AS English Lit AQA- Wider Reading

i'm really slacking tbh all i've done is start wuthering heights haha

we're doing dorian gray for our prose coursework piece, and i actually quite enjoyed it as a book tbh although i'm not sure how much of it would be good in the exam other than parts on women ??? i mean thats all i can think of off the top of my head

we're doing a doll's house for the comparison piece and comparing it w/ dorian gray, and doing tennyson for the poetry :-)

any tips for the prose essay ???? i'm doing my draft right now but got a bit stumped half way through

Erm, I honestly wouldn't stress a single hair over mocks. I never did and I did alright! I knew they aren't important. My sixth form used to be like "oh, we can't wait to do these mock(ery) exams"! For your mocks just focus on texts you have already read. Your teachers are the ones that mark them anyway, so it really wouldn't make a difference. When they mark it, they become examiners, not teachers (unless their marking policy states otherwise). Just focus on texts you have already finished, analysed and have found quotes for. That's all. The texts I mentioned, you should read for the real exam.

Oh right, I understand, you have trouble with being concise? It is hard, I'm like that. I go into far too much detail and used to write "over-flowery" it would end up not making sense. But I suppose this is what the mocks are for. But we never had one in English Lit because we did coursework with both teachers until January as my English teacher (Subject Leader, English) just went ballistic when she found out my Head of Sixth Form forced her to say all English Lit students need a mock. If my English teacher thought English Lit mocks were useless then, I'd obvs go with her.

It depends about the mock thing. The way you are being taught the AQA A could be different from mine. But I really wouldn't worry about mocks. In my A2 Philosophy mock I got a U... By the end of it, I came out with a B. I've always found mocks pretty pointless, too much unnecessary stress

I tend to stress about everything and anything tbh, so even if I wasn't putting much on it I would still get stressed Yeah, I'll just focus on those ones. The teachers hinted that the main context in our mock question would be on women so I've got a lot for that already.

That's what I do too. My English teacher put my target last year as "Brevity is the soul of wit" but I do think I'm a bit more on top of it now.

Oh right. Well in that case, Madame Bovary and Therese Raquin are excellent texts for women in the 19th Century. I sooo wish I had done Vic Lit rather than WW1!

As you progress through your A-levels, you will learn to perfect your strengths and learn how to strengthen your flaws in writing!

we're doing dorian gray for our prose coursework piece, and i actually quite enjoyed it as a book tbh although i'm not sure how much of it would be good in the exam other than parts on women ??? i mean thats all i can think of off the top of my head

Oh there is a lot more to Dorian Gray than women. There is a socialist element to it. When Wilde wrote the book there was a lot of change in the air. So for example, the aristocracy of Henry is one of them, where he politically corrupts Dorian's mind to believe that power is everything and without it, you mean nothing. So you can definitely link that with the Industrial Revolution, where power of new inventions were becoming better and better and replacing the old values of Victorian society.

You also have the religion and philosophical side of Dorian Gray. The whole exchanging beauty and youth with the devil with your soul. Victorian England was not to dabble in the devil's liquor to say the least. They took religion very devoutly. Of course there were demons, witches, ghosts and ghouls running around in Victorian Literature but as part as entertainment. However, the connection Dorian has to the devil is quite sinister and person, it could be interpreted as the time of rebellion that was going on in England. It is a sign of change and how easy it is to become corrupted with the people you associate yourself with and people who you don't.

Also a good example of societal values is the comparison between where Sybil stays and where Dorian stays. It's a cross between social class and that stigma of social class and order between citizens of Victorian England. the degradation of it all symbolises the way the social pecking order of the Victorian Era was.

There's quite a lot of stuff you can use in Dorian Gray to be honest!