Exams have arrived – it’s now or never

How on earth do you prepare for an A Level Eng. Lit exam?

Welcome to the third in a short series about how to revise English successfully.

What does it mean to revise: An author’s methods of presentation?

It is very likely that at least one of the questions you will face in the exam will focus on how an author presents his/her intentions within or across texts. How can you prepare for that?

The key aim of questions like these is to get you to focus not on ‘what happens’ but how the author has crafted the text in order to elicit a particular response in the reader.

There are basic areas to cover, regardless of the text. For each of the following:

• Try and make condensed notes / a mind map / list headwords
• Learn a quotation or specific example to illustrate.

Plot

1. With whom is a reader to identify – a 1st or 3rd person narrator, a particular character?
   
   a) How has the author achieved that sense of identification?
   b) How does it shape the reader’s perspective on the plot?
   
   
2. If there is a sub-plot
   
   a) What is its relevance to the main one?
   b) How are the main and sub-plots interwoven?
   
   
3. What is the impact of presenting events chronologically / non-chronologically?
   
   a) What is the impact of any time frame on the presentation of the plot?

Narrative perspective

1. Who is telling the story and how close is the reader to him/her?
   
   
2. At what pace do events unfold – how has the author created that effect?
   
   
3. Is there direct authorial comment and/or does tone / irony / mood guide a reader’s response?

Patterning

1. What themes brought to the fore? (See previous blog in series)
   
   
2. How are imagery and / or symbolism used?
   
   
3. Are there repetitions / echoes of:
   
   a) Events
   b) Locations
   c) Family structures?

Description

1. How would you characterise the author’s descriptive techniques?
   
   
2. What kind of language is employed when – to what effect?
   
   
3. How do these techniques create:
   
   a) Character (see previous blog in series)
   b) Location and atmosphere
   c) Drama, tension / suspense?

As you cover these ideas you always need to keep in mind the intentions of the author – and remember to tell the examiner what they are!

GOOD LUCK

Help - Exams are getting closer!

How on earth do you prepare for an A Level Eng. Lit exam?

Welcome to the second in a short series about how to revise English successfully.

2. What does it mean to revise: Themes?

It is very likely that at least one of the questions you will face in the exam will focus on how an author presents one or more themes within or across texts. How can you prepare for that?

There are basic areas to cover, regardless of the text. For each of the following:

• Try and make condensed notes / a mind map / list headwords
• Learn a quotation or specific example to illustrate.

Selected theme:

Within a text

1. Identify the theme’s emergence – instances of its recurrence
2. What imagery is associated with the theme? Does this create a particular mood?
3. How is the theme worked out through the plot / narrative arc?
4. In prose, do any relationships between characters illustrate this theme?

Across texts

1. How is the theme dealt with differently in comparative texts?
2. Look at 1 – 3 above

Author:

1. How does the author ‘use’ this theme – what ‘meaning’ does it represent?
   a) How is the theme outworked to support this (include imagery and mood)?
   b) Are there direct authorial comments that guide the reader’s interpretation of the theme?

Reader:

1. Do you have a personal response to this theme – has it made you reflect on aspects of contemporary life?
2. Are you satisfied with how the author has ‘used’ the theme?

Always keep in mind that themes are highlighted by an author to serve the purposes of the text – what are these purposes?

Looming exams - Arrggghhhh!

If you are a more recent subscriber to this blog, you probably won’t be familiar with some material we presented a couple of years ago about how to prepare for sitting A Level English exams. Unlike the obvious marshalling of facts that provides a framework for Chemistry or History for example, how to go about revising English texts is less obvious. So, for our current students:

Welcome to the first in a short series about how to revise English successfully.

1. What does it mean to revise: Characterisation?

It is very likely that at least one of the questions you will face in the exam will focus on characterisation (how an author presents a character). How can you prepare for that?

There are basic areas to cover, regardless of the text. For each of the following:

• Try and make condensed notes / a mind map / list headwords
• Learn a quotation or specific example to illustrate

Selected character:

1) The character’s narrative arc:

• How s/he is introduced
• His/her story/development through the novel
• The character’s own new perspectives by the end (what s/he has learnt)

2) His/her physical appearance and the language s/he uses (register, syntax)

3) His/her relationships with others in the text

4) The imagery associated with him/her.

Author:

1) The author’s attitude to the character – discerned through

• 2 and 4 above
• Differences in perspective
• Tone used describing that character and direct/indirect judgements on him/her (authorial intrusion?)

2) Changes in attitude / sympathy – ultimate assessment of character.

Reader:

1) Be aware of your personal response to the character – have you found the hero / heroine attractive – annoying - funny?

2) Are you satisfied with how the author created the character

• Are they believable (2D or fully rounded) – or more significant for the role they play in the text’s ‘meaning’?
• Do you have other criticisms about the characterisation?

Always keep in mind that every character is simply a literary construct, created by an author for the purposes of the text.

Re-vision – or vision?

It is always scary when you finally respond to the pressure of looming exams, dig out your notes and then realise that they are not as complete / helpful as they need to be!

Revision is meant to be exactly that – looking again at work previously covered. But what to do when you find yourself looking at material for the first time?

At this stage, your teachers simply won’t have time to be wading through the basics – their job now is to help you pull it all together. Luckily, there are many web resources such as Crossref-it.info that provide helpful summaries of texts, scene by scene, chapter by chapter so as to remind you of how events fit together. Good ones should also pose questions that focus your thinking about the text.

In the new The Winter’s Tale guide, for example, you will find sections that give an overview of individual characters, as well as linking themes and sequences of images – great help if you are time poor.

For higher A Level grades examiners want to see that you can draw all your knowledge together into a ‘wide-ranging’ answer – backed up by specific examples too of course.