AS AQA B English Literature

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Reply 220

Adrianna123

Original post by fxyz

Was it 47 for a B? Cos it was 50 for an A in jan..

No 47 for an A

Reply 221

Adrianna123

Original post by Captain Hindsight

Hi Adrianna, sorry to hear that the paper was horrible. The good thing though about being in AS is that you can always retake in A2 and you can always try for a remark. As for university offers, if the offer is AAB and, hypothetically speaking, you got a C in this paper, you can still get good offers as university offers are based on predicted grades (largely). I'm sure you did good, however.

Out of interest, what were the questions like? Aspects of narrative is an interesting exam, AQA ask odd questions...

Aww thanks :smile:

Yeaah but I really don't wanna retake, it was so much hardwork and effort!
Just hope my coursework can pull my grade up
The Section B questions were about either climaxes or speech
You didn't do the exam?

Reply 222

Unsworth

Gatsby section A question was an absolute gift from AQA!

I specifically revised chapters 6 + 7 as they are the only ones which haven't come up and boom up came chapter 7. Writing about if Gatsby as a tragedy pretty much gives you freedom to talk about anything in the book, so I think that was another nice question rather then getting asked something niche and specific!

Section B I thought significance of climaxes was a pretty nice question, similar to the key events question which has come up in past papers.

My guess at grade boundary for an A is 52-55.

Reply 223

Char Wari

Good luck to everyone come results day :smile:

Reply 224

Captain Hindsight

Original post by Adrianna123

Aww thanks :smile:

I see what you mean, retakes aren't really an ideal scenario to be in. The good thing about this exam though is that the grade requirements for an A isn't that high, it'll probably be around 50 or so give or take a few, so 25/40 on each section which would otherwise seem average would get an A.

Climaxes or speech... hmm, interesting. I probably would have chosen climaxes, but that's just my opinion. I'm sure there are equally valid arguments to say about speeches though.

& i'm in A2 and I took the exam last year and came out with a B. I got something like 42 out of 80 with 8/21, 12/21 and 22/40... It was an ok performance from me...

Reply 225

mandem2k11

for speeches i was fine talknig about pride and prejudice as well as browning and his dramatic monologue

birdsong i ended up talking about the lack of speech and the significance of that hahah and how he uses simple short dialouge :L was trying not to outwardly say "Birdsong fails at life"

Reply 226

1234sam1234

I had to study: Auden, Browning, The Road (McCarthy) and Small Island (Levy). I can't remember what I wrote but it was defiantly crap. I just remember not being able to find any quotes in the 600 page 'Small Island'.

Reply 227

Danatlive

My answer for (Gatsby) Section A question a was really simplistic but I just focused on nailing narrative methods. Is this what they're looking for or do they expect a more elloquent response (which I gave in the second question)? This was my second time of sitting this exam :smile:

Reply 228

LFS

Original post by Danatlive

You're not marked on AO1 so I reckon you did the right thing!

Reply 229

cocowater

Did anyone do the question on climaxes?? I messed that up so badly, my timing was awful, I wrote so little on the last text :frown:

I am glad I wasn't alone though, nearly everyone came out of the examination hall saying the same thing. Hopefully my c/w grade will be able to push my grades up though :s-smilie:

Reply 230

Reale

Yeah I done the climax one, (Gatsby, God of Small Things and Rossetti). I had to bullet point my last paragraph when they said 'pens down'. Ran out of time -_-

Reply 231

EsmeA

I did speeches because I freaked at climaxes- literally would have had nothing to say on that.

But then I freaked after the exam- Browning's entire poem is the dramatic monologue form, and I only mentioned the reported speech (which is literally one line) in my last duchess.

Section B was a nightmare, but Gatsby was a beautiful question, so hopefully I redeemed myself there; wish I knew the grade boundaries!

Reply 232

cocowater

Original post by Reale

Yeah I done the climax one, (Gatsby, God of Small Things and Rossetti). I had to bullet point my last paragraph when they said 'pens down'. Ran out of time -_-

haha, omg, exactly the same thing happened to me as well! I did it on Pride and Prejudice, Kite Runner and Rossetti. What poems did you talk about for Rosseti? I did Winter: My secret as an anti-climax. My writing was seriously shoddy, really worried about my results for this exam :frown:

Reply 233

PeaceLoveKindness

Would narrative method (such as Nick reporting the events in The Great Gatsby) count as speech? I'm just wondering, I didn't do the question but I was thinking maybe that's what it meant...

(edited 11 years ago)

Reply 234

jennieanydot

I did the question on climaxes and am regretting it! Pretty sure I waffled for an hour solid. I did Keats for part A and think I did ok on A(a) and pretty poorly on A(b). :s-smilie:

Glad to hear others found it tricky (not in a mean way!) - I'm sitting exams as a private candidate so I've had no teacher to tell me how to tackle them and nobody to speak to about them before or afterwards! Hopefully if we all found them tough the grade boundaries won't be too high...

I've done A levels before and they are hard, but it's worth remembering that this isn't your only opportunity and your life won't be ruined if you don't do as well as you'd like. I'm 25 and taking some more to get back into uni because I wasn't ready when I was 18 and chose the wrong course. I've had an awful lot of fun in between then and now, have a good looking CV and I'll still have 35 years of working left after I graduate!

Good luck everyone, I'd be interested to hear how others found it! :smile:

Reply 235

Adrianna123

Original post by Captain Hindsight

Yeah especially for English Lit! Yeah true, hopefully it'll be okay...do you think coursework will pull your grade up quite a bit?
Oh okay that's really good welldone! :smile:

Reply 236

Charly29416

I dont really know how I did, I feel like I waffled through section B :/

Reply 237

HeidiLouiseJ

Section A
I did Tennyson poetry, which I hate, but I needed Browning to do section B :smile:

Part a) 'Godiva', wrote about:
-Characterisation
-Irony
-Dramatic Pauses
-Theme
-Foreshadowing
-Representation
-Symbolism
-General structure
May have threw some sibilance in there, linked it all in with layers of meaning, the poet's intention, reader's response and implication.

Part b) Sounded like a history essay, haha. I did 'Tithonus', 'Ulysses' and 'Mariana'. I wanted to do 'The Lady of Shalott' too but decided against it.
-I wrote about how Tennyson was a family man but had an admirable love for his friend who passed the same year he wrote the poem 'Tithonus', and his inability to cope produced two poetry books in honor of his friend, then added what that could imply in the sense of immortality.
-I wrote about patriarchy, and how women were gaining strength due to being left alone for long periods of time (like 'Mariana' and 'Ulysses' when wanting to leave his wife), because of the female leader and because of the suffragettes etc. and linked it back to the question.
-I wrote about a 19th century perspective and a 21st century perspective, male vs. female.
-How using the idea of Greek Gods was due to Tennyson needing moral security and how the Gods were undeniable and known for their greatness in contrast to the Christian God in the Victorian era.
-Also how 'Mariana' contrasts 'Ulysses' and 'Tithonus', not just because she's a woman, but it's English Folklore, and Tennyson's obsession with fairy tales. (Which I would have linked into Spencerian writings such as 'faery tale' and 'The Lady of Shalott', but had no time so I finished quick)

Then linked them all back to the question :biggrin:

Section B
I spoke about 'The Kite Runner', 'The Great Gatsby', 'My Last Duchess', 'The Pied Piper' and 'Fra Lippo Lippi', I chose the one about significance of speech. I included:
-Dialogue
-Autodigetic narrator
-Implied listener
-Reported speech
-Interjections
-Colloquial speech
-Iambic pentameter being the narrative device closely mimicking speech.
-Dialect
-Italic fragments in poetry implying speech
& then linked them all to characterisation, theme, the poet's intention, reader's response & irony.

Not gonna lie, I kicked that exam's ass. :biggrin:

(edited 11 years ago)

Reply 238

Captain Hindsight

Original post by Adrianna123

Yeah especially for English Lit! Yeah true, hopefully it'll be okay...do you think coursework will pull your grade up quite a bit?
Oh okay that's really good welldone! :smile:

Hopefully coursework will pull the UMS up... but I'd take a B, i'll just have to do better in my other two subjects :P

Reply 239

cocowater

Original post by jennieanydot

I did the question on climaxes and am regretting it! Pretty sure I waffled for an hour solid. I did Keats for part A and think I did ok on A(a) and pretty poorly on A(b). :s-smilie:

Yay! Someone who did Keats too :smile:

tbqh, Aa) was pretty nice, the poem was really short so I didn't have to panic about finding quotes + there was a lot of things to say about it. Ab) wasn't too bad but I didn't get time to finish it because I had to move on to section B. It was actually a pretty good question considering the crap that AQA has given us before :tongue: