English Literature Advice

2

I recently sat a English Literature Paper 2 mock exam which included An Inspector Calls, Power and Conflict Poetry and Unseen Poetry.
Out of the three I was most confident in An Inspector Calls as I was almost able to finish my full answer however I was cut short by the clock. Poetry on the other hand is a weakness for me.
I am asking what is the best way to revise Poetry as there are 15 poems and to revise all of them in detail for only one to come up seems a bit harsh, I would love any advice and same goes for unseen poetry where I am weak at analysing and constructing paragraphs.
Hoping to get a response!

Thank You,

Rafsan

Reply 1

username7727897

9

Original post

by RafsanAhmed

I recently sat a English Literature Paper 2 mock exam which included An Inspector Calls, Power and Conflict Poetry and Unseen Poetry.
Out of the three I was most confident in An Inspector Calls as I was almost able to finish my full answer however I was cut short by the clock. Poetry on the other hand is a weakness for me.
I am asking what is the best way to revise Poetry as there are 15 poems and to revise all of them in detail for only one to come up seems a bit harsh, I would love any advice and same goes for unseen poetry where I am weak at analysing and constructing paragraphs.
Hoping to get a response!
Thank You,
Rafsan

Pick a few poems that relate to multiple themes and focus on them. I think mine were Storm on the Island, Exposure, Remains and Kamikaze. Kamikaze came up in the exam and I think I compared with Exposure or SOTI (can’t remember which). You won’t be able to memorise full poems but you need to know quotes for each that you can discuss. With the poems that you aren’t focusing on, make sure that if you saw a version without annotations that you know what you would write about, but you don’t need to memorise those quotes word for word as they’ll be right in front of you. At A-level we only study four poems and although they are pages long it’s still just a task of memorising specific and relevant quotes.

Reply 2

RafsanAhmed

OP

2

Original post

by offline.tal

Pick a few poems that relate to multiple themes and focus on them. I think mine were Storm on the Island, Exposure, Remains and Kamikaze. Kamikaze came up in the exam and I think I compared with Exposure or SOTI (can’t remember which). You won’t be able to memorise full poems but you need to know quotes for each that you can discuss. With the poems that you aren’t focusing on, make sure that if you saw a version without annotations that you know what you would write about, but you don’t need to memorise those quotes word for word as they’ll be right in front of you. At A-level we only study four poems and although they are pages long it’s still just a task of memorising specific and relevant quotes.

Thank You!
What about Unseen Poetry?

Reply 3

username7727897

9

Original post

by RafsanAhmed

Thank You!
What about Unseen Poetry?

The best way is to practice different questions and learn how to write a decent answer regardless of what comes up. I did a bit of practice for it but I didn’t put as much emphasis on it as I did for the other content (which I believe was An Inspector Calls and the Power and Conflict poetry). In all honesty me having sat my GCSES nearly two years ago has meant I have forgotten a lot since

Reply 4

wikiscrazyy

2

Original post

by RafsanAhmed

I recently sat a English Literature Paper 2 mock exam which included An Inspector Calls, Power and Conflict Poetry and Unseen Poetry.
Out of the three I was most confident in An Inspector Calls as I was almost able to finish my full answer however I was cut short by the clock. Poetry on the other hand is a weakness for me.
I am asking what is the best way to revise Poetry as there are 15 poems and to revise all of them in detail for only one to come up seems a bit harsh, I would love any advice and same goes for unseen poetry where I am weak at analysing and constructing paragraphs.
Hoping to get a response!
Thank You,
Rafsan

For unseen poetry what helped me most was simply learning all of the different writing and language techniques that poets use and simply explaining why the poet has specifically used this technique to convey so and so. For example, juxtaposition, oxymorons, alliteration, repetition, personification, onomatopoeia, similes, metaphors, assonance etc. Also a lot of people forget to mention the structure of the poem which is just as important, mention the tone, rhyme and the pace, is it slow? If so why has the writer decided to do so? Basically prepare yourself a mental checklist of most of the things that the poet can include. Each technique you see whilst reading through the unseen poem highlight it even if you have no clue of how to explain it in that time being. Simply being able to identify these techniques in poems that you haven’t been exposed to is a step forward! Also, remember that practice makes perfect, the more you expose yourself to unseen poems and even simply identifying these techniques the more you will be prepared for the real exam. Once you can indentify the techniques used then you can work on linking these techniques to the purpose. Most questions for unseen poems are worded similarly to ‚How does the poet present… as…?’. Use that as your base to justify the techniques. For example if it said how does the poet present the car as dangerous. If you identified juxtaposition (two conflicting ideas) you could state that poet presents the car as dangerous and overpowering through the use of juxtaposition in the quotation ‚….’. This quotation highlights the mere overbearing nature of the car as the contrast created between so and so highlights the internal conflict created in the drivers head due to the car. That’s the best example I could give haha. I hope that was somewhat helpful also don’t be afraid to ask your teacher for help or watch videos online. Hope you find unseen poetry easier going forward, best of luck☺️.

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