The Student Room Group

A Level Combined English vs Lit

What do A level courses contain in combined English vs English literature? I'm trying to pick between them- I want to go for the one that contains more creative + persuasive writing
Original post by disasterbi
What do A level courses contain in combined English vs English literature? I'm trying to pick between them- I want to go for the one that contains more creative + persuasive writing

Hi, I'm in year 13 doing English Lit on Edexcel. Obviously can't speak for Lang but I'd say Lit isn't very creative/persuasive in its writing; it's pretty much all essays, you have to think creatively sometimes (especially with poetry) but you don't do 'persuasive' or 'creative' writing in the same way as GCSE. I'm studying two Crime and Detection novels (In Cold Blood and Lady Audley's Secret), two tragedies (Othello and A Streetcar Named Desire), The Romantics' Poetry and Modern Poetry; this is spread out over 3 exams and (in total) 5 essays; we also have a NEA (coursework) element which is a 3000 word comparison essay about two texts (one of your choice) which provides quite a lot of freedom but is also a mammoth task if you don't enjoy long essay writing (I've had a love/hate relationship with it).Hope this helps, let me know if you have any other questions!
It's good that someone else has already answered this for Lit because I do Combined on AQA and there's a little bit of creative writing but not much- for paper 1 (year 12 stuff) you study for the literature side a collection of poems and a novel, ours were Seamus Heaney and The Handmaid's Tale but it might change depending on your college/sixth form, and for the language side an anthology of texts about Paris from different genres (memoir, transcript, advert etc)
For paper 2 (year 13, I finished the last bit of exam content recently) you study a novel for the 're-creative writing' and a play, ours were The Great Gatsby and A Streetcar Named Desire but again it depends- the creative writing bit is Gatsby and you have to re-write a section somewhat in the author's style while also giving original insights then write a commentary on it- so not very similar to GCSE but it is creative to some degree
Then there's coursework worth 20% of the grade (2500-3000 words) that is about comparing the way a literary and a non-literary text present any theme you choose, I found this really fun because there's so much scope for choice
The main difference I believe between combined and lit is that in combined we analyse spoken language features and word classes as well as literary features and semantics/themes whereas lit is less based on word classes
Original post by lilymosses_
It's good that someone else has already answered this for Lit because I do Combined on AQA and there's a little bit of creative writing but not much- for paper 1 (year 12 stuff) you study for the literature side a collection of poems and a novel, ours were Seamus Heaney and The Handmaid's Tale but it might change depending on your college/sixth form, and for the language side an anthology of texts about Paris from different genres (memoir, transcript, advert etc)
For paper 2 (year 13, I finished the last bit of exam content recently) you study a novel for the 're-creative writing' and a play, ours were The Great Gatsby and A Streetcar Named Desire but again it depends- the creative writing bit is Gatsby and you have to re-write a section somewhat in the author's style while also giving original insights then write a commentary on it- so not very similar to GCSE but it is creative to some degree
Then there's coursework worth 20% of the grade (2500-3000 words) that is about comparing the way a literary and a non-literary text present any theme you choose, I found this really fun because there's so much scope for choice
The main difference I believe between combined and lit is that in combined we analyse spoken language features and word classes as well as literary features and semantics/themes whereas lit is less based on word classes


Omg I do combined too!! I know like nobody who does lang lit

Quick Reply

Latest