By Slanted Light

Hello! And first of all - hurrah for C! *g*

And gosh - what a very different reading list yours is from mine (also Jurassic Periods ago, and of course Across Oceans *g*) Although we did include poems by Donne and Marvell - and of course a Shakespeare play, though not either of yours. *g* I suspect I'm conflating some of my Year 11 (and maybe even Year 10) books with my HSC ones, but it would be interesting to read them again too anyway.

Aha! Have dug into my trunk/coffee table and found the 1984 HSC general syllabus thingie (for all subjects though, not just English - that's perhaps a bit deeper down than I have the energy to excavate just now. but this is what it looks like so far:

English (3 parts for the exam)
- a "single text" (two to be studied) I rather think these were The Long Prospect by Elizabeth Harrower and... something else. The Grapes of Wrath, maybe? Or was that Year 11? Hmmn...
- Thematic study - four core books and supplementary reading around the theme - ("Confronting the Future"). I remember Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, and 1984 by George Orwell (cos it was *g*) and two non-fiction books, Confronting the Future by Charles Birch and Sleepers, Wake! by Barry Jones.
- general essay (two short pieces of writing in the exam).
Also a Writing Workshop folio - minimum six pieces of writing.

English Lit (3 parts to exam again)
- twelve set poems
- Shakespeare (Macbeth
- Other literature - a novel (The Leopard by Guiseppe de Lampedusa) and a play (Electra)
Also a Project/Theme - "Women in Fiction and Contemporary Society":
- two novels (Monkey Grip by Helen Garner and The Millstone by Margaret Drabble
- examination of how women are portrayed in society, particularly through the media
(Assessment - a taped interview, a taped character study, essay comparing women in literature and in contemporary society, essay comparing the presentation of women in two pieces of literature, class participation/involvement).

Hmmn, very interesting, now I've fished this out!