Mr Nabeel Dowlut 1

Extract from examiners’ report

Write a story which includes the sentence: ‘No-one could understand why she
failed to turn up.’ (350-500 words)

June 2012 Paper 1

This question was an extremely popular one and it produced a number of

very good narratives. There were a vast number of occasions and places where a
character was expected to be for any number of reasons before eventually not
‘turning up’. These included the airport, a birthday party, sporting events, revision
meetings and exams. There were some very serious and moving events as well,
with people failing to turn up at the hospital bedside of a sick relation. By the very
nature of the given quotation, it was mostly normally placed either at or towards
the end of the essay to provide a dramatic finale. Strong characterisation of
people placed in difficult circumstances were in evidence in the better essays.

A large number of candidates did not take the expression ‘failed to turn up’
at face value to mean ‘not putting in an appearance’ but rather they took it at a
more colloquial level and interpreted it as meaning that someone did not put in a
good performance. Some took the expression to mean ‘he/she failed’. The problem
with these was that in order to perform badly or fail they did indeed have to ‘turn
up’ which was something of a contradiction. However, these interpretations were
largely given some benefit of the doubt although they resulted in a loss of narrative
climax. Good narratives made excellent use of properly punctuated dialogue
in this essay but weaker responses could have used speech more in order to vary
the narrative and add life to it.

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