AQA GCSE English Literature Unit 1H June 2013 Of Mice and Men

From memory:


a. Passage about Slim (Prince of the ranch, kill flies with a bullwhip etc)
How does Steinbeck present Slim?

b. How does Steinbeck show that some people were more important than others in Of Mice and Men? How does this relate to the context of the time?

hi guys, can anyone find, or does anyone have a link for the june 2013 paper on OMAM?

extract
a tall man stood in the doorway. He held a crushed stetson hat under his arm while he combed his long, black, damp hair straight back. Like the others he wore blue jeans and a short denim jacket. When he had finished combing his hair he moved into the room, and he moved with a majesty only achieved by royalty and master craftsmen. He was a jerkline skinner, the prince of the ranch, capable of driving ten, sixteen, even twenty mules with a single line to the leaders. He was capable of killing a fly on the wheeler’s butt with a bull whip without touching the mule. There was a gravity in his manner and a quiet so profound that all talk stopped when he spoke. His authority was so great that his word was taken on any subject, be it politics or love. This was slim, the jerkline skinner. His hatchet face was ageless. He might have been thirty-five or fifty. His ear heard more than was said to him, and his slow speech had overtones not of thought, but of understanding beyond thought. His hands, large and lean, were as delicate in their action as those of a temple dancer.
He smoothed out his crushed hat, creased it in the middle and put it on. He looked kindly at the two in the bunk house. ‘it’s brighter’n a bitch outside,’ he said gently. ‘can’t hardly see nothing in here. You the new guys?’
‘just come,’ said george.
‘gonna buck barley?’
‘that’s what the boss says.’
slim sat down on a box across the table from george. He studied the solitaire hand
that was upside down to him. ‘hope you get on my team,’ he said. His voice was very gentle. ‘i gotta pair of punks on my team that don’t know a barley bag from a blue ball. You guys ever bucked any barley?’

questions
part (a)
in this passage, how does steinbeck present slim? Refer closely to the passage in your answer.
And then part (b)
in the rest of the novel, how does steinbeck show that some people on the ranch are considered more important than others? How does this reflect the society in which the novel is set? (30 marks)
spag: (4 marks)

mark scheme
indicative content
examiners are encouraged to reward any valid interpretations. Answers might, however, include some of the following:
Ao1
 what slim looks like
 his competence at his job as a ‘jerkline skinner’
 details about his personality
 attitude to others
ao2
 references to ‘royalty’, ‘majesty’, ‘prince’ – effects
 godlike/ spiritual references
 reference to ‘like the others’ but then the contrast when steinbeck goes on to describe
him as not at all like the others other than what he wears
 references to his personality / manner – ‘gravity in his manner’, ‘kindly’, ‘his voice was
very gentle’
ao4
 hierarchy of ranch – the boss, curley – slim’s position in relation to these – a different authority from curley’s – gained by respect
 position in hierarchy of the old / disabled – candy / lennie
 crooks as a black man and curley’s wife as a woman
 places to represent hierarchy – house / bunk house / stable / harness room
 relate to attitudes in society



posted from tsr mobile

They could ask about Slim/Curley in part a) then the part b) could ask something about hierarchy and how some people had more power at the time, cos you could talk about slim being the prince and curley being the boss' son etc.

Candy came up in jan 2011... i am spending my time stalking past questions and trying to predict rather than revising :/