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Advanced Higher English - Getting full marks

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Original post by Quick-use
Hey, I'm not doing the Textual Analysis. I never use 'I think'. I try to say things like, "The point is..." or, "Therefore, it must be said that..." or, rather impersonally, "We must not give into our flaws..."

Christie, what do you do to get good marks? Loads of personal response about themes?


Oooh, I rather like "It must be said that...", I'm going to use that! :biggrin:

I don't get good marks, so I'm not a great person to ask about this. I've only done about four essays throughout the course of the year, which is probably why... :tongue: I've been sitting at about a high B for most of them.
Reply 41
Hey, I was just wondering if anyone could give me any help on boosting my textual analysis marks? I only get around 13/30 which is dismal, and I was wondering if there was any good way to structure them rather than point > quote > explain. I really need a B to meet my conditional also, so any help would be great. Thanks :biggrin:
Reply 42
Original post by christielovesyou
Oooh, I rather like "It must be said that...", I'm going to use that! :biggrin:

I don't get good marks, so I'm not a great person to ask about this. I've only done about four essays throughout the course of the year, which is probably why... :tongue: I've been sitting at about a high B for most of them.


How do you get a high B still? :gasp:
I've been going all over the place: D to a high B.
Original post by Quick-use
How do you get a high B still? :gasp:
I've been going all over the place: D to a high B.


I think it's partially because with Donne the metaphors and conceits and such are so complex that it's easy to pick up big marks, as long as you explain them fully and link it to the theme or the question. I think if I were writing an essay on Keats (which I could do, because we studied him too, but I think Donne's safer for the exam) it would be much harder because there's only so much you can say.

Here's a list of general hints I've compiled from things my teacher's said/feedback from essays:

Answer the question in the introduction

Answer question again at the start of each paragraph, before starting the analysis

Plan, plan, plan! A detailed and thorough plan is vital, and it's okay to spend a long time on the plan if it's going to make writing the actual essay quicker and easier

Don't be afraid to state the obvious

Don't be afraid to disagree with any statements made in the question, and twist the question to fit what you think and what you have evidence for

Don't start the analysis too soon

Round off paragraphs with a summary of your point in that paragraph - it's better to be repetitive than to not have a clear line of thought

Single inverted commas show authorial unease, and that you haven't misread/misunderstood the text

If mentioning critics, make clear the extent to which your essay will agree with them

If audience can be mentioned, do it!

Mention techniques and ideas which link texts together

Remember to stitch together your argument, either as each point is made or in a lengthier paragraph before the conclusion. This helps avoid it becoming too "pedestrian". Comparitive treatment is vital, much like in the dissertation

Reply 44
Original post by J'adoreMaCachette
I am! Or at least, I studied it... Gonna do Austen instead, I can't ever remember the structure for Shakey quotes! Think it'll be on the tragic hero though. Good luck! P.S. I will die if the question is on duty and desire or the great oppositions because I wrote an A essay on a similar question but have now not revised Shakespeare for a fortnight. Generally prefer Austen. Anyway...



You too!


I really really want it to be a question on classical tragedy/tragic hero because that's what I have done the most revision for :smile: Can you remember the question you did for the duty and desire essay? :smile:
Good luck to you too! Hope you get a decent question for Austen.
Original post by lntaylor
Hey, I was just wondering if anyone could give me any help on boosting my textual analysis marks? I only get around 13/30 which is dismal, and I was wondering if there was any good way to structure them rather than point > quote > explain. I really need a B to meet my conditional also, so any help would be great. Thanks :biggrin:


I got full marks in my prelim TA and the main thing I'd have to say is - don't get too hung up on individual little things. What I've always done is spend 5 minutes making notes before I start writing, highlight three main ideas (one per point) and then explain how the author uses techniques to convey them. A lot of people in my class were trying to write a whole paragraph on one small metaphor without really putting it into context or explaining the POINT of the metaphor.

That might not have made a lot of sense but - it works for me :smile:
Original post by christielovesyou
Finally I meet someone else doing Donne! (lol, doing Donne. Tomorrow we'll have done Donne...done...)

I've got 71 Donne quotes (not that I've memorised them yet...woops), you'll be fine with that amount. I only seem to use 10/11 per essay anyway! :tongue:

I doubt it'll be Renaissance learning, because that came up in 2009. Also, for the past three years, they've specified what poems you need to write about so it's most likely going to be something open-ended. My teacher reckons it could be something about his treatment of women or his sincerity. I hope it is because I actually have opinions and good quotes and critical knowledge about those things! :smile: However, if A Nocturnal Upon St. Lucy's Day comes up for two years in a row (which I doubt it will), I'm absolutely screwed because I didn't bother revising that one. Nor did I revise Show Me Dear Christ Thy Spouse, because I think it's a stupid pointless poem to be on the prescription and it doesn't link into any argument I could make, ever. :rolleyes:

I don't think knowing critics really matters, I'm just adding some in so I've got a stronger basis for my argument. The critical literature isn't widely available, my teacher only got it because he's subscribed to a site which you can get it from, so most people won't have access to it. I wouldn't worry! :biggrin:

EDIT: Oooooh, just noticed you're a St Modans-er and doing the Baccalaureate! I probably met you at the conference for it last year. And your teachers are moderating my project. And we know the same people. Small world. :biggrin:


The "Donne done" thing has been hilarious for my English class for, ooh, ever since we started doing Donne! I'd say on average once a week one of us comes out with "Have you done the Donne essay?" then bursts out laughing.

If one comes up on women (I hadn't thought about this question) what poems would you plan on doing? I'm thinking... Falling Star for anti-women, possibly Air and Angels cause of the men and women's love bit at the end, or Twickenham Garden cause of the unfaithful mistress. Then for pro-women, just one of his more celebratory love poems with some Petrarchan-esque imagery? Oh gaaad.

I used "Show me dear Christ" in my prelim essay for a question on "Discuss how Donne uses love imagery in religious poetry and religious imagery in love poetry", but that's about the only example I can think of, it's a bit of a random poem considering all the rest of them fit into their little boxes of love, sadness about love, separation, death.

I may have sneakily dropped the Bacc after getting my uni offers... needed to "concentrate on exams" as I told my year head :rolleyes:
Reply 47
Original post by -chiquitita
I got full marks in my prelim TA and the main thing I'd have to say is - don't get too hung up on individual little things. What I've always done is spend 5 minutes making notes before I start writing, highlight three main ideas (one per point) and then explain how the author uses techniques to convey them. A lot of people in my class were trying to write a whole paragraph on one small metaphor without really putting it into context or explaining the POINT of the metaphor.

That might not have made a lot of sense but - it works for me :smile:


I'm not doing the TA but your advice seems applicable to the essays. What do you mean by "the POINT of the metaphor."?
Original post by Quick-use
I'm not doing the TA but your advice seems applicable to the essays. What do you mean by "the POINT of the metaphor."?


Like - they would explain the connotations of the language used, or whatever, doing all the technical stuff. But they wouldn't then go on to link this to other things in the text, or really use it to further their argument. It would just be a stand alone thing.

EDIT: Thought of an example. One of the poetry essays we did as a NAB, there was something in one of the major quotes about "amorous love" for the church. People just wrote "amorous has connotations of lust and sexuality" then left it at that, rather than describing in detail how as the whole poem is about the speaker's desire to discover the one true faction of the Christian church, the fact that he uses words suggestive of sex indicates how strong that desire is, etc etc. Again I'm not that sure if it makes sense, I'm quite hesitant to say a lot in case what I'm saying is absolute rubbish and I sound like an idiot. Hah.
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 49
Original post by -chiquitita
I got full marks in my prelim TA and the main thing I'd have to say is - don't get too hung up on individual little things. What I've always done is spend 5 minutes making notes before I start writing, highlight three main ideas (one per point) and then explain how the author uses techniques to convey them. A lot of people in my class were trying to write a whole paragraph on one small metaphor without really putting it into context or explaining the POINT of the metaphor.

That might not have made a lot of sense but - it works for me :smile:


Wow, full marks is amazing! Thanks, this does make sense, the only thing is do you mean three pieces of evidence in the text for each part of the question?
Original post by -chiquitita
The "Donne done" thing has been hilarious for my English class for, ooh, ever since we started doing Donne! I'd say on average once a week one of us comes out with "Have you done the Donne essay?" then bursts out laughing.

If one comes up on women (I hadn't thought about this question) what poems would you plan on doing? I'm thinking... Falling Star for anti-women, possibly Air and Angels cause of the men and women's love bit at the end, or Twickenham Garden cause of the unfaithful mistress. Then for pro-women, just one of his more celebratory love poems with some Petrarchan-esque imagery? Oh gaaad.

I used "Show me dear Christ" in my prelim essay for a question on "Discuss how Donne uses love imagery in religious poetry and religious imagery in love poetry", but that's about the only example I can think of, it's a bit of a random poem considering all the rest of them fit into their little boxes of love, sadness about love, separation, death.

I may have sneakily dropped the Bacc after getting my uni offers... needed to "concentrate on exams" as I told my year head :rolleyes:


It's been the same for for us with the done Donne jokes. Gets me every time. :rolleyes:

I did an essay the other day which was pretty much a women essay (well, it was meant to be treatment of love, but the two worked well together), and I based it around a couple of quotes from the critic Cristina Malcomson:

Donne's poetry "ranges from misogyny to mutual love to reverence" and he is "wittily and maliciously misogynistic but never fully serious."

So I did Go Catch a Falling Star to demonstrate his misogyny (and I made a point that he seems quite immature in that poem, so he was probably quite young and hadn't truly experienced love), The Sun Rising for mutual love/reverence and then The Ecstasy (which wasn't really women-based) for how he believes spiritual love needs to be embodied. In the exam though, if a question came up on women, I'd use A Valediction Forbidding Mourning, because the conceits used (like the compasses) flatter the woman - he clearly thinks she's intelligent enough to understand the conceit. Also, critic Wisam Mansour suggested that the narrator of AVFM could actually be female, so I would include that argument.
Original post by lntaylor
Wow, full marks is amazing! Thanks, this does make sense, the only thing is do you mean three pieces of evidence in the text for each part of the question?


And no, I tend to use a few quotes, maybe one or two major pieces of evidence then a few which are just a couple of words which I'd throw into the essay rather than focusing on them... kind of depends, but usually the big ideas run throughout the text, so you can refer to how they're developed from the start to the end, like "this idea is furthered towards the end, where author again makes reference to how blah blah blah" :smile:


Original post by christielovesyou
It's been the same for for us with the done Donne jokes. Gets me every time. :rolleyes:

I did an essay the other day which was pretty much a women essay (well, it was meant to be treatment of love, but the two worked well together), and I based it around a couple of quotes from the critic Cristina Malcomson:

Donne's poetry "ranges from misogyny to mutual love to reverence" and he is "wittily and maliciously misogynistic but never fully serious."

So I did Go Catch a Falling Star to demonstrate his misogyny (and I made a point that he seems quite immature in that poem, so he was probably quite young and hadn't truly experienced love), The Sun Rising for mutual love/reverence and then The Ecstasy (which wasn't really women-based) for how he believes spiritual love needs to be embodied. In the exam though, if a question came up on women, I'd use A Valediction Forbidding Mourning, because the conceits used (like the compasses) flatter the woman - he clearly thinks she's intelligent enough to understand the conceit. Also, critic Wisam Mansour suggested that the narrator of AVFM could actually be female, so I would include that argument.


We have quite a lot of English in-jokes which are incredibly unfunny, I think it's cause we all find the actual syllabus quite boring so we have to entertain ourselves... haha.

I've never realised that about AVFM, I've kind of neglected it when relentlessly searching the internet for Donne notes, think it's my least favourite out of all the poems. Learned a couple of quotes on it but nothing really on the conceit of the compasses as I found it quite cold and boring, woops. I'll remember that if it comes up tomorrow though!
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 52
Original post by -chiquitita
Like - they would explain the connotations of the language used, or whatever, doing all the technical stuff. But they wouldn't then go on to link this to other things in the text, or really use it to further their argument. It would just be a stand alone thing.

EDIT: Thought of an example. One of the poetry essays we did as a NAB, there was something in one of the major quotes about "amorous love" for the church. People just wrote "amorous has connotations of lust and sexuality" then left it at that, rather than describing in detail how as the whole poem is about the speaker's desire to discover the one true faction of the Christian church, the fact that he uses words suggestive of sex indicates how strong that desire is, etc etc. Again I'm not that sure if it makes sense, I'm quite hesitant to say a lot in case what I'm saying is absolute rubbish and I sound like an idiot. Hah.


Ah I see! Is this what you do for your essays as well?
Original post by Quick-use
Ah I see! Is this what you do for your essays as well?


Yeah, I only started doing it because I find I get incredibly overwhelmed if I try to write too much in detail about the exact techniques, so just wrote more broadly and threw in a few quotes to back up what I was saying rather than basing an essay entirely around the quotes, then I started getting much better marks. It's odd. Whenever we study anything in class, we go into so much depth on, say, one aspect of the sentence structure, but whenever I wrote an essay focusing on that, I was getting comments like "look at the poem from more of a distance" (which obviously made no sense, since it didn't actually explain to me what I was doing, and I was fully under the impression that the whole point of a poetry essay was to entirely dissect the whole poem/s on a page, not link everything together)

Oops, I seem to have hijacked this thread, every second post is me :colondollar:
Reply 54
Original post by -chiquitita
so just wrote more broadly and threw in a few quotes to back up what I was saying rather than basing an essay entirely around the quotes, then I started getting much better marks.


What do you mean by that? Can you give me a few examples, please? :smile: :fluffy:
Original post by Quick-use
What do you mean by that? Can you give me a few examples, please? :smile: :fluffy:


For example, if the major theme in one of my poems was how religion is used to express the poisonousness of love the start of my paragraph would be a generalisation about this then I'd explain what my quote was about briefly, then add the quote, then analyse it, and after each small bit of analysis link it to my argument. Gah. Hard to explain. This was a timed essay I did the other day, so here's the start of the paragraph (before any comparison with other poems)

"One example in which Donne uses religious imagery to reveal his emotions is in Twickenham Garden, in which it is used to convey his bitterness towards the whole idea of love. He compares love to a poisonous insect which can transform anything, making it negative:
"O Self traitor, I do bring
That spider Love, which transubstantiates all
And can convert manna to gall"
The mention here of "transubstantiation" refers, of course, to one of the fundamental principles of the Catholic faith: that Jesus turned bread and wine into his body and blood, and that this transformation happens during every Catholic mass. Donne cleverly uses this reference to express the opinion that love transforms everything. However, like a spider, love is venomous, and does not make things positive, but destroys them, as we can see from the next line. "Manna" is, again, a religious reference, and was a kind of heavenly bread that the Israelites were sent by God. In claiming that love can convert this holy foodstuff into "gall", a bitter, disgusting substance, Donne implies that love is so poisonous that it can make even the purest, most lovely things bitter and turn them bad. Additionally, the self-pitying, lamenting tone of "O! self traitor" only further expresses his feelings on love - it is a torturous emotion which, for him, ruins everything."

That probs wasn't the best example, looking back it wasn't the greatest essay or anything, but I still got an A so it can't be that bad :smile:
Reply 56
Original post by -chiquitita
For example, if the major theme in one of my poems was how religion is used to express the poisonousness of love the start of my paragraph would be a generalisation about this then I'd explain what my quote was about briefly, then add the quote, then analyse it, and after each small bit of analysis link it to my argument. Gah. Hard to explain. This was a timed essay I did the other day, so here's the start of the paragraph (before any comparison with other poems)

"One example in which Donne uses religious imagery to reveal his emotions is in Twickenham Garden, in which it is used to convey his bitterness towards the whole idea of love. He compares love to a poisonous insect which can transform anything, making it negative:
"O Self traitor, I do bring
That spider Love, which transubstantiates all
And can convert manna to gall"
The mention here of "transubstantiation" refers, of course, to one of the fundamental principles of the Catholic faith: that Jesus turned bread and wine into his body and blood, and that this transformation happens during every Catholic mass. Donne cleverly uses this reference to express the opinion that love transforms everything. However, like a spider, love is venomous, and does not make things positive, but destroys them, as we can see from the next line. "Manna" is, again, a religious reference, and was a kind of heavenly bread that the Israelites were sent by God. In claiming that love can convert this holy foodstuff into "gall", a bitter, disgusting substance, Donne implies that love is so poisonous that it can make even the purest, most lovely things bitter and turn them bad. Additionally, the self-pitying, lamenting tone of "O! self traitor" only further expresses his feelings on love - it is a torturous emotion which, for him, ruins everything."

That probs wasn't the best example, looking back it wasn't the greatest essay or anything, but I still got an A so it can't be that bad :smile:


Right! I see what you've done! Thank-a-you :biggrin:
Reply 57
So instead of staying, here's my quote, this is what it means, you go on to say the significance of it in relation with your point (an aspect of it). I really needed that man (I see you're a girl, but I'm so happy I won't think of a synonym) as it has told me how to do an essay now! :biggrin: THANK YOU! :biggrin: :fluffy: :grouphugs:
I got an A for Advanced Higher English. Our teacher was absolutely useless. I spent ages on my dissertation (a labour of love, I enjoyed it so much) and submitted a story I got published when I was 15. Pretty chuffed it was worthy of an A at Advanced Higher English.

It's very subjective. I don't really think there's a set formula you can stick to like SQA for Higher (Statement, Quote, Analysis). You have to show a bit more flair than that.
Reply 59
Ugh, nerves are kicking in! Looking forward to getting this over and done with though :tongue:

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