sampler bite-size lit

Bite-Size Literature (8th-10th grade)

"Bite-Size Literature" is an online literature class for 9th/10th graders and advanced middle school students. Over the course of the year, students will read and analyze 35-40 classic and contemporary short stories from around the world.

To give students a sense of the class, here are short excerpts from some of our reading.

"Far off to the north and west the mountains stood up half encircling Omelas on her bay. The air of morning was so clear that the snow still crowning the Eighteen Peaks burned with white-gold fire across the miles of sunlit air, under the dark blue of the sky. There was just enough wind to make the banners that marked the racecourse snap and flutter now and then." (Ursula Le Guin)

"I reached out to Mom's creation. Its tail twitched, and it pounced playfully at my finger. "Rawrr-sa," it growled, the sound somewhere between a cat and rustling newspapers." (Ken Liu)

"We were down South, in Alabama--Bill Driscoll and myself--when this kidnapping idea struck us. It was, as Bill afterward expressed it, 'during a moment of temporary mental apparition'; but we didn't find that out till later." (O. Henry)

"The light was so weak at noon that when Pelayo was coming back to the house after throwing away the crabs, it was hard for him to see what it was that was moving and groaning in the rear of the courtyard. He had to go very close to see that it was an old man, a very old man, lying face down in the mud, who, in spite of his tremendous efforts, couldn't get up, impeded by his enormous wings." (Gabriel García Márquez)

"Said a blade of grass to an autumn leaf, “You make such a noise falling! You scatter all my winter dreams." Said the leaf indignant, “Low-born and low-dwelling! Songless, peevish thing! You live not in the upper air and you cannot tell the sound of singing.”" (Kahlil Gibran)

"When they were finished eating she got up and said, 'Now, here, take this ten dollars and buy yourself some blue suede shoes. And next time, do not make the mistake of latching onto my pocketbook nor nobody else’s—because shoes come by devilish like that will burn your feet.'" (Langston Hughes)

"Long ago, our ancestors looked at the sky and saw gods. Their ancestors saw only stars. In the end, only the earth knew the truth." (N.K. Jemisin)

"Once upon a sunny morning a man who sat in a breakfast nook looked up from his scrambled eggs to see a white unicorn with a golden horn quietly cropping the roses in the garden. The man went up to the bedroom where his wife was still asleep and woke her. 'There's a unicorn in the garden,' he said. 'Eating roses.' She opened one unfriendly eye and looked at him." (James Thurber)

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Have you ever read a short story before? If so, do you remember the title or anything about it? *

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You can find out more about "Bite-Size Literature" here.

Class Sampler