Could someone grade my GCSE English Lit essay?

I can provide some informal feedback but this is general and not in terms of a specific mark scheme - someone else may be better placed to advise on how to best meet the exam rubric in question (although you've not noted which exam board you are with).

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Priestley presents Mr. Birling in many ways throughout the play. <- this doesn't say anything As well as this, < -redundant as previous sentence didn't say anything really Priestley has presented Mr. Birling is <- typo, "as" the older generation who <- "which", not "who"; also should really say "as a member of the older generation which" as it's an oddly phrased sentence otherwise believes in capitalism. <- I think you're referring more to the character's participation in capitalism rather than "belief" in it. If you wanted to frame it in a Marxist reading you could use specific terminology of him being a member of the bourgeoisie Because of this, Mr. Birling cares for himself <- for or about? as this is a key belief in capitalism. <- I would disagree but as you have not provided any kind of reference I don't even need to, this is basically just a random assertion. A key belief in capitalism according to whom?


From the stage directions, we are immediately introduced to Mr. Birling. <- specific references? Which stage directions? From what part of the play? Contextualise. He is described as being “rather portentous” and “rather provincial in speech”. The meaning of the word ‘portentous’ means significant or important. <- is this the only meaning? Are there other dual meanings to consider or some etymology of the roots of that word? What is a portent? This word choice is particularly important when describing Mr. Birling because of <- due to the way he has earnt <- earned his money, which can be seen when Mr. Birling is “provincial in speech” <- this sentence is somewhat circular as currently phrased. I think you need to merge this with the following sentence and simplify the phrasing to make your analysis clearer i.e. that referring to him as provincial would be seen as pejorative and a reference to his not having been born into wealth and/or nobility and that he came from humble beginnigns and earned his wealth - and may even be considered as nouveau riche This suggests Mr. Birling was not born into being posh <- colloquialism, I would avoid using this unless in scare quotes i.e. "posh" or upper class and might have earnt <- earned his way up <- this is I think the first real point being made here, and has some appropriate evidence for it albeit the structure of your writing obscures this. However, you need to explain the importance and relevance of this - why would him not being born into wealth be important? Consider the social and political factors of the time, contextual factors etc. , <- should be a full stop As we see at the beginning of the play, Mr. Birling shares his views on capitalism and his strong thoughts about it <- you need examples (quotes) and analysis/explanation of why this point is important. Remember PEE - point, evidence, explain. As the reader, I thought Mr. Birling is showing off his power, and therefore, caused me to dislike this character. <- this is OK if you are bringing in a reader response approach to it but you need to actually go somewhere with this. Also honestly I'm not sure I'd go with a reader response approach at this level personally and would focus on text centric approaches myself...but that might just be me so take that with a pinch of salt! You do need to actually develop this argument though if you are going to use it.

During the play, Mr. Birling starts to talk to Gerald and Eric about his beliefs. <- Generally you want to start your paragraphs with a "thesis statement". Make it clear what your overall point is and how you will approach it. Why does it matter that he is talking to them about his beliefs? As is this is just a fairly empty statement. We can also <- implies in addition to something - your first sentence did not make any points for this to be additional to clearly see how Priestley presents Mr. Birling was only caring about himself when he states, “a man has to make his own way, has to look after himself “. Priestly uses declarative words such as ‘has’. by doing this, Mr. Birling is seen as powerful or important to be giving such instructions. <- Fine, although you could expand more on your analysis here - who is he giving instructions to? What does that say about the dynamics between those characters?. Mr. Birling is also talking about <- better to write in the past tense usually for academic writing e.g. "Mr. Birling also talked about...". I'd personally also use something like "stated" or "discussed" as "talked about" is a little colloquial for my tastes but I accept that is more a personal stylistic peeve of mine men having to look after themselves instead of women. <- evidence? Use quotes for direct textual evidence, or paraphrase with clear contextualising to make it obvious exactly what part of the text you are referring to This could be <- bit wishy washy; I'd generally avoid language like this and just state it outright because as the play had taken place <- "in the time period the play was set in" is much clearer than this, there were strict gender rules <- roles and strong segregation between what men and women could do. <- was there? Was this universal or did it vary between groups? Were some people "freer" than others to express themselves outside of prescribed gender norms? Were gender roles less rigid among some groups or social classes than others? Also would be nice to have some evidence/references here for this claim, which as alluded to I think is a little less black and white than presented Mr. Birling heavily believes in looking after himself, to mind his own business <- not sure if this is a (granted fairly clever) pun or another colloquialism used somewhat carelessly. I'm inclined to think the latter - I'd suggest being more explicit "to care for his business and not involve himself in the affairs of others" or similar and / or <- this is stylistically horrible to me; also makes the sentence a lot more vague family. The audience <- which audience? A contemporary one or a modern one? would strongly agree <- Would they? Would any not agree? that Priestley presents Mr. Birling is <- typo, "as" a man who strongly cares for himself because of his capitalist views. <- you've not actually linked the capitalist views into your point at all here, so it falls a little flat. Also the analysis is a bit thin on the ground leading up to this so it's a bit harder to accept this claim.

As we move on, Mr. Birling starts getting interrogated by the Inspector. <- this is just paraphase and adds nothing. Why is it important that he is being interrogated? What is your point for this paragraph? As the Inspector talks about Mr. Birling’s business, Mr. Birling’s response can show <- odd phrasing his views on <- also odd phrasing only caring for himself and family. Mr. Birling says to the Inspector “well Inspector, I don’t see that it is any concern of yours how I run my own business?”. The use of rhetorical questions used by Mr. Birling here and throughout the play <- examples please is <- "are" used, however <- why however...? this is part of the same point, this is one moment where it is clear to see Mr. Birling’s egotistical views. This is because by using the rhetorical question, it is as if Mr. Birling is questioning the Inspector’s authority <- a bit tenuous but ok, a clearer link between the usage of rhetorical questions and challenging authority figures might be nice as I think you've just fallen slightly short of the point you're trying to make. <- this should be combined with the previous sentence as a single sentence. This furthermore shows how Mr. Birling does not think the Inspector should mind Mr. Birling’s business, because by questioning the Inspector, we can see Mr. Birling is trying to stop the Inspector and to put him down. <- would prefer to see a bit more analysis for this point - which I agree with - by pointing out that by posing a question which is not intended to have an answer, he is rhetorically trying to shut the inspector out of the dialogue or something along those lines Thus, Mr. Birling has been presented by Priestley to only care for himself and his family. <- again a bit of a weak finish due to a fairly major claim in your concluding statement which I don't think the rest of the paragraph has done the heavy lifting to get us to it. Also there's no reference to his family throughout the sentence until here...

In conclusion, Priestley has presented Mr. Birling to be egotistical. <- expand In other words, he is one to only care for himself, business and family. <- this is just a definition, give us some butter to go with the bread! Mr. Birling is a heavily unliked <- not a word!!! you are looking for "disliked" or "unlikable" character because of these beliefs <- eh, not sure you've shown that. Also by many standards at many different times in history, caring for one's family over other matters would be seen as a positive. Why is it a negative here? and Priestley wanted the audience or reader to understand the issues of this belief system and how it is not good for society <- not sure we quite got there based on the analysis above but sure, this is a reasonable point to be trying to make. Mr. Birling represents this society and its opposing beliefs to Priestley’s.<- if he represents the society in question, but that the belief system is bad for society, how does one reconcile that? You could unpack this more maybe. Or just rephrase if that's not the route you want to go. Also I think there is an over-reliance on authorial intent throughout personally...you can avoid using a reader response approach without defaulting to intentionalism.


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I've put some comments above - the purple ones are stylistic/grammatical/spelling/structural issues I think need addressing, the red ones are where I think you've not really hit the mark or missed something, the green ones are where I think you're going towards something, and the final amber bit is just a bit more of a general comment on your conclusion and approach. These are mostly "internal" issues cropping up as I read it.

In terms of the internal structure I think your introduction is a bit waffley and doesn't do what it should, which is give the reader of the essay an idea of how you will overall structure your essay and what approaches you will take. I think part of the issue here is that you didn't spend a couple minutes thinking of an overall plan for the essay and just kind of wrote continually until you ran out and then stuck a conclusion on the end. Which also contributed to another issue - your conclusion is a bit weak, in large part because I don't think the body actually matches the conclusion (due to a lack of analysis in many parts).

The bigger "external"/overall issue is that I don't think you really answered the question all that well. The question asked how far was the character presented as someone who cared only for himself and his family - you've just answered "how", not "how far". Consider to what extent this is represented, how it compares to other characters, and whether he is presented as caring more for one thing than the other. Is he truly presented as only caring about those things? Are there other things he's shown as caring about? If there are other things, what are they and why are those important? Does his apparently demonstrations of care for his family or self actually reflect a more deep seated care about other things? Does his caring about these things actually make a material difference to them? Does it help them, or harm them, or neither? Why and how? These are some things I'd think about personally, without having read the play and only having the vaguest sense of what occurs in it.

Since you've not really answered the question and your analysis is patchy even in the best places, personally I'd not think this would score too highly...I would focus on making sure you are answering the question asked (look for command words and key phrases in the question - in this case "how far", not just "how") and also try and make sure you go into depth in the analysis, and provide evidence for it. Avoid just paraphrasing the story - make a point about why a given passage or quote is important, and then analyse that example using the appropriate literary terminology and reference to literary techniques.

here is the essay and question:

Mr Birling says ‘…a man has to mind his own business and look after himself and his own’.
How far does Priestley present Mr Birling as a man who cares only for himself and his family?
Write about:
what Mr Birling says and does
how far Priestley presents Mr Birling as a man who cares only for himself and his family





Priestley presents Mr. Birling in many ways throughout the play. As well as this, Priestley has presented Mr. Birling is the older generation who believes in capitalism. Because of this, Mr. Birling cares for himself as this is a key belief in capitalism.

From the stage directions, we are immediately introduced to Mr. Birling. He is described as being “rather portentous” and “rather provincial in speech”. The meaning of the word ‘portentous’ means significant or important. This word choice is particularly important when describing Mr. Birling because of the way he has earnt his money, which can be seen when Mr. Birling is “provincial in speech”. This suggests Mr. Birling was not born into being posh or upper class and might have earnt his way up, As we see at the beginning of the play, Mr. Birling shares his views on capitalism and his strong thoughts about it. As the reader, I thought Mr. Birling is showing off his power, and therefore, caused me to dislike this character.

During the play, Mr. Birling starts to talk to Gerald and Eric about his beliefs. We can also clearly see how Priestley presents Mr. Birling was only caring about himself when he states, “a man has to make his own way, has to look after himself “. Priestly uses declarative words such as ‘has’. by doing this, Mr. Birling is seen as powerful or important to be giving such instructions. Mr. Birling is also talking about men having to look after themselves instead of women. This could be because as the play had taken place, there were strict gender rules and strong segregation between what men and women could do. Mr. Birling heavily believes in looking after himself, to mind his own business and / or family. The audience would strongly agree that Priestley presents Mr. Birling is a man who strongly cares for himself because of his capitalist views.

As we move on, Mr. Birling starts getting interrogated by the Inspector. As the Inspector talks about Mr. Birling’s business, Mr. Birling’s response can show his views on only caring for himself and family. Mr. Birling says to the Inspector “well Inspector, I don’t see that it is any concern of yours how I run my own business?”. The use of rhetorical questions used by Mr. Birling here and throughout the play is used, however, this is one moment where it is clear to see Mr. Birling’s egotistical views. This is because by using the rhetorical question, it is as if Mr. Birling is questioning the Inspector’s authority. This furthermore shows how Mr. Birling does not think the Inspector should mind Mr. Birling’s business, because by questioning the Inspector, we can see Mr. Birling is trying to stop the Inspector and to put him down. Thus, Mr. Birling has been presented by Priestley to only care for himself and his family.

In conclusion, Priestley has presented Mr. Birling to be egotistical. In other words, he is one to only care for himself, business and family. Mr. Birling is a heavily unliked character because of these beliefs and Priestley wanted the audience or reader to understand the issues of this belief system and how it is not good for society. Mr. Birling represents this society and its opposing beliefs to Priestley’s.