AQA GCSE Eng Lit urgent help please? :)

I think this is quite good to be honest, i would say you're writing at A grade, possibly pushing towards A*, one thing you could do is bring some more of your own ideas into it, i find that Curley's wife keeps social boundaries intact and ends up destroying other peoples dreams i.e the whole ranch dream from the other characters.
You could also talk abit about how her name is just 'Curley's wife' which symbols how she's just an object and signifies how lonely she is and how maybe women were presented back then (another idea to bring out of context, this could push you into the A* bracket)
All in all though it looks good

John Steinbeck's 'Of Mice and Men' is set in 1930s America. it represents the theme of dreams, amongst others, and also shows dreams being crushed. The novel deals with the Great Depression and gives readers an insight into how life was dealt with back then. Curely's wife, in the novel, is portrayed in a specifically negative way, however her behaviour can be interpreted on many different levels.

It could be argued that Curely's wife is a victim of social oppresision due to her gender. As the book was set in the 1930s, it shows how little respect women had back then. The fact Curley's wife is not referred to by her name at any point in the book represents the fact she is living in the shadow of what? Be a bit more specifiic e..g a 'male dominated society'.. as she is called "Curley's wife", which suggests that she is only identified as belonging to her husband...etc..not her own identity..etc..also could elaborate on how the apostrophe shows she has no individualism- being curley's wife is what forms her identity ...In addition, the ranch workers refer to her using offensive language such as "tart".. which is a derogatory term and has obvious negative connotations..'As she is only referred to by names like that shows she is not well thought of on the ranch. However, because Curely's wife is craving attention, this may be why she behaves the way she does because it's the only way she gets attention. The quote don't say 'the quote' just give it, "well- she got the eye." shows what people think about her. The quote is said by Candy which shows she's an easy target for gossip due to her suggestive behaviour...quote etc... The sentence is short which shows the certainty of Candy's thought. The punctuation also shows Candy is proud of what he is saying and the hyphen used shows Candy did not hesitate to tell people about her. However, the hyphen could also have been used to show a quick pause as Candy realises he shouldn't be talking about her; he is slightly fearful of her. Steinbeck uses Curley's wife as a symbol of stereotypical discrimination that took place during the Great Depression.


Furthermore, Curley's wife is also presented as a victim in the quote, "I don't like Curley. He aint a nice fella." Both sentences are short to add drama for dramatic effect? . However, they could have also been used to emphasise her short words. The word "like" is written in Italics which also shows emphasis. Curley's Wife uses the word "like" which connotes feelings between two friends rather than a married couple. As she doesn't use the word "love", it shows just how lonely she was as she was married to a man she never loved. This is where the theme of loneliness surfaces..which could explain her suggestive behaviour in order to gain attention..etc.... In addition, Curley's wife also also represents the theme of dreams as in the book she says, "He says I could have gone with that show. But my ol' lady woudn' let me". This quote shows she once had dreams to go far in life. The words and punctuation used in "ol'" and "woudn'" shows how Curely's wife is uneducated as she doesn't use standard English. However, it could have been used to show illustrate the way many people spoke in America at that time. Her loneliness is also represented by the way Curely reacted to her death; he acted as if he didn't have any feelings for her. He just saw her as an object... link this to her being 'curley's' wife apostrophe -belonging she belonged to him.. this use of punctuation shwoing how objectified she is...etc..curley's wife can be considered as having multiple functions etc/... because rather than being upset for the loss of his wife, he immediately turned to violence. This loneliness shows that she may just be acting up.


Okay, that's only 2 main paragraphs of it, there are 4 in total. Writing this up I realised I waffle quite a bit but does anybody have any idea what grade this would be and how I could improve? ALL criticism welcome

Hey,

Overall this is quite good, I would say if this is your general standard then a B/A borderline, but have a look at what I have suggested.

Hope it helps

hey man, was this last year (2010) paper question?