Students Take Ownership During Gothic Literature Unit

On Halloween, 10th-grade Honors English classes at Hendrick Hudson High School had no choice but to immerse themselves in holiday spirit. When they walked into the library, lights were dimmed, tables were covered with black cloths and decorated with both deep-red roses and battery-powered candles with dark stems.

Each table was also home to several copies of novels selected by their teachers. Those handful of choices were that class’ options for a month-long Gothic Literature unit.

The unit was creatively launched by teacher Melissa Barthelmes and co-taught by Library Media Specialist Mary Beth DeGennaro on Halloween for obvious reasons and made for an engaging lesson. The students first watched book trailers, then visited the tables to “speed date” the books, Barthlemes said, suggesting they could examine the cover and read a few pages to learn more about the author’s style.

Being it was Halloween, a bowl of candy was available, too.

“We picked the books, which were targeted to the students in each class,” Barthlemes said. “But we allow them to make their own decision about which one they would like to read.”

While reviewing the book choices — and snacking on candy — students filled in “dating slips,” then signed up to read one of the novels, with Barthelmes reviewing the choice with them. Based on those selections, the students will form literature circles with classmates who made the same choice, and will meet throughout the unit to discuss their novel.

From there, the project will be largely student-led. The groups will meet several times during the unit to discuss journal responses and questions that each student prepared. They will explore key themes, symbols and writing styles and explore ideas in the text and relate them to current events. There will be a series of assignments that will gauge what the students learn throughout the process.

Their book choices ranged from classics to contemporaries: “Pet Sematary,” by Stephen King; “Picture of Dorian Gray,” by Oscar Wilde; “Mexican Gothic,” by Silvia Moreno-Garcia; “Interview with the Vampire,” by Anne Rice; “The Thirteenth Tale,” by Diane Setterfield; “Wide Sargasso Sea,” by Jean Rhys; “The Bone Houses,” by Emily Lloyd-Jones; “Something Wicked This Way Comes,” by Ray Bradbury; “She is a Haunting,” by Trang Thanh Tran; and “Rebecca,” by Daphne du Maurier.

Throughout the unit, the students will be exposed to other examples of Gothic media and explore various common tropes.

“Gothic literature is a subgenera of Romanticism,” Barthlemes said. “We are going to explore these tropes that exist through various lenses and see how they can apply to the texts the students are reading.”