Fiction (Units 1, 4, 7)

  • Character: details, perspective and motive

  • Contrasting characters and character relationships

  • Setting and the values it conveys

  • Plot order, sequence and contrast

  • Narrator, point of view and reliability

  • Word choice, imagery and symbol in fiction

Course Content

    Poetry (Units 2, 5, 8)

    • Speaker and poetic perspective

    • Structure and contrast in a poem

    • Diction: specific words and phrases

    • Comparison: simile, metaphor, personification, allusion

    • Imagery, symbol and extended metaphor

    • Ambiguity, juxtaposition, irony and paradox

    Longer Fiction or Drama (Units 3, 6, 9)

    • Character change and complexity across a long work

    • Significant events and conflict

    • Setting and the world of the work

    • Structure and contrast across a long work

    • Narrator reliability and shifting perspective

    • Interpreting the work as a whole

    Literary Argumentation

    • Claims that require defense

    • Defensible thesis statements

    • Building a line of reasoning

    • Commentary: linking evidence to the thesis

    • Selecting relevant and sufficient evidence

    • Control over the elements of composition

    Exam Tasks

    • Section I: multiple-choice passage sets

    • FRQ 1: Poetry Analysis

    • FRQ 2: Prose Fiction Analysis

    • FRQ 3: Literary Argument

    • Sophistication and complex argument

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