GCSE

English
Literature
Unseen Prose

1
 Study Booklet

Name:________________________________________
Overview

For this section of your exam you will study an unseen nineteenth
century prose text, you should be able to:

· read and understand a prose extract;

· use details from the prose extract to illustrate interpretations;
· and explain and evaluate the ways in which the author expresses
meaning and achieves effects.

Assessment Objectives

In this Unit two Assessment Objectives are assessed, each is of equal

weighting:

· AO1 – respond to texts critically and imaginatively; select and

evaluate relevant textual detail to illustrate and support
interpretations; and

· AO2 – explain how language, structure and form contribute to

writers’ presentation of ideas, themes, characters and settings.

QWC

In GCSE English Literature, students must demonstrate their quality of

written communication.

This means they need to:

· ensure that text is legible and that spelling, punctuation and grammar
are accurate so that meaning is clear;

2
 · organise information clearly and coherently,
· use specialist vocabulary where appropriate.

Assessment Summary

- You are given 45 minutes to answer the

question in this section
- It is worth 10% of the marks for the
qualification.
- Students should spend 15 minutes
reading the extract
- Spend 30 minutes writing your response
to the question.

Introduction

What is Prose?
Prose is a form of language that has no formal metrical structure, in other
words, no rhyme or rhythm. It applies a natural flow of speech, and ordinary
grammatical structure rather than rhythmic structure, such as in the case
of traditional poetry.
Normal every day speech is spoken in prose and most people think and write
in prose form. The novel you are studying as part of your literature exam is
also prose.
………………
In your exam you will be asked to read an unprepared extract from a work
on nineteenth century Prose. This means you will be reading work
written in the past.

It might therefore be worth researching what life was like in the past, this
will help you understand the texts you are reading. In addition, it is also
worth remembering that sometimes the style of work written in this time
period may seem rather different to modern prose that you are probably
used to reading. For instance, you might find that sentences are longer,
descriptions are more detailed and that sometimes words are used that you
may be unfamiliar with. Don’t let this put you off; there is much to be
gained from stepping back in time and engaging with some of the classics
from this period.
Areas to Research
· Education

3
 · Religion
· Class
· Power/ monarchy
· Social attitudes
· Role of women
· Lifestyle- what people wore, ate, etc.
· Entertainment
· Famous people
· The Arts and Literature

Reading for Meaning: Subject Matter

The first thing we need to do when we read an unseen passage is to read for
meaning, in other words read to understand what is happening in the
passage.
Task 1: Read the following passages, summarise what is happening
in each one.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1.
“Look—” he murmured, holding out his arm to stop Malfoy.
Something bright and white was gleaming on the ground. They
inched closer.
It was the unicorn all right, and it was dead. Harry had never
seen anything so beautiful and sad. Its long, slender legs were
stuck out at odd angles where it had fallen and its mane was
spread pearly-white on the dark leaves.
Harry had taken one step toward it when a slithering sound
made him freeze where he stood. A bush on the edge of the
clearing quivered. . . . Then, out of the shadows, a hooded
figure came crawling across the ground like some stalking
beast. Harry, Malfoy, and Fang stood transfixed. The cloaked
figure reached the unicorn, lowered its head over the wound in
the animal’s side, and began to drink its blood.

4
“AAAAAAAAAAARGH!”
Malfoy let out a terrible scream and bolted—so did Fang. The
hooded figure raised its head and looked right at Harry—
unicorn blood was dribbling down its front. It got to its feet
and came swiftly toward Harry—he couldn’t move for fear.
Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone, J.K Rowling
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2.
Having mounted beside her, Alec d’Urberville drove rapidly along the crest of the
first hill, chatting compliments to Tess as they went, the cart with her box being left
far behind. Rising still, an immense landscape stretched around them on every side;
behind, the green valley of her birth, before, a gray country of which she knew
nothing except from her first brief visit to Trantridge. Thus they reached the verge of
an incline down which the road stretched in a long straight descent of nearly a mile.

Ever since the accident with her father’s horse Tess Durbeyfield, courageous as she
naturally was, had been exceedingly timid on wheels; the least irregularity of motion
startled her. She began to get uneasy at a certain recklessness in her conductor’s
driving.
“You will go down slow, sir, I suppose?” she said with attempted unconcern.
D’Urberville looked round upon her, nipped his cigar with the tips of his large white
centre-teeth, and allowed his lips to smile slowly of themselves.
“Why, Tess,” he answered, after another whiff or two, “it isn’t a
brave bouncing girl like you who asks that? Why, I always go
down at full gallop. There’s nothing like it for raising your
spirits.”
Tess of the d’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
----------------------------------------------------------------------- ---
3.
The monster showed up just after
midnight. As they do.

Conor was awake when it came.

He’d had a nightmare. Well, not a

nightmare. The nightmare. The
one he’d been having a lot lately.
The one with the darkness and
the wind and the screaming. The

5
one with the hands slipping from his grasp, no matter how
hard he tried to hold on.

The one that always ended with–

“Go away,” Conor whispered into the darkness of his bedroom,
trying to push the nightmare back, not let it follow him into the
world of waking. “Go away now.” He glanced over at the clock
his mum had put on his bedside table. 12.07. Seven minutes
past midnight. Which was late for a school night, late for a
Sunday, certainly.

A Monster Calls, Patrick Ness

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
-

The night passed rapidly. I was too tired

even to dream; I only once awoke to hear the
wind rave in furious gusts, and the rain fall in
torrents, and to be sensible that Miss
Miller had taken her place by my side.
When I again unclosed my eyes, a loud bell
was ringing; the girls were up and
dressing; day had not yet begun to dawn,
and a rushlight or two burned in the room. I
too rose reluctantly; it was bitter cold, and I dressed as well as I could for shivering,
and washed when there was a basin at liberty, which did not occur soon, as there was
but one basin to six girls, on the stands down the middle of the room. Again the bell
rang: all formed in file, two and two, and in that order descended the stairs and
entered the cold and dimly lit schoolroom: here prayers were read by Miss Miller;
afterwards she called out—

“Form classes!”

A great tumult succeeded for some minutes, during which Miss Miller repeatedly
exclaimed, “Silence!” and “Order!” When it subsided, I saw them all drawn up in
four semicircles, before four chairs, placed at the four tables; all held books in their
hands, and a great book, like a Bible, lay on each table, before the vacant seat. A
pause of some seconds succeeded, filled up by the low, vague hum of numbers; Miss
Miller walked from class to class, hushing this indefinite sound.

6
Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Task 2: Discussion Questions

· Were you able to summarise what was happening in each passage?

· Were some of the texts more difficult to understand than others?

· Which of the texts do you think were written recently and which were
written in the past? How were you able to work this out?

· Which one did you enjoy most?

Narrative Voice
When reading unseen prose, it is important to identify who is telling the
story?
First person or third person are the most commonly used in fiction.
Task 1: Read the following extracts and identify who the narrator is.
1.
One evening of late summer, before the nineteenth century
had reached one-third of its span, a young man and woman,
the latter carrying a child, were approaching the large village
of Weydon-Priors, in Upper Wessex, on foot. They were plainly
but not ill clad, though the thick hoar of dust which had
accumulated on their shoes and garments from an obviously
long journey lent a disadvantageous shabbiness to their
appearance just now. The man was of fine figure, swarthy, and
stern in aspect; and he showed in profile a facial angle so
slightly inclined as to be almost perpendicular. He wore a
short jacket of brown corduroy, newer than the remainder of
his suit, which was a fustian waistcoat with white horn
buttons, breeches of the same, tanned leggings, and a straw
hat overlaid with black glazed canvas.
The Mayor of Casterbridge, Thomas Hardy
_______________________________________________________________________

7
2.
The evening, I remember, was still and cloudy; the London air
was at its heaviest; the distant hum of the street-traffic was at
its faintest; the small pulse of the life within me, and the great
heart of the city around me, seemed to be sinking in unison,
languidly and more languidly, with the sinking sun. I roused
myself from the book which I was dreaming over rather than
reading, and left my chambers to meet the cool night air in the
suburbs. It was one of the two evenings in every week which I
was accustomed to spend with my mother and my sister. So I
turned my steps northward in the direction of Hampstead.

Events which I have yet to relate make it necessary to

mention in this place that my father had been dead some years
at the period of which I am now writing; and that my sister
Sarah and I were the sole survivors of a family of five children.
My father was a drawing-master before me. His exertions had
made him highly successful in his profession; and his
affectionate anxiety to provide for the future of those who
were dependent on his labours had impelled him, from the time
of his marriage, to devote to the insuring of his life a much
larger portion of his income than most=men consider it
necessary to set aside for that purpose. Thanks to his
admirable prudence and self-denial my mother and sister were
left, after his death, as independent of the world as they had
been during his lifetime. I succeeded to his connection, and
had every reason to feel grateful for the prospect that awaited
me at my starting in life.
The Woman in White, Wilkie Collins
----------------------------------------------------------------- --------------
3.
The first place that I can well
remember was a large pleasant
meadow with a pond of clear
water in it. Some shady trees
leaned over it, and rushes and
water-lilies grew at the deep
end. Over the hedge on one side
we looked into a plowed field,

8
and on the other we looked over a gate at our master's house,
which stood by the roadside; at the top of the meadow was a
grove of fir trees, and at the bottom a running brook overhung
by a steep bank.
While I was young I lived upon my mother's milk, as I could not
eat grass. In the daytime I ran by her side, and at night I lay
down close by her. When it was hot we used to stand by the
pond in the shade of the trees, and when it was cold we had a
nice warm shed near the grove.
As soon as I was old enough to eat grass my mother used to
go out to work in the daytime, and come back in the evening.
There were six young colts in the meadow besides me; they
were older than I was; some were nearly as large as grown-up
horses. I used to run with them, and had great fun; we used to
gallop all together round and round the field as hard as we
could go. Sometimes we had rather rough play, for they would
frequently bite and kick as well as gallop.
Black Beauty, Anna Sewell

Task 2:
· Write an account of your morning in the first and then in the third
person.
· Consider the advantages and disadvantages of writing in both the
first and the third person narrative voice?

Setting
One of the things it is worth paying particular attention to in the passage is
where the story is set. This can give you a sense of location and time, in
other words where and when the story is set. What we are told about the
setting can often help us understand what is happening in the passage.
Task 1: Read the following extracts, identify where and when they
are set.

It was such a crowded scene, and there were so many objects to attract attention, that,
at first, Nicholas stared about him, really without seeing anything at all. By degrees,
however, the place resolved itself into a bare and dirty room, with a couple of
windows, whereof a tenth part might be of glass, the remainder being stopped up with
old copy-books and paper. There were a couple of long old rickety desks, cut and
notched, and inked, and damaged, in every possible way; two or three forms; a
detached desk for Squeers; and another for his assistant. The ceiling was supported,

9
like that of a barn, by cross-beams and rafters; and the walls were so stained and
discoloured, that it was impossible to tell whether they had ever been touched with
paint or whitewash.

Nicholas Nickleby, Charles Dickens

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The hallway smelt of boiled cabbage and old rag mats. At one
end of it a coloured poster, too large for indoor display, had
been tacked to the wall. It depicted simply an enormous face,
more than a metre wide: the face of a man of about forty-five,
with a heavy black moustache and ruggedly handsome
features. Winston made for the stairs. It was no use trying the
lift. Even at the best of times it was seldom working, and at
present the electric current was cut off during daylight hours.
It was part of the economy drive in preparation for Hate Week.
The flat was seven flights up, and Winston, who was thirty-
nine and had a varicose ulcer above his right ankle, went
slowly, resting several times on the way. On each landing,
opposite the lift-shaft, the poster with the enormous face
gazed from the wall. It was one of those pictures which are so
contrived that the eyes follow you about when you move. BIG
BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU, the caption beneath it ran.
1984, George Orwell
Setting and Atmosphere
Often the description of a particular setting can be used to create a certain
atmosphere or mood.

Task 1: Read the following passage and identify what mood or

atmosphere is created by the description of setting.

10
Above the chimney were sundry villainous old guns, and a
couple of horse-pistols: and, by way of ornament, three
gaudily-painted canisters disposed along its ledge. The floor
was of smooth, white stone; the chairs, high-backed, primitive
structures, painted green: one or two heavy black ones lurking
in the shade. In an arch under the dresser reposed a huge,
liver-coloured bitch pointer, surrounded by a swarm of
squealing puppies; and other dogs haunted other recesses

Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte

__________________________________________________________________________

Read the following passage, pay particular attention to what mood

or atmosphere is being created.
London. Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord Chancellor
sitting in Lincoln's Inn Hall. Implacable November weather. As
much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired
from the face of the earth, and it would not be wonderful to
meet a Megalosaurus, forty feet long or so, waddling like an
elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill. Smoke lowering down from
chimney-pots, making a soft black drizzle, with flakes of soot
in it as big as full-grown snowflakes — gone into mourning, one
might imagine, for the death of the sun. Dogs,
undistinguishable in mire. Horses, scarcely better; splashed to
their very blinkers. Foot passengers, jostling one another's
umbrellas in a general infection of ill temper, and losing their
foot-hold at street-corners, where tens of thousands of other
foot passengers have been slipping and sliding since the day
broke (if this day ever broke), adding new deposits to the crust
upon crust of mud, sticking at those points tenaciously to the
pavement, and accumulating at compound interest.

Fog everywhere. Fog up the river, where it flows among green

aits and meadows; fog down the river, where it rolls deified
among the tiers of shipping and the waterside pollutions of a
great (and dirty) city. Fog on the Essex marshes, fog on the
Kentish heights. Fog creeping into the cabooses of collier-
brigs; fog lying out on the yards and hovering in the rigging of

11
great ships; fog drooping on the gunwales of barges and small
boats. Fog in the eyes and throats of ancient Greenwich
pensioners, wheezing by the firesides of their wards; fog in the
stem and bowl of the afternoon pipe of the wrathful skipper,
down in his close cabin; fog cruelly pinching the toes and
fingers of his shivering little 'prentice boy on deck. Chance
people on the bridges peeping over the parapets into a nether
sky of fog, with fog all round them, as if they were up in a
balloon and hanging in the misty clouds.

Gas looming through the fog in divers places in the streets,

much as the sun may, from the spongey fields, could be seen
to loom by husbandman and ploughboy. Most of the shops
lighted two hours before their time — as the gas seems to
know, for it has a haggard and unwilling look.
Bleak House, Charles Dickens

Task 2:
1. What mood or atmosphere is created in the passage above?
2. Pick out two examples of how the writer uses language to create this
mood or atmosphere.
3. Explain the effect of the examples you have chosen on the reader
using a PEA paragraphs for each one.

P- Point
E- Evidence
A. Analysis

Integrating quotes into a PEA paragraph

You already know how to write a PEA paragraph but here is a tip on how to
includes quotes from the passage. There are two ways to do this:

1. (BASIC) Insert a quote after a phrase such as: “this is shown in”, “this
is demonstrated by the poet when he/she writes”, “The poet shows
this in the line.”

This is effective, but simplistic.

2. (ADVANCED) Integrate quoted material into the sentence after your

topic sentence. For instance:

12
 It is clear that Lucy is heartbroken, from her “slack… lifeless” hands,
in addition to her stony eyes “that saw nothing.” The shock of the loss
“had passed too straight and direct through the heart, for cry or tear.”

Read the following passage, pay particular attention to how the

setting is used to create a particular atmosphere.

(A young man is visiting an old castle. He is met by three, strange

looking old people who agree to show him to his room – a room where
someone had once died. In this extract he is walking through the
corridor, on his way to the room.)

I left the door wide open until the

candle was well alight, and then I
shut them in and walked down the
chilly, echoing passage.
I must confess that the oddness of
these three old pensioners in whose
charge her ladyship had left the
castle, and the old-fashioned
furniture of the housekeeper's room
in which they gathered, affected me in spite of my efforts to
keep myself at a matter-of-fact mood. The ornaments and
conveniences of the room about them were ghostly--the
thoughts of vanished men, which still haunted rather than
participated in the world of to-day. But with an effort I sent
such thoughts away. The long, draughty passage was chilly
and dusty, and my candle flared and made the shadows cower
and quiver. The echoes rang up and down the spiral staircase,
and a shadow came sweeping up after me, and one fled before
me into the darkness overhead. I came to the landing and
stopped there for a moment, listening to a rustling that I
thought I heard; then, satisfied of the absolute silence, I
pushed open the door and stood in the corridor.
The effect was not what I expected, for the moonlight, coming
in by the great window on the grand staircase, picked out
everything in vivid black shadow or silvery illumination.

13
Everything was in its place: the house might have been
deserted yesterday instead of eighteen months ago. There
were candles in the sockets of the sconces, and whatever
dust had gathered on the carpets or upon the polished flooring
was distributed so evenly as to be invisible in the moonlight. I
was about to advance, and stopped abruptly. A bronze statue
stood upon the landing, hidden from me by the corner of the
wall, but its shadow fell with marvellous distinctness upon the
white panelling, and gave me the impression of someone
crouching to waylay me. I stood rigid for half a minute
perhaps. Then, with my hand in the pocket that held my
revolver, I advanced, only to discover another statue
glistening in the moonlight. That incident for a time restored
my nerve, and a porcelain ornament of a man on the table,
whose head rocked silently as I passed him, scarcely startled
me.
The door to the red room and the steps up to it were in a
shadowy corner. I moved my candle from side to side, in order
to see clearly the nature of the recess in which I stood before
opening the door. Here it was, thought I, that the last person
who visited this room was found, and the memory of the story
gave me a sudden twinge of apprehension. I glanced over my
shoulder at the statue in the moonlight, and opened the door
of the red room rather hastily.
The Red Room, H. G. Wells

Task 3: How does the writer build suspense and create an

atmosphere of tension and unease?
In your answer you should comment on:

· The setting;

· How the narrator feels at the start of the passage;

· What makes him feel nervous as he walks through the corridor;

· Any words or phrases which make us feel tense.

Form

14
Form means type of story or genre.

Task 1:

· What type of story is ‘The Red Room’? Pick out the elements of the
story that define it as belonging to that particular form.

· What other forms are you familiar with? Look back over some of the
passages you have already studied; can you identify what type of
stories they are?

Characters
One of the most important aspects of the passage you will be expected to
write about is how the characters in it have been created.

When discussing character, make sure to comment on:

· How they are described;
· What they think;
· What they say (dialogue);
· What they do;
· How they interact with others;
· What other characters say about them.

Task 1: Read the following character descriptions, what

impressions do you have of these characters?

1. Harry had always been small and skinny for

his age… Harry had a thin face, knobbly
knees, black hair and bright green eyes. He
wore round glasses held together with a lot
of cellotape because of all the times Dudley
had punched him in the nose. The only thing
Harry liked about his appearance was a very
thin scar on his forehead which was shaped like a bolt of
lightning.

15
………………………………………………………………………………………..

2. Her name was Mrs. Pratchett. She was a small skinny old hag
with a moustache on her upper lip and a mouth as sour as a
green gooseberry. She never smiled. She never welcomed us
when we went in. By far the most loathsome thing about Mrs.
Pratchett was the filth that clung about her. Her apron was
grey and greasy. Her blouse had bits of breakfast all over it,
toast crumbs and tea stains and splotches of dried egg yolk.
It was her hands , however, that disturbed us most. They were
disgusting. They were black with dirt and grime. They looked
as though they had been putting lumps of coal on the fire all
day long. The mere sight of her grimy right hand with its black
fingernails digging an ounce of Chocolate Fudge out of the jar
would have caused a starving tramp to go running from the
shop.

………………………………………………………………………………………………

3. If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll
probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy
childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all
before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of
crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the
truth. In the first place, my parents would have about two
haemorrhages apiece if I told anything pretty personal about
them. They’re quite touchy about anything like that, especially
my father. They’re nice and all - I’m not saying that - but
they’re also touchy as hell. Besides, I’m not going to tell you
my whole goddam autobiography or anything. I’ll just tell you
about this madman stuff that happened to me around last
Christmas just before I got pretty run-down and had to come
out here and take it easy.

…………………………………………………………………………………………

4. When Farmer Oak smiled, the corners of his mouth spread till
they were within an unimportant distance of his ears, his eyes
were reduced to chinks, and diverging wrinkles appeared
round them, extending upon his countenance like the rays in a
rudimentary sketch of the rising sun.

16
 His Christian name was Gabriel, and on working days he was a
young man of sound judgment, easy motions, proper dress,
and general good character. On Sundays he was a man of
misty views, rather given to postponing, and hampered by his
best clothes and umbrella: upon the whole, one who felt
himself to occupy morally that vast middle space of Laodicean
neutrality which lay between the Communion people of the
parish and the drunken section,—that is, he went to church,
but yawned privately by the time the congregation reached the
Nicene creed, and thought of what there would be for dinner
when he meant to be listening to the sermon. Or, to state his
character as it stood in the scale of public opinion, when his
friends and critics were in tantrums, he was considered rather
a bad man; when they were pleased, he was rather a good
man; when they were neither, he was a man whose moral
colour was a kind of pepper-and-salt mixture.

Task 2
Where do our impressions of these characters come from?

· How they are described;

· What they think;
· What they say (dialogue);
· What they do;
· How they interact with others;
· What other characters say about them.

Analysing Character

Read the following extract from the novel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. In
it Mr. Hyde is observed beating a man to
death.

Presently her eye wandered to the other, and

she was surprised to recognise in him a
certain Mr Hyde, who had once visited her
master, and for whom she had conceived
a dislike. He had in his hand a heavy cane,
with which he was trifling; but he answered

17
never a word, and seemed to listen with an ill-contained impatience.
And then all of a sudden he broke out in a great flame of anger,
stamping with his foot, brandishing the cane, and carrying on (as the maid
described it) like a madman. The very old gentleman took a step back, with
the air of one very much surprised and a trifle hurt; and at that Mr Hyde
broke out of all bounds, and clubbed him to the earth. And next
moment, with ape-like fury, he was trampling his victim under foot, and
hailing down a storm of blows, under which the bones were audibly
shattered and the body jumped upon the roadway. At the horror of these
sights and sounds, the maid fainted.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, R.L Stevenson,

Task 3: How does Stevenson present Mr Hyde to be an evil, unforgiving

criminal? (TIP – look at the words and phrases in bold)

1) How others respond to them- ‘For whom she had conceived a

dislike’, this would seem to suggest that the character makes other
people feel uneasy or uncomfortable, to the extent that they develop a
dislike of him.

2) What he says, -‘For he answered never a word’, this implies….

Writing about Characters

Read the following passage. In it, the character Scrooge has just
woken up after having been visited by the three ghosts.

"I don't know what to do!" cried Scrooge,

laughing and crying in the same breath;
and making a perfect Laocoön of himself
with his stockings. "I am as light as a
feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as
merry as a schoolboy. I am as giddy as a

18
drunken man. A merry Christmas to everybody! A happy New Year to all the
world. Hallo here! Whoop! Hallo!"
He had frisked into the sitting-room, and was now standing there: perfectly
winded.
"There's the saucepan that the gruel was in!" cried Scrooge, starting off
again, and going round the fireplace.
"There's the door, by which the Ghost of Jacob Marley entered! There's the
corner where the Ghost of Christmas Present, sat! There's the window where
I saw the wandering Spirits! It's all right, it's all true, it all happened. Ha ha
ha!"
Really, for a man who had been out of practice for so many years, it was a
splendid laugh, a most illustrious laugh. The father of a long, long line of
brilliant laughs!
A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
Task 4: Question: How does Dickens present the redeemed
character of Scrooge?
How to write about character
1. Underline evidence from the text that tells you something about the
character.
2. Consider how the author uses language in their creation of the
character.
3. Write your observations up using the PEA format.

Exemplar Answer
Question: How does Dickens present the redeemed character of
Scrooge?
In the extract the author presents Scrooge as a redeemed character, pleased to be
alive and full of Christmas cheer. Dickens uses the verb, 'cried Scrooge' which
creates the impression that Scrooge is excited and animated.
A series of rather clichéd similes are spoken by Scrooge, "I am as light as a
feather, I am as happy as an angel" these shows how light-hearted and happy
Scrooge is feeling. They could also suggest he is speaking spontaneously and
without much thought given to the words used.
Dickens uses direct speech "Whoop! Hallo!" to convey Scrooge’s exclamations
of joy, his speech is childlike and give us the impression of Scrooge skipping
around his room. Adding to this impression of Scrooge’s childlike behaviour is
Dicken’s use of the verb 'Frisked' – which also suggests that he is moving
lightly and with gaiety.

19
At one point in the passage he is overcome and his speech is reduced to
laughter, "Ha ha ha!" again showing how cheerful he has become. Dickens
describes this as 'a most illustrious laugh' - the adjective 'illustrious' means well-
known. It is as if Scrooge has already laughed so much that the sound has
become part of his usual utterances. The extract concludes with a metaphor,
'The father of a long, long line of brilliant laughs!' – which shows there will be
many more laughs to come.
__________________________________________________________________________

Read the following extract which describes a character called

Fagan.

In a frying pan, which was on the fire, and which was secured to the
shelf over the fire by a string, some sausages were cooking; and
standing over them, with a fork in his hand, was a very old
shrivelled Jew whose villainous looking and repulsive face was
hidden by a quantity of matted red hair. He was dressed in a greasy
flannel gown, with his throat bare; and seemed to be switching his
attention between the frying pan and the clothes horse over which
many silk handkerchiefs were hanging.

Oliver Twist, Charles Dickens

Task 5:
· Underline those parts of the extract which you feel are most
informative in presenting the character of Fagan
· Consider the connotations of the words and phrases you have
underlined. For instance, ‘shrivelled has connotations of being
wrinkled, shrunken, has connotations of being used up, old,
unpleasant’.
· Now write three PEA paragraphs explaining the impact of the writer’s
choice of words upon the reader. Use the exemplar essay based on
Scrooge to help you structure your answer.
___________________________________________________________________________
Practice Paper
Now that you have learned about narrative voice, setting, atmosphere,
tone and character it is time to try working on identifying and writing

20
about these elements of the text in a longer passage, similar to the type you
will be given in the exam.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………
Below is an extract from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, in which
Doctor Frankenstein considers the consequences of his creation.
IT WAS on a dreary night of November that I beheld the
accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost amounted
to agony, collected the instruments of life around me, that I might
infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet. It
was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against
the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the
glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of
the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion
agitated its limbs.
How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how
delineate the wretch whom with such infinite pains and care I had
endeavoured to form? His limbs were in proportion, and I had
selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful! -- Great God! His yellow
skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his
hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly
whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid
contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same
colour as the dun white sockets in which they were set, his
shrivelled complexion and
straight black lips.
The different accidents of life
are not so changeable as the
feelings of human nature. I
had worked hard for nearly
two years, for the sole
purpose of infusing life into
an inanimate body. For this I
had deprived myself of rest
and health. I had desired it
with an ardour that far
exceeded moderation; but
now that I had finished, the
beauty of the dream vanished,
and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. Unable to endure
the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room,
continued a long time traversing my bed chamber, unable to
compose my mind to sleep. At length lassitude succeeded to the
tumult I had before endured; and I threw myself on the bed in my

21
clothes, endeavouring to seek a few moments of forgetfulness. But
it was in vain: I slept, indeed, but I was disturbed by the wildest
dreams. I thought I saw Elizabeth, in the bloom of health, walking in
the streets of Ingolstadt. Delighted and surprised, I embraced her;
but as I imprinted the first kiss on her lips, they became livid with
the hue of death; her features appeared to change, and I thought
that I held the corpse of my dead mother in my arms; a shroud
enveloped her form, and I saw the grave-worms crawling in the folds
of the flannel. I started from my sleep with horror; a cold dew
covered my forehead, my teeth chattered, and every limb became
convulsed: when, by the dim and yellow light of the moon, as it
forced its way through the window shutters, I beheld the wretch --
the miserable monster whom I had created. He held up the curtain
of the bed and his eyes, if eyes they may be called, were fixed on
me. His jaws opened, and he muttered some inarticulate sounds,
while a grin wrinkled his cheeks. He might have spoken, but I did
not hear; one hand was stretched out, seemingly to detain me, but I
escaped, and rushed down stairs. I took refuge in the courtyard
belonging to the house which I inhabited; where I remained during
the rest of the night, walking up and down in the greatest agitation,
listening attentively, catching and fearing each sound as if it were
to announce the approach of the demoniacal corpse to which I had
so miserably given life.
Oh! no mortal could support the horror of that countenance. A
mummy again endued with animation could not be so hideous as
that wretch. I had gazed on him while unfinished he was ugly then;
but when those muscles and joints were rendered capable of
motion, it became a thing such as even Dante could not have
conceived.
I passed the night wretchedly. Sometimes my pulse beat so quickly
and hardly that I felt the palpitation of every artery; at others, I
nearly sank to the ground through languor and extreme weakness.
Mingled with this horror, I felt the bitterness of disappointment;
dreams that had been my food and pleasant rest for so long a space
were now become a hell to me; and the change was so rapid, the
overthrow so complete!

Task 6:
1. Meaning – What is happening in this extract?

22
 2. Narrative Voice- Who is narrating the passage? How is the speaker
feeling in the opening paragraph? PEA

3. Setting/ mood and atmosphere -How does the description of setting

in the opening paragraph establish mood and atmosphere? PEA

4. Setting- Explain how the writer uses pathetic fallacy to foreshadow

what is to come later in the novel? PEA

5. Character- What details about the creature create a sense of how

horrific it is? PEA

6. Style- Explain the effect of the use of exclamation marks in the

second paragraph. PEA

7. Character -What extra details about the creature are we given in the
second paragraph? What impression do they seek to create for the
reader? PEA

8. Character -What evidence is there in paragraph three that Doctor

Frankenstein is deeply upset by his creation? PEA

9. Meaning -Look carefully at the last paragraph what does the Doctor
mean when he says his dreams were now, ‘a hell’ to him?

23
Language and Imagery
When reading an unseen text, you need to be able to
comment on how the author uses language. I – IMAGERY

This means you should be able to comment on:

A - ALLITERATION
· Individual words and phrases – what are
their connotations? M – METAPHOR
· How the writer uses figurative language
(metaphors, similes, personification etc.)
· Sentence types and punctuation A - ANECDOTE
· Word types – verbs, adverbs, adjectives etc.

F - FACTS
I AM A FOREST CREEP!
O- OXYMORON
This is a useful way to remember the various aspects
R- REPETITION
of language you might come across in the text.
E- EMOTIVE LANGUAGE
S- SENSORY
Task 1: Read the following extract from R.L DESCRIPTIONS
Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Try to pick
T – TRIPLES
out as many features of I AM A FOREST CREEP as
you can.

It was a fine dry night; frost in the air; the C - CONTRAST

streets as clean as a ballroom floor; the lamps, R- RHETORICAL
unshaken by any wind, drawing a regular QUESTION
pattern of light and shadow. By ten o'clock,
when the shops were closed the by-street was E- EXCITING
very solitary and, in spite of the low growl of ADJECTIVES, VERBS
AND ADVERBS
London from all round, very silent. Small sounds
carried far; domestic sounds out of the houses E – EFFECTIVE
were clearly audible on either side of the OPENINGS/ ENDINGS
roadway; and the rumour of the approach of any
P - PERSONIFICATION
passenger preceded him by a long time. Mr.
Utterson had been some minutes at his post,
when he was aware of an odd light footstep
drawing near. In the course of his nightly
patrols, he had long grown accustomed to the
quaint effect with which the footfalls of a single
person, while he is still a great way off,

24
suddenly spring out distinct from the vast hum and clatter of the
city. Yet his attention had never before been so sharply and
decisively arrested; and it was with a strong, superstitious prevision
of success that he withdrew into the entry of the court.
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, R.L Stevenson

Close Language Analysis

Writing effectively about literature means engaging in close language
analysis and thinking carefully about why the writer chose the words and
phrases they did.
(In this passage Jane is being punished, she is sent to a room in her aunt’s
house, known as the Red Room, it is also the room in which her uncle died).
Daylight began to forsake the red-room; it was past four
o’clock, and the beclouded afternoon was tending to drear
twilight. I heard the rain still beating continuously on the
staircase window, and the wind howling in the grove behind
the hall; I grew by degrees cold as a stone, and then my
courage sank. My habitual mood of humiliation, self-doubt,
forlorn depression, fell damp on the embers of my decaying ire.
All said I was wicked, and perhaps I might be so: what thought
had I been just conceiving of starving myself to death? That
certainly was a crime: and was I fit to die? Or was the vault
under the chancel of Gateshead Church an inviting bourne? In
such vault I had been told did Mr Reed lie buried; and led by
this thought to recall his idea, I dwelt on it with gathering
dread. I could not remember him, but I knew that he was my
own uncle – my mother’s brother – that he had taken me when
a parentless infant to his house; and that in his last moments
he had required a promise of Mrs Reed that she would rear and
maintain me as one of her own children. Mrs Reed probably
considered she had kept this promise; and so she had, I dare
say, as well as her nature would permit her: but how could she
really like an interloper, not of her race, and unconnected with
her, after her husband’s death, by any tie? It must have been
most irksome to find herself bound by a hard-wrung pledge to
stand in the stead of a parent to a strange child she could not
love, and to see an uncongenial alien permanently intruded on
her own family group.
Jayne Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
Task 2

25
 · Underline where the writer has used language in a lively and engaging
way. Use I AM A FOREST CREEP.

· Choose three examples from the passage and try to explain how they
create meaning for the reader.

Below is an example of a response that uses close language

analysis.
The first line of the passage makes it clear that it is starting to get dark, ‘Daylight
began to forsake the red-room’. The use of the loaded verb ‘forsake’ is worth noting
as it has biblical connotations which suggest that Jane has been abandoned both
literally and metaphorically, by her family and perhaps even God himself. Daylight is
personified and it is implied that it has made a decision to leave the room and indeed
Jane behind. This abandonment ties in with Jane’s own fears of being left behind. An
atmosphere of gloom is presented by the reference to the ‘beclouded afternoon’,
creates a rather miserable atmosphere and the use of the adjective ‘drear’ to describe
the twilight with its connotations of a dullness adds to the impression that this Is a
depressing and bleak day.
PLEA
When writing about the writer’s use of language it is useful to make it clear
which specific language device they have used. A useful way to remember
this is to P-L-E-A, which is a variation on the PEA paragraphs you have
been used to writing.
P-Point
L- Language device
E- Evidence
A- Analysis

Point - The writer create a tense and gloomy atmosphere

Language Device – personification / pathetic fallacy
Evidence- the wind howling in the grove behind the hall

26
Analysis – the writer’s use of personification makes the outside world
appear just as threatening as the internal one; the room in which Jane is
imprisoned. The wind is compared to a wild animal and she appears to be
the vulnerable prey. The use of pathetic fallacy adds an atmosphere of
tension and unease to the experience.
Bringing it all together:
The writer creates a tense and gloomy atmosphere; we are told that the wind
was, ‘howling in the grove behind the hall’. the writer’s use of personification
makes the outside world appear just as threatening as the internal one; the room
in which Jane is imprisoned. The wind is compared to a wild animal and she
appears to be the vulnerable prey. The use of pathetic fallacy adds an
atmosphere of tension and unease to the experience. of tension to the
experience.

Read the following passage. In it Pip, a young man, discovers that

everything he believed about his supposed benefactor Miss
Havisham and her protégé Estella
is wrong.
For an hour or more, I remained too
stunned to think; and it was not until I
began to think, that I began fully to
know how wrecked I was, and how
the ship in which I had sailed was
gone to pieces.
Miss Havisham's intentions towards
me, all a mere dream; Estella not
designed for me; I only suffered in
Satis House as a convenience, a sting
for the greedy relations, a model with a
mechanical heart to practise on when
no other practice was at hand; those
were the first smarts I had. But,
sharpest and deepest pain of all -- it was for the convict, guilty of I knew
not what crimes, and liable to be taken out of those rooms where I sat
thinking, and hanged at the Old Bailey door, that I had deserted Joe.
I would not have gone back to Joe now, I would not have gone back to Biddy
now, for any consideration: simply, I suppose, because my sense of my own
worthless conduct to them was greater than every consideration. No
wisdom on earth could have given me the comfort that I should have derived
from their simplicity and fidelity; but I could never, never, never, undo
what I had done.

Great Expectations, Charles Dickens

27
Task 3:
How does the writer convey a sense of Pip’s shock and regret? Use
PLEA paragraphs in your answer

Imagery
The word “imagery” is often thought of as language that is used to create a
mental picture by appealing to the senses. Whilst this is true, it is only
partially correct. Imagery is slightly more complex than just creating a
picture for the reader. It is creating a picture for the reader by using
figurative language in a way that appeals to all of our senses.
Here is an example you may be familiar with from your study of Steinbeck’s,
‘Of Mice and Men’:
‘swinging his hands like a bear’.
Here a simile is used to compare the character of Lennie to a bear. In doing
so Steinbeck creates an impression of a character who is physically large
and strong like a bear and who moves slowly. However, as well as this it
should be remembered that a bear is a dangerous animal, therefore the
character is presented as one who also has the potential to be dangerous.
Task 4:
Read the following extract from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Hound of
the Baskervilles and identify where and how imagery has been used to
engage the reader.
I have said that over the great Grimpen Mire there hung a
dense, white fog. It was drifting slowly in our direction and
banked itself up like a wall on that side of us, low but thick
and well defined. The moon shone on it, and it looked like a
great shimmering ice-field, with
the heads of the distant tors as
rocks borne upon its surface.

Big Words! One of the things you

may have noticed when you are reading
literature from the past is that a lot of

28
the vocabulary may be unfamiliar. Do not let this put you off, even if you
don’t understand a word in a sentence chances are you understand the rest,
so what you have to do is make an educated guess as to what you think the
word might mean.
You will not lose marks if you do not understand one particular word.
Having said that, as an English literature student you should be aiming to
expand your own vocabulary and impress your mates by using as many ‘big
words’ as possible!

Read the following extract which features a lot of ‘big words’, or as

your English teacher would prefer you to say -sophisticated and
complex vocabulary!

Madame de Villefort had no longer any doubt; all was over—

she had consummated the last terrible work she had to
accomplish. There was no more to do in the room, so the
poisoner retired stealthily, as though fearing to hear the sound
of her own footsteps; but as she withdrew she still held aside
the curtain, absorbed in the irresistible attraction always
exerted by the picture of death, so long as it is merely
mysterious and does not excite disgust. Just then the lamp
again flickered; the noise startled Madame de Villefort, who
shuddered and dropped the curtain. Immediately afterwards
the light expired, and the room was plunged in frightful
obscurity, while the clock at that minute struck half-past four.
Overpowered with agitation, the poisoner succeeded in
groping her way to the door, and reached her room in an agony
of fear.
The darkness lasted two hours longer; then by degrees a cold
light crept through the Venetian blinds, until at length it
revealed the objects in the room. About this time the nurse's
cough was heard on the stairs and the woman entered the
room with a cup in her hand. To the tender eye of a father or a
lover, the first glance would have sufficed to reveal
Valentine's condition; but to this hireling, Valentine only
appeared to sleep. "Good," she exclaimed, approaching the
table, "she has taken part of her draught; the glass is three-
quarters empty."
Then she went to the fireplace and lit the fire, and although
she had just left her bed, she could not resist the temptation
offered by Valentine's sleep, so she threw herself into an arm-
chair to snatch a little more rest. The clock striking eight

29
awoke her. Astonished at the prolonged slumber of the
patient, and frightened to see that the arm was still hanging
out of the bed, she advanced towards Valentine, and for the
first time noticed the white lips. She tried to replace the arm,
but it moved with a frightful rigidity which could not deceive a
sick-nurse. She screamed aloud; then running to the door
exclaimed,—"Help, help!"
The Count of Monte Cristo, Alexander Dumas
Task 5
· Underline any words you may not have encountered before or are not
sure what their meaning is.
· Working with a partner see if you can work out what you think they
mean.

Tone
If you engage in close reading you can often get a sense of how the author
wants to make their audience feel about a certain character or situation.
This is sometimes conveyed through their TONE. Read the following extract
and by the end of it hopefully the author’s intention and tone will become
clear!
Oliver had not been
within the walls of the
workhouse a quarter of
an hour, and had
scarcely completed the
demolition of a second
slice of bread, when Mr.
Bumble, who had
handed him over to the
care of an old woman,
returned; and, telling
him it was a board night, informed him that the board had said
he was to appear before it forthwith.
Not having a very clearly defined notion of what a live board
was, Oliver was rather astounded by this intelligence, and was
not quite certain whether he ought to laugh or cry. He had no
time to think about the matter, however; for Mr. Bumble gave
him a tap on the head, with his cane, to wake him up: and
another on the back to make him lively: and bidding him to

30
follow, conducted him into a large white-washed room, where
eight or ten fat gentlemen were sitting round a table. At the
top of the table, seated in an arm-chair rather higher than the
rest, was a particularly fat gentleman with a very round, red
face. 'Bow to the board,' said Bumble. Oliver brushed away
two or three tears that were lingering in his eyes; and seeing
no board but the table, fortunately bowed to that. 'What's your
name, boy?' said the gentleman in the high chair.
Oliver was frightened at the sight of so many gentlemen,
which made him tremble: and the beadle gave him another tap
behind, which made him cry. These two causes made him
answer in a very low and hesitating voice; whereupon a
gentleman in a white waistcoat said he was a fool. Which was
a capital way of raising his spirits, and putting him quite at his
ease.
'Boy,' said the gentleman in the high chair, 'listen to me. You
know you're an orphan, I suppose?'
'What's that, sir?' inquired poor Oliver.
'The boy is a fool—I thought he was,' said the gentleman in
the white waistcoat.
'Hush!' said the gentleman who had spoken first. 'You know
you've got no father or mother, and that you were brought up
by the parish, don't you?'
'Yes, sir,' replied Oliver, weeping bitterly.
'What are you crying for?' inquired the gentleman in the white
waistcoat. And to be sure it was very extraordinary.
What could the boy be crying for?
'I hope you say your prayers every night,' said another
gentleman in a gruff voice; 'and pray for the people who feed
you, and take care of you—like a Christian.'
'Yes, sir,' stammered the boy. The gentleman who spoke last
was unconsciously right. It would have been very like a
Christian, and a marvellously good Christian too, if Oliver had
prayed for the people who fed and took care of him. But he
hadn't, because nobody had taught him.
'Well! You have come here to be educated, and taught a useful
trade,' said the red-faced gentleman in the high chair.

31
'So you'll begin to pick oakum to-morrow morning at six
o'clock,' added the surly one in the white waistcoat.
For the combination of both these blessings in the one simple
process of picking oakum, Oliver bowed low by the direction of
the beadle, and was then hurried away to a large ward; where,
on a rough, hard bed, he sobbed himself to sleep. What a novel
illustration of the tender laws of England! They let the paupers
go to sleep!
Poor Oliver! He little thought, as he lay sleeping in happy
unconsciousness of all around him, that the board had that
very day arrived at a decision which would exercise the most
material influence over all his future fortunes. But they had.
And this was it:
The members of this board were very sage, deep,
philosophical men; and when they came to turn their attention
to the workhouse, they found out at once, what ordinary folks
would never have discovered—the poor people liked it! It was
a regular place of public entertainment for the poorer classes;
a tavern where there was nothing to pay; a public breakfast,
dinner, tea, and supper all the year round; a brick and mortar
elysium, where it was all play and no work. 'Oho!' said the
board, looking very knowing; 'we are the fellows to set this to
rights; we'll stop it all, in no time.' So, they established the
rule, that all poor people should have the alternative (for they
would compel nobody, not they), of being starved by a gradual
process in the house, or by a quick one out of it. With this
view, they contracted with the water-works to lay on an
unlimited supply of water; and with a corn-factor to supply
periodically small quantities of oatmeal; and issued three
meals of thin gruel a day, with an onion twice a week, and half
a roll of Sundays. They made a great many other wise and
humane regulations, having reference to the ladies, which it is
not necessary to repeat; kindly undertook to divorce poor
married people, in consequence of the great expense of a suit
in Doctors' Commons; and, instead of compelling a man to
support his family, as they had theretofore done, took his
family away from him, and made him a bachelor!
Task 1:

32
 1) ‘Oliver…had scarcely completed the demolition of a second slice of
bread…’ What does Dickens’ use of the word ‘demolition’ suggest
about how Oliver eats?

2) ‘…where eight or ten fat gentlemen were sitting round a table…’ What
is your first reaction to the word ‘fat’ used to describe the gentlemen?

3) ‘At the top of the table, seated in an arm-chair rather higher than the
rest, was a particularly fat gentleman with a very round, red face’.
What do we deduce about the particularly fat gentleman from this
sentence?

4) How would you describe the attitude of the particularly fat gentleman
towards Oliver? Give examples to support your answer.

5) What do you think of the attitude of the gentleman in the white

waistcoat towards Oliver? Again, give examples to support your
answer.

6) Why would Oliver have been ‘a marvellously good Christian’ if he had

prayed for the people who fed him? What tone do you think Dickens
intended when writing this line?

7) “'Well! You have come here to be educated, and taught a useful trade,'
said the red-faced gentleman in the high chair. ‘So you'll begin to pick
oakum to-morrow morning at six o'clock,' added the surly one in the
white waistcoat.” How does Dickens intend the reader to react to these
lines?

8) Look again at the first three paragraphs. How does the author reveal
his attitude towards the boy Oliver and the workhouse officials? What
do you think is his intention? How does he want the reader to feel?

Structure
One of the things the examiner will expect you
to write about is structure. What does this
mean?

· How the story is told – from start to finish

– chronological, cyclical, flashbacks etc.

· Repetition – are any words or ideas

repeated in the passage?

33
 · Openings – how does the passage open and how does it end?

· Connections – how are the paragraphs linked together?

· Paragraph lengths – is there a range of different sizes?

· Sentences – are there long sentences, short sentences, or a mixture

of both?

· Narrative perspective – does the narrator stay the same

throughout?

_________________________________________________________________

Writing about Structure

When writing about structure you can comment either on the structure of
specific sentences or on the extract as a whole. Below is an example of how
we can use structure to analyse specific sentences.

Below is an extract from Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. In it Mr. Lanyon,
an old friend of Dr. Jekyll, reflects on the shock of finding out about
his old friend.

"I have had a shock," he said, "and I shall never recover. It is a

question of weeks. Well, life has been pleasant; I liked it; yes,
sir, I used to like it."
Here’s how to break down and analyse this quotation, thinking about the
sentence lengths, sentence types, sentence order and the punctuation used.
"I have had a shock,' (1) he said, (2) 'and I shall never recover. (3) It
is a question of weeks. (4) Well, life has been pleasant; I (5) liked it;
yes, sir, I used to like it."
· (1) "he said" - the use of "he said" breaks up Lanyon's narrative and
adds further impact to the fact "he shall never recover." This
highlights Lanyon's negative state of mind.
· (2) "and I shall never recover" - this is a compound sentence. The
use of the "and" links the two thoughts together. The end of the
sentence is ambiguous because we don't know what Dr Lanyon is
going to recover from.
· (3) "It is a question of weeks" - a simple sentence highlighting his
trauma.
· (4) "Well," - complex sentence. The use of "well" highlights a
conversational tone - also that Dr Lanyon is looking at the past.
· (5) "Liked"/"used" - past tense. This highlights his recent change in
heart and how he dislikes life now due to what he has seen.

34
___________________________________________________________________________
Alternatively, you can look at the structure of the whole passage. Read the
following extract in which Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson come face to face
with a rather terrifying dog!
I have said that over the great Grimpen Mire there hung a
dense, white fog. It was drifting slowly in our direction, and
banked itself up like a wall on that side of us, low, but thick
and well defined. The moon shone on it, and it looked like a
great shimmering ice-field, with the heads of the distant tors
as rocks borne upon its surface. Holmes's face was turned
towards it, and he muttered impatiently as he watched its
sluggish drift.
"It's moving towards us, Watson."
"Is that serious?"
"Very serious, indeed — the one thing upon earth which could
have disarranged my plans. He can't be very long, now. It is
already ten o'clock. Our success and even his life may depend
upon his coming out before the fog is over the path."
The night was clear and fine above us. The stars shone cold
and bright, while a half-moon bathed the whole scene in a soft,
uncertain light. Before us lay the dark bulk of the house, its
serrated roof and bristling chimneys hard outlined against the
silver-spangled sky. Broad bars of golden light from the lower
windows stretched across the orchard and the moor. One of
them was suddenly shut off. The servants had left the kitchen.
There only remained the lamp in the dining-room where the
two men, the murderous host and the unconscious guest, still
chatted over their cigars.
Every minute that white woolly plain which covered one half of
the moor was drifting closer and closer to the house. Already
the first thin wisps of it were curling across the golden square
of the lighted window. The farther wall of the orchard was
already invisible, and the trees were standing out of a swirl of
white vapour. As we watched it the fog-wreaths came
crawling round both corners of the house and rolled slowly
into one dense bank, on which the upper floor and the roof
floated like a strange ship upon a shadowy sea. Holmes struck
his hand passionately upon the rock in front of us and stamped
his feet in his impatience.

35
"If he isn't out in a quarter of an hour the path will be covered.
In half an hour we won't be
able to see our hands in
front of us."
"Shall we move farther
back upon higher ground?"
"Yes, I think it would be as
well."
So as the fog-bank flowed
onward we fell back before
it until we were half a mile
from the house, and still
that dense white sea, with the moon silvering its upper edge,
swept slowly and inexorably on.
"We are going too far," said Holmes. "We dare not take the
chance of his being overtaken before he can reach us. At all
costs we must hold our ground where we are." He dropped on
his knees and clapped his ear to the ground. "Thank God, I
think that I hear him coming."
A sound of quick steps broke the silence of the moor.
Crouching among the stones we stared intently at the silver-
tipped bank in front of us. The steps grew louder, and through
the fog, as through a curtain, there stepped the man whom we
were awaiting. He looked round him in surprise as he emerged
into the clear, starlit night. Then he came swiftly along the
path, passed close to where we lay, and went on up the long
slope behind us. As he walked he glanced continually over
either shoulder, like a man who is ill at ease.
"Hist!" cried Holmes, and I heard the sharp click of a cocking
pistol. "Look out! It's coming!"
The Hound of the Baskervilles, Sherlock Holmes

Task 1:

How has the writer structured this text to interest and engage the reader?

Consider:

- What the writer focuses your attention on at the beginning;

36
 - How and why the writer changes the focus as the passage
continues;

- Any other structural features.

37
Preparing for the Exam
So far in our study we have learned about:

· Subject matter- what is the passage about?

· Narrative voice – who is telling the story?
· Characters – who are the key characters, how are they presented?
· Setting – where is the story set?
· Atmosphere – what mood is created about the people and places in
the passage?
· Language and Imagery – how does the writer use figurative
language and imagery to create certain effects upon the reader?
· Author’s Intention (tone) – what do you think the writer is trying to
make you think or feel?
· Structure – how has structure been used in the passage?

In the exam you will not be explicitly asked to comment on all of these but
consideration of some or all will undoubtedly feature in your answer.

In the exam you need to spend some time looking carefully at ‘or ‘unpacking
the question’. Highlight or underline the key terms, these will direct you to
the elements of the text the examiner wants you to explicitly focus on in the
exam.

Below is a sample question. Highlight the elements you would have

to address in your answer.

How does the writer engage the reader?

You may wish to consider:

· the characters’ feelings and reactions;

· the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

38
Sample Exam Paper

Extract from: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

(Jane Eyre is the story of an orphaned girl, who goes to live with her rich
aunt, Mrs Reed and her cousins, Georgina, Eliza and John Reed at
Gateshead Hall. The child is not treated well in her aunt’s house and her
aunt allows her son to torment Jane. In this extract, Jane confronts her
aunt, Mrs Reed, who has called her a liar.)

Sitting on a low stool, a few yards from her

armchair, I examined her figure; I perused her
features. In my hand I held the tract containing
the sudden death of the Liar, to which narrative
my attention had been pointed as to an
appropriate warning. What had just passed;
what Mrs Reed had said concerning me to Mr
Brocklehurst; the whole tenor of their
conversation, was recent, raw, and stinging in
my mind; I had felt every word as acutely as I
had heard it plainly, and a passion of
resentment fomented now within me.

Mrs Reed looked up from her work; her eye settled on mine, her fingers at the
same time suspended their nimble movements.

‘Go out of the room; return to the nursery,’ was her mandate. My look or
something else must have struck her as offensive, for she spoke with extreme
though suppressed irritation. I got up, I went to the door; I came back again; I
walked to the window, across the room, then close up to her.

Speak I must: I had been trodden on severely, and must turn; but how? What
strength had I to dart retaliation at my antagonist? I gathered my energies and
launched them in this blunt sentence:

‘I am not deceitful: if I were, I should say I loved you; but I declare I do not love
you: I dislike you the worst of anybody in the world except John Reed; and this
book about the liar, you may give to your girl, Georgiana, for it is she who tells
lies, and not I.’
Mrs Reed’s hands still lay on her work inactive: her eye of ice continued to
dwell freezingly on mine.

‘What more have you to say?’ she asked, rather in the tone in which a person might
address an opponent of adult age than such is ordinarily used to a child.

39
That eye of hers, that voice stirred every antipathy I had. Shaking from head to
foot, thrilled with ungovernable excitement, I continued:

‘I am glad you are no relation of mine: I will never call you aunt again so long
as I live. I will never come to see you when I am grown up; and if anyone asks
me how I liked you, and how you treated me, I will say the very thought of you
makes me sick, and that you treated me with miserable cruelty.’

‘How dare you affirm that, Jane Eyre?’

‘How dare I, Mrs Reed? How dare I? Because it is the truth. You think I have no
feelings, and that I can do without one bit of love or kindness: but I cannot live
so: and you have no pity. I shall remember how you thrust me back – roughly
and violently thrust me back – into the red-room, and locked me there, to my
dying day; though I was in agony; though I cried out, while suffocating with
distress, “Have mercy! Have mercy, Aunt Reed!” And that punishment you made
me suffer because your wicked boy struck me – knocked me down for nothing. I
will tell anyone who asks me questions, this exact tale. People think you are a
good woman, but you are bad, hard-hearted. You are deceitful!’

Ere I had finished this reply, my soul began to expand, to exult, with the strangest
sense of freedom, of triumph, I ever felt. It seemed as if an invisible bond had burst,
and that I had struggled out into unhoped-for liberty. Not without cause was this
sentiment: Mrs Reed looked frightened; her work had slipped from her knee; she was
lifting up her hands, rocking herself to and fro, and even twisting her face as if she
would cry.

How does the writer engage the reader?

You may wish to consider:

· the characters’ feelings and reactions;

· the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

Top Tips for Writing about Unseen Prose

Tip No 1: Write a lot about a little.

For instance, take the line from the passage:

40
Sitting on a low stool, a few yards from her armchair.

The use of the word ‘low’’ could perhaps suggest Jane’s status in this house;
she is not considered important enough to be given a chair, but instead she is
given a stool and is positioned lower than her aunt. She doesn’t seem to be on
the same level, literally and metaphorically speaking. The fact that the chair is a
few yards from her aunt’s could also suggest there is a distance between the
two characters; perhaps they dislike each other and do not have a warm loving
relationship. In addition, we are told that the aunt sits on an ‘armchair’, which
again might suggest her superior status as she is the one given the comfortable
chair, whilst Jane is given the stool.
Tip No 2: Watch out for Punctuation/ Structure
You should also analyse the writer’s use of punctuation/structure for effect.
Here’s an example:

I got up, I went to the door; I came back again; I walked to the
window, across the room, then close up to her.

The writer uses punctuation to create an atmosphere of tension and reflect

Jane’s increasing frustration and anger. When she says, “I got up, I went to the
door; I came back again…” it is clear that her physical restlessness is reflective
of her internal agitation. The writer’s use of commas and semi-colons requires
the reader to stop and start when reading the sentence, almost mirroring Jane’s
actions as she paces back and forth. This also creates a sense of anticipation for
the reader as they await Jane’s next actions.

Tip No 3 : Identify and Discuss Language Devices

Close analysis of language is your key to success. We’ve already told you to
write a lot about a little; the other thing to remember is to identify what
language devices are being used by the author and how they create
meaning.

Use the PLEA structure to help you structure your paragraphs

P – point
L – language device used

41
E- evidence
A – analysis, or explanation of how the point creates meaning.

Jane is filled with relief when she tells her aunt how she really feels. The writer
uses the metaphor of binding to suggest Jane’s emotion has previously been
confined and suppressed, ‘It seemed as if an invisible bond had burst, and that I
had struggled out into unhoped-for liberty’. Jane feels that this ‘invisible bond
has now been broken, the use of the word ‘burst’ suggests some kind of an
uncontrollable explosion has occurred, and the use of the verb ‘struggled’
implies this has not been an easy experience but the results are, ‘unhoped for
liberty’. Jane ‘s outburst has released her and given her a new sense of freedom.

Top Tip 4: Structure Your Answer

Look again at the question.

How does the writer engage the reader?

You may wish to consider:

· the characters’ feelings and reactions;

· the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

In this question you need to discuss how the characters interact with each
other. Aim to pick out five examples to discuss. Those examples should
explore the characters’ feelings and reactions. In doing this you need to
write about language devices used to convey information about the
characters. You are also asked to discuss the structure of the passage,
which means how it starts and ends, as well as how paragraphs and
sentences are organised.

Suggested Structure

· Opening – brief overview of subject matter what the passage is about,

where it is set etc.
· Development - 4-5 PLEA paragraphs in which you comment on,
characters, language, structure and form.

Exemplar Response

Read the following exemplar essay and annotate where it addresses

the key terms of the question.

42
The extract begins with a narrative lead-in to the situations, ‘Sitting on a low stool, a
few yards from her armchair, I examined her figure; I perused her features.’
This line immediately tells us a great deal about the relationship between Jane and her
aunt. The use of the word ‘low’’ could perhaps suggest Jane’s status in this house; she
is not considered important enough to be given a chair, but instead she is given a stool
and is positioned lower than her aunt. She doesn’t seem to be on the same level,
literally and metaphorically speaking. The fact that the chair is a few yards from her
aunt’s could also suggest there is a distance between the two characters; perhaps they
dislike each other and do not have a warm loving relationship. In addition, we are told
that the aunt sits on an ‘armchair’, which again might suggest her superior status as
she is the one given the comfortable chair, whilst Jane is given the stool.

The sentence structure of the opening of the extract is complex - ‘In my hand I held
the tract…to which narrative my attention had been pointed as to an appropriate
warning’. This use of long complex sentences is typical of pre-nineteenth century
prose. The sentence structure has the effect of directing our attention towards what is
in Jane’s hand, the tract, ‘containing the sudden death of the liar’, it appears to the
modern reader as a rather shocking thing for a young girl to be reading and presents
Jane’s aunt as a rather harsh disciplinarian.

The writer uses dialogue to reveal character and drive narrative, for instance we are
told that aunt Reid says, “Go out of the room; return to the nursery,” was her
mandate.’ This instruction reveals Mrs Reed as a cold, unfeeling and harsh character.
The word ‘mandate’, has connotations of an order given that cannot be refused. Mrs
Reed therefore appear as a figure of authority.

Jane’s aunt is described using the metaphor; ‘her eye of ice’ this suggests Mrs Reed’s
callous and cold response to Jane Eyre.

The confrontation between Jane Eyre and Mrs Reed results in a breakdown of their
relationship. The use of dialogue enables us to see the anger Jane has for her aunt and
gives us a clear impression of her character. Jane tells her aunt, “I am glad you are no
relation of mine’. This is a rather harsh statement and shows that Jane must have
genuine cause for her anger and frustration. Jane’s independent spirit is further
suggested when she goes as far as to say, ‘the very thought of you makes me sick,’,
this comment would have been very unusual for a Victorian child, as this was a time
when children were supposed to be seen and not heard. It once again reflects Jane as
an unconventional character who is not afraid to state her beliefs.

Despite the fact that Jane is a child we often see her standing up for herself and the
personal pronoun, ‘I’ is used throughout the passage. In addition to this her speech
makes use of several exclamation and question marks; as well as repetition –
‘“How dare I? How dare I, Mrs Reed?”’ this suggests increased tension and Jane’s
distress.

43
Another point worth noting about Jane’s speeches are that they are long; Mrs Reed’s
are short suggesting Mrs Reed’s shock at Jane Eyre’s emotional onslaught.

As the extract ends Jane is filled with relief after she tells her aunt how she really
feels. The writer uses the metaphor of a bond to suggest Jane’s emotion has
previously been confined and suppressed, ‘It seemed as if an invisible bond had burst,
and that I had struggled out into unhoped-for liberty’. Jane feels that this ‘invisible
bond has now been broken, the use of the word ‘burst’ suggests some kind of an
uncontrollable explosion has occurred, and the use of the verb ‘struggled’ implies this
has not been an easy experience but the results are, ‘unhoped for liberty’. Jane ‘s
outburst has released her and given her a new sense of freedom.

It is worth noting how the extract opens and ends. At the beginning, Aunt Reed had
been quietly sitting on her armchair as Jane sat beneath on a stool, however, at the end
of the passage aunt Reed is now reduced to a rather pathetic character who is
‘rocking herself to and fro… twisting her face as if she would cry’. It would seem that
the roles have been reversed the once subservient Jane is now triumphant and aunt
Reid has been reduced to a childlike state.

1. Identify both the positive aspects of this essay as well as what the
student could do to improve it.

Practice Papers

44
Practice Paper 1

Silas Marner, an old weaver, comes into his house to discover a

child sleeping next to his hearth.

45
Turning towards the hearth, where the two logs had fallen apart, and
sent forth only a red uncertain glimmer, he seated himself on his
fireside chair, and was stooping to push his logs together, when, to his
blurred vision, it seemed as if there were gold on the floor in front of
the hearth. Gold! —his own gold—brought back to him as
mysteriously as it had been taken away! He felt his heart begin to beat
violently, and for a few moments he was unable to stretch out his
hand and grasp the restored treasure. The heap of gold seemed to
glow and get larger beneath his agitated gaze. He leaned forward at
last, and stretched forth his hand; but instead of the hard coin with
the familiar resisting outline, his fingers encountered soft warm curls.
In utter amazement, Silas fell on his knees and bent his head low to
examine the marvel: it was a sleeping child—a round, fair thing, with
soft yellow rings all over its head. Could this be his little sister come
back to him in a dream—his little sister whom he had carried about in
his arms for a year before she died, when he was a small boy without
shoes or stockings? That was the first thought that darted across
Silas's blank wonderment. _Was_ it a dream? He rose to his feet again,
pushed his logs together, and, throwing on some dried leaves and
sticks, raised a flame; but the flame did not disperse the vision—it
only lit up more distinctly the little round form of the child, and its
shabby clothing. It was very much like his little sister. Silas sank into
his chair powerless, under the double presence of an inexplicable
surprise and a hurrying influx of memories. How and when had the
child come in without his knowledge? He had never been beyond the
door. But along with that question, and almost thrusting it away,
there was a vision of the old home and the old streets leading to
Lantern Yard—and within that vision another, of the thoughts which
had been present with him in those far-off scenes. The thoughts were
strange to him now, like old friendships impossible to revive; and yet
he had a dreamy feeling that this child was somehow a message come
to him from that far-off life: it stirred fibres that had never been moved
in Raveloe—old quiverings of tenderness—old impressions of awe at
the presentiment of some Power presiding over his life; for his
imagination had not yet extricated itself from the sense of mystery in
the child's sudden presence, and had formed no conjectures of
ordinary natural means by which the event could have been brought
about.

But there was a cry on the hearth: the child had awaked, and Marner
stooped to lift it on his knee. It clung round his neck, and burst louder
and louder into that mingling of inarticulate cries with "mammy" by
which little children express the bewilderment of waking. Silas pressed
it to him, and almost unconsciously uttered sounds of hushing
tenderness, while he bethought himself that some of his porridge,

46
which had got cool by the dying fire, would do to feed the child with if
it were only warmed up a little.

Silas Marner, George Eliot

___________________________________________________________________________

Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

47
Practice Paper 2

(A group of slaves are aboard a steam ship travelling to the slave

markets of New Orleans. The slave trader, Haley, has arranged for
Lucy’s daughter to be sold as soon as the boat reaches Louisville.
Lucy is not aware of what is about to happen).

It was a bright, tranquil evening when the boat stopped at the wharf at
Louisville. The woman had been sitting with her baby in her arms, now
wrapped in a heavy sleep. When she heard the name of the place called out,
she hastily laid the child down in a little cradle formed by the hollow among
the boxes, first carefully spreading under it her cloak; and then she sprung
to the side of the boat, in hopes that, among the various hotel-waiters who
thronged the wharf, she might see her husband. In this hope, she pressed
forward to the front rails, and, stretching far over them, strained her eyes
intently on the moving heads on the shore, and the crowd pressed in
between her and the child.

"Now's your time," said Haley, taking the sleeping child up, and handing him
to the stranger. "Don't wake him up, and set him to crying, now; it would
make a devil of a fuss with the gal." The man took the bundle carefully, and
was soon lost in the crowd that went up the wharf. When the boat, creaking,
and groaning, and puffing, had loosed from the wharf, and was beginning
slowly to strain herself along, the woman returned to her old seat. The
trader was sitting there, —the child was gone!

"Why, why, —where?" she began, in bewildered surprise.

"Lucy," said the trader, "your child's gone; you may as well know it first as
last.You see, I know'd you couldn't take him down south; and I got a chance
to sell him to a first-rate family, that'll raise him better than you can."

The trader had arrived at that stage of Christian and political perfection
which has been recommended by some preachers and politicians of the
north, lately, in which he had completely overcome every humane weakness
and prejudice. His heart was exactly where yours, sir, and mine could be
brought, with proper effort and cultivation. The wild look of anguish and
utter despair that the woman cast on him might have disturbed one less
practised; but he was used to it. He had seen that same look hundreds of
times. You can get used to such things, too, my friend; and it is the great
object of recent efforts to make our whole northern community used to
them, for the glory of the Union. So the trader only regarded the mortal
anguish which he saw working in those dark features, those clenched
hands, and suffocating breathings, as necessary incidents of the trade, and
merely calculated whether she was going to scream, and get up a
commotion on the boat; for, like other supporters of our peculiar institution,
he decidedly disliked agitation. But the woman did not scream. The shot
had passed too straight and direct through the heart, for cry or tear.

48
Dizzily she sat down. Her slack hands fell lifeless by her side. Her eyes
looked straight forward, but she saw nothing. All the noise and hum of the
boat, the groaning of the machinery, mingled dreamily to her bewildered ear;
and the poor, dumb-stricken heart had neither cry nor tear to show for its
utter misery.

Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe

___________________________________________________________________________

Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

49
Practice Paper 3

Read the following extract from Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations.

In it, Pip, a young boy has been sent for by Miss Havisham, an
elderly lady who lives nearby in an old mansion. She was jilted on
her wedding day and has remained in her house since that day,
stopping all the clocks and remaining in her wedding dress. She
has requested the boy to come and keep her company.
However, the only thing to be done being to knock at the door, I knocked,
and was told from within to enter. I entered, therefore, and found myself in a
pretty large room, well lighted with wax candles. No glimpse of daylight was
to be seen in it. It was a dressing-room, as I supposed from the furniture,
though much of it was of forms and uses then quite unknown to me. But
prominent in it was a draped table with a gilded looking-glass, and that I
made out at first sight to be a fine lady's dressing-table.
Whether I should have made out this object so soon, if there had been no
fine lady sitting at it, I cannot say. In an arm-chair, with an elbow resting on
the table and her head leaning on that hand, sat the strangest lady I have
ever seen, or shall ever see.
She was dressed in rich materials - satins, and lace, and silks - all of white.
Her shoes were white. And she had a long white veil dependent from her
hair, and she had bridal flowers in her hair, but her hair was white. Some
bright jewels sparkled on her neck and on her hands, and some other jewels
lay sparkling on the table. Dresses, less splendid than the dress she wore,
and half-packed trunks, were scattered about. She had not quite finished
dressing, for she had but one shoe on - the other was on the table near her
hand - her veil was but half arranged, her watch and chain were not put on,
and some lace for her bosom lay with those trinkets, and with her
handkerchief, and gloves, and some flowers, and a prayer-book, all
confusedly heaped about the looking-glass.
It was not in the first few moments that I saw all these things, though I saw
more of them in the first moments than might be supposed. But, I saw that
everything within my view which ought to be white, had been white long ago,
and had lost its lustre, and was faded and yellow. I saw that the bride within
the bridal dress had withered like the dress, and like the flowers, and had
no brightness left but the brightness of her sunken eyes. I saw that the
dress had been put upon the rounded figure of a young woman, and that
the figure upon which it now hung loose, had shrunk to skin and bone.
Once, I had been taken to see some ghastly waxwork at the Fair,
representing I know not what impossible personage lying in state. Once, I
had been taken to one of our old marsh churches to see a skeleton in the
ashes of a rich dress, that had been dug out of a vault under the church

50
pavement. Now, waxwork and skeleton seemed to have dark eyes that
moved and looked at me. I should have cried out, if I could.

"Who is it?" said the lady at the table.

"Pip, ma'am."
"Pip?"
"Mr. Pumblechook's boy, ma'am. Come - to play."
"Come nearer; let me look at you. Come close."
It was when I stood before her, avoiding her eyes, that I took note of the
surrounding objects in detail, and saw that her watch had stopped at twenty
minutes to nine, and that a clock in the room had stopped at twenty
minutes to nine.
"Look at me," said Miss Havisham. "You are not afraid of a woman who has
never seen the sun since you were born?"
I regret to state that I was not afraid of telling the enormous lie
comprehended in the answer "No."
"Do you know what I touch here?" she said, laying her hands, one upon the
other, on her left side.
"Yes, ma'am." (It made me think of the young man.)
"What do I touch?"
"Your heart."
"Broken!"
She uttered the word with an eager look, and with strong emphasis, and
with a weird smile that had a kind of boast in it. Afterwards, she kept her
hands there for a little while, and slowly took them away as if they were
heavy.
Great Expectations, Charles Dickens

Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

51
Practice Paper 4

In this extract Jo March attempts to cook for her sisters, friend of

the family Miss Crocker and next-door neighbour Laurie.

Having rekindled the fire, she thought she would go to market while the
water heated. The walk revived her spirits, and flattering herself that she
had made good bargains, she trudged home again, after buying a very young
lobster, some very old asparagus, and two boxes of acid strawberries. By the
time she got cleared up, the dinner arrived and the stove was red-hot.
Hannah had left a pan of bread to rise, Meg had worked it up early, set it on
the hearth for a second rising, and forgotten it. Meg was entertaining Sallie
Gardiner in the parlor, when the door flew open and a floury, crocky,
flushed, and dishevelled figure appeared, demanding tartly...

“I say, isn’t bread risen enough when it runs over the pans?”...

... Language cannot describe the anxieties, experiences, and exertions which
Jo underwent that morning, and the dinner she served up became a
standing joke. Fearing to ask any more advice, she did her best alone, and
discovered that something more than energy and good will is necessary to
make a cook. She boiled the asparagus for an hour and was grieved to find
the heads cooked off and the stalks harder than ever. The bread burned
black; for the salad dressing so aggravated her that she could not make
it fit to eat. The lobster was a scarlet mystery to her, but she hammered and
poked till it was unshelled and its meager proportions concealed in a grove
of lettuce leaves. The potatoes had to be hurried, not to keep the asparagus
waiting, and were not done at the last. The blancmange was lumpy, and the
strawberries not as ripe as they looked, having been skilfully ‘deaconed.’

“Well, they can eat beef and bread and butter, if they are hungry, only it’s
mortifying to have to spend your whole morning for nothing,” thought Jo, as
she rang the bell half an hour later than usual, and stood, hot, tired, and
dispirited, surveying the feast spread before Laurie, accustomed to all sorts
of elegance, and Miss Crocker, whose tattling tongue would report them far
and wide.

Poor Jo would gladly have gone under the table, as one thing after another
was tasted and left, while Amy giggled, Meg looked distressed, Miss Crocker
pursed her lips3, and Laurie talked and laughed with all his might to give a
cheerful tone to the festive scene.

52
Jo’s one strong point was the fruit, for she had sugared it well, and had a
pitcher of rich cream to eat with it. Her hot cheeks cooled a trifle, and she
drew a long breath as the pretty glass plates went round, and everyone
looked graciously at the little rosy islands floating in a sea of cream. Miss
Crocker tasted first, made a wry face, and drank some water hastily. Jo,
who refused, thinking there might not be enough, for they dwindled
sadly after the picking over, glanced at Laurie, but he was eating away
manfully, though there was a slight pucker about his mouth and he kept his
eye fixed on his plate. Amy, who was fond of delicate fare, took a heaping
spoonful, choked, hid her face in her napkin, and left the table precipitately.
“Oh, what is it?” exclaimed Jo, trembling.

“Salt instead of sugar, and the cream is sour,” replied Meg with a tragic
gesture.

Jo uttered a groan and fell back in her chair, remembering that she had
given a last hasty powdering to the berries out of one of the two boxes on the
kitchen table, and had neglected to put the milk in the refrigerator.

Little Women, Louisa May Alcott

_________________________________________________________________________

Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

53
Practice Paper 5

(In this passage Elizabeth, who has developed a dislike for Mr.
Darcy believing him to be too proud as well as instrumental in
preventing her sister’s relationship with a Mr. Bingham, meets with
Mr. Darcy.)

She was suddenly roused by the sound of the door-bell, and her spirits were
a little fluttered by the idea of its being Colonel Fitzwilliam himself, who had
once before called late in the evening, and might now come to inquire
particularly after her. But this idea was soon banished, and her spirits were
very differently affected, when, to her utter amazement, she saw Mr. Darcy
walk into the room. In an hurried manner he immediately began an enquiry
after her health, imputing his visit to a wish of hearing that she were better.
She answered him with cold civility. He sat down for a few moments, and
then getting up, walked about the room. Elizabeth was surprised, but said
not a word. After a silence of several minutes, he came towards her in an
agitated manner, and thus began --

"In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed.
You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you."

Elizabeth's astonishment was beyond expression. She stared, coloured,

doubted, and was silent. This he considered sufficient encouragement; and
the avowal of all that he felt, and had long felt for her, immediately followed.
He spoke well; but there were feelings besides those of the heart to be
detailed, and he was not more eloquent on the subject of tenderness than of
pride. His sense of her inferiority - of its being a degradation - of the family
obstacles which judgment had always opposed to inclination, were dwelt on
with a warmth which seemed due to the consequence he was wounding, but
was very unlikely to recommend his suit.

In spite of her deeply rooted dislike she could not be insensible to the
compliment of such a man's affection, and though her intentions did not
vary for an instant, she was at first sorry for the pain he was to receive; till,

54
roused to resentment by his subsequent language, she lost all compassion
in anger. She tried, however, to compose herself to answer him with
patience, when he should have done. He concluded with representing to her
the strength of that attachment which, in spite of all his endeavours, he had
found impossible to conquer; and with expressing his hope that it would
now be rewarded by her acceptance of his hand. As he said this, she could
easily see that he had no doubt of a favourable answer. He spoke of
apprehension and anxiety, but his countenance expressed real security.
Such a circumstance could only exasperate farther, and, when he ceased,
the colour rose into her cheeks, and she said --

"In such cases as this, it is, I believe, the established mode to express a
sense of obligation for the sentiments avowed, however unequally they may
be returned. It is natural that obligation should be felt, and if I could feel
gratitude, I would now thank you. But I cannot -- I have never desired your
good opinion, and you have certainly bestowed it most unwillingly. I am
sorry to have occasioned pain to any-one. It has been most unconsciously
done, however, and I hope will be of short duration. The feelings which, you
tell me, have long prevented the acknowledgment of your regard, can have
little difficulty in overcoming it after this explanation."

Mr. Darcy, who was leaning against the mantlepiece with his eyes fixed on
her face, seemed to catch her words with no less resentment than surprise.
His complexion became pale with anger, and the disturbance of his mind
was visible in every feature. He was struggling for the appearance of
composure, and would not open his lips till he believed himself to have
attained it.

Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen

___________________________________________________________________________

Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

55
Practice Paper 6

(In this extract the detective, Sherlock Holmes and his partner Dr.
Watson have just found the body of Bartholomew Sholto.)
The chamber in which we found ourselves was about ten feet one way and
six the other. The floor was formed by the rafters, with thin lath-and-plaster
between, so that in walking one had to step from beam to beam. The roof
ran up to an apex, and was evidently the inner shell of the true roof of the
house. There was no furniture of any sort, and the accumulated dust of
years lay thick upon the floor.
"Here you are, you see," said Sherlock Holmes, putting his hand against the
sloping wall. "This is a trap-door which leads out on to the roof. I can press
it back, and here is the roof itself, sloping at a gentle angle. This, then, is
the way by which Number One entered. Let us see if we can find any other
traces of his individuality."
He held down the lamp to the floor, and as he did so I saw for the second
time that night a startled, surprised look come over his face. For myself, as I
followed his gaze my skin was cold under my clothes. The floor was covered
thickly with the prints of a naked foot, — clear, well defined, perfectly
formed, but scarce half the size of those of an ordinary man.
"Holmes," I said, in a whisper, "a child has done the horrid thing."
He had recovered his self-possession in an instant. "I was staggered for the
moment," he said, "but the thing is quite natural. My memory failed me, or I
should have been able to foretell it. There is nothing more to be learned
here. Let us go down."
"What is your theory, then, as to those footmarks?" I asked, eagerly, when
we had regained the lower room once more.
"My dear Watson, try a little analysis yourself," said he, with a touch of
impatience. "You know my methods. Apply them, and it will be instructive to
compare results."
"I cannot conceive anything which will cover the facts," I answered.

56
"It will be clear enough to you soon," he said, in an off-hand way. "I think
that there is nothing else of importance here, but I will look." He whipped
out his lens and a tape measure, and hurried about the room on his knees,
measuring, comparing, examining, with his long thin nose only a few inches
from the planks, and his beady eyes gleaming and deep-set like those of a
bird. So swift, silent, and furtive were his movements, like those of a trained
blood-hound picking out a scent, that I could not but think what a terrible
criminal he would have made had he turned his energy and sagacity against
the law, instead of exerting them in its defense. As he hunted about, he kept
muttering to himself, and finally he broke out into a loud crow of delight.
"We are certainly in luck," said he. "We ought to have very little trouble now.
Number One has had the misfortune to tread in the creosote. You can see
the outline of the edge of his small foot here at the side of this evil-smelling
mess. The carboy has been cracked, you see, and the stuff has leaked out."
"What then?" I asked.
"Why, we have got him, that's all," said he. "I know a dog that would follow
that scent to the world's end. If a pack can track a trailed herring across a
shire, how far can a specially-trained hound follow so pungent a smell as
this? It sounds like a sum in the rule of three. The answer should give us
the — But halloo! here are the accredited representatives of the law."
Heavy steps and the clamour of loud voices were audible from below, and
the hall door shut with a loud crash.

The Sign of the Four, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

__________________________________________________________________________

Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

57
Practice Paper 7

(In this extract Dickens introduces the character of Scrooge.)

Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grind- stone, Scrooge! a

squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner!
Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous
fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within
him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his cheek,
stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin lips blue and spoke out
shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime was on his head, and on his
eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low temperature always
about with him; he iced his office in the dogdays; and didn't thaw it one
degree at Christmas.
External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could
warm, no wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he,
no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no pelting rain less open
to entreaty. Foul weather didn't know where to have him. The heaviest
rain, and snow, and hail, and sleet, could boast of the advantage over him in
only one respect. They often "came down" handsomely, and Scrooge never
did.
Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looks, "My dear
Scrooge, how are you? When will you come to see me?" No beggars
implored him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him what it was o'clock,
no man or woman ever once in all his life inquired the way to such and such
a place, of Scrooge. Even the blind men's dogs appeared to know him; and
when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into doorways and
up courts; and then would wag their tails as though they said, "No eye at all
is better than an evil eye, dark master!"
But what did Scrooge care? It was the very thing he liked. To edge his way
along the crowded paths of life, warning all human sympathy to keep its
distance, was what the knowing ones call "nuts" to Scrooge.
Once upon a time -- of all the good days in the year, on Christmas Eve -- old
Scrooge sat busy in his counting-house. It was cold, bleak, biting weather:
foggy withal: and he could hear the people in the court outside go wheezing
up and down, beating their hands upon their breasts, and stamping their

58
feet upon the pavement stones to warm them. The city clocks had only just
gone three, but it was quite dark already -- it had not been light all day: and
candles were flaring in the windows of the neighbouring offices, like ruddy
smears upon the palpable brown air. The fog came pouring in at every
chink and keyhole, and was so dense without, that although the court was
of the narrowest, the houses opposite were mere phantoms. To see the
dingy cloud come drooping down, obscuring everything, one might have
thought that Nature lived hard by, and was brewing on a large scale.
The door of Scrooge's counting-house was open that he might keep his eye
upon his clerk, who in a dismal little cell beyond, a sort of tank, was copying
letters. Scrooge had a very small fire, but the clerk's fire was so very much
smaller that it looked like one coal. But he couldn't replenish it, for Scrooge
kept the coal-box in his own room; and so surely as the clerk came in with
the shovel, the master predicted that it would be necessary for them to
part. Wherefore the clerk put on his white comforter, and tried to warm
himself at the candle; in which effort, not being a man of a strong
imagination, he failed.
A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
__________________________________________________________________________
Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the character’s feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

59
Practice Paper 8

(In this extract a young lawyer, Jonathon Harker arrives at the

home of his new client, Count Dracula).

I must have been asleep, for certainly if I had been fully awake I must
have noticed the approach of such a remarkable place. In the gloom
the courtyard looked of considerable size, and as several dark ways led
from it under great round arches, it perhaps seemed bigger than it
really is. I have not yet been able to see it by daylight.
When the caleche stopped, the driver jumped down and held out his
hand to assist me to alight. Again I could not but notice his prodigious
strength. His hand actually seemed like a steel vice that could have
crushed mine if he had chosen. Then he took my traps, and placed
them on the ground beside me as I stood close to a great door, old and
studded with large iron nails, and set in a projecting doorway of
massive stone. I could see even in the dim light that the stone was
massively carved, but that the carving had been much worn by time
and weather. As I stood, the driver jumped again into his seat and
shook the reins. The horses started forward, and trap and all
disappeared down one of the dark openings.
I stood in silence where I was, for I did not know what to do. Of bell or
knocker there was no sign. Through these frowning walls and dark
window openings it was not likely that my voice could penetrate. The
time I waited seemed endless, and I felt doubts and fears crowding
upon me. What sort of place had I come to, and among what kind of
people? What sort of grim adventure was it on which I had embarked?
Was this a customary incident in the life of a solicitor's clerk sent out
to explain the purchase of a London estate to a foreigner? Solicitor's
clerk! Mina would not like that. Solicitor, for just before leaving
London I got word that my examination was successful, and I am now
a full-blown solicitor! I began to rub my eyes and pinch myself to see if
I were awake. It all seemed like a horrible nightmare to me, and I
expected that I should suddenly awake, and find myself at home, with
the dawn struggling in through the windows, as I had now and again

60
felt in the morning after a day of overwork. But my flesh answered the
pinching test, and my eyes were not to be deceived. I was indeed
awake and among the Carpathians. All I could do now was to be
patient, and to wait the coming of morning.
Just as I had come to this conclusion I heard a heavy step
approaching behind the great door, and saw through the chinks the
gleam of a coming light. Then there was the sound of rattling chains
and the clanking of massive bolts drawn back. A key was turned with
the loud grating noise of long disuse, and the great door swung back.
Within, stood a tall old man, clean shaven save for a long white
moustache, and clad in black from head to foot, without a single speck
of colour about him anywhere. He held in his hand an antique silver
lamp, in which the flame burned without a chimney or globe of any
kind, throwing long quivering shadows as it flickered in the draught of
the open door. The old man motioned me in with his right hand with a
courtly gesture, saying in excellent English, but with a strange
intonation.
"Welcome to my house! Enter freely and of your own free will!" He
made no motion of stepping to meet me, but stood like a statue, as
though his gesture of welcome had fixed him into stone. The instant,
however, that I had stepped over the threshold, he moved impulsively
forward, and holding out his hand grasped mine with a strength which
made me wince, an effect which was not lessened by the fact that it
seemed cold as ice, more like the hand of a dead than a living man.
Again, he said,
"Welcome to my house! Enter freely. Go safely, and leave something of
the happiness you bring!" The strength of the handshake was so much
akin to that which I had noticed in the driver, whose face I had not
seen, that for a moment I doubted if it were not the same person to
whom I was speaking. So to make sure, I said interrogatively, "Count
Dracula?"
Dracula, Bram Stoker

Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

61
Practice Paper 9

(In this extract Barton and Wilson come to the aid of the
impoverished Davenport family).

The two men, rough tender nurses as they were, lighted the fire, which
puffed into the room as if it did not know the way up the damp,
unused chimney. The very smoke seemed purifying and healthy in the
thick, clammy air. The children clamoured again for bread; but this
time Barton took a piece first to the poor, helpless, hopeless woman,
who still sat by the side of her husband, listening to his anxious
miserable mutterings. She took the bread, when it was put into her
hand, and broke a bit, but could not eat. She was past hunger. She
fell down on the floor with a heavy unresisting bang. The men looked
puzzled. ‘She’s well-nigh clemmed,’ said Barton. ‘Folk do say one
mustn’t give clemmed people much to eat; but, bless us she’ll eat
naught.’
‘I’ll tell you what I’ll do,’ said Wilson. ‘I’ll take these two big lads, as
does nowt but fight, home to my missis’s for tonight, and I will get a
jug’o tea. Them women always does best with tea and such-like slop.’
So Barton was now left alone with a little child, crying (when it had
done eating) for mammy; with a fainting, dead-like woman; and with
the sick man, whose mutterings were rising up to screams and shrieks
of agonized anxiety. He carried the woman to the fire, and chafed her
hands. He looked around for something to raise her head. There was
literally nothing but some loose bricks. However, those he got; and
taking off his coat he covered them with it as well as he could. He
pulled her feet to the fire, which now began to emit some faint heat.
He looked round for water but the poor woman had been too weak to
drag herself out to the distant pump, and water there was none. He
snatched the child, and ran up the area-steps to the room above, and
borrowed their only saucepan with some water in it. Then he began,
with the usual skill of a working man, to make some gruel; and when
it was hastily made, he seized a battered iron table-spoon (kept when
many other little things had been sold in a lot) in order to feed baby

62
and with it he forced one or two drops between her clenched teeth.
The mouth opened mechanically to receive more, and gradually she
revived. She sat up and looked round; and recollecting all, fell down
again in weak and passive despair. Her little child crawled to her,
and wiped with its fingers the thick-coming tears which she now had
strength to weep. It was now high time to attend to the man. He lay on
straw so damp and mouldy that no dog would have chosen it in
preference to flags; over it was a piece of sacking, coming next to his
worn skeleton of a body; above him was mustered every article of
clothing that could be spared by mother or children this bitter
weather; and in addition to his own, these might have given as much
warmth as one blanket, could they have been kept on him; but as he
restlessly tossed to and fro, they fell off and left him shivering in spite
of the burning heat of his skin. Every now and then he started up in
his naked madness, looking like the prophet of woe in the fearful
plague picture; but he soon fell again in exhaustion, and Barton found
he must be closely watched, lest in these falls he should injure himself
against the hard brick floor. He was thankful when Wilson
reappeared, carrying in both hands a jug of steaming tea, intended for
the poor wife; but when the delirious husband saw drink, he snatched
at it with animal instinct, with a selfishness he had never shown in
health.

Mary Barton, Elizabeth Gaskell

_____________________________________________________________________
Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

You may wish to consider:

• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

63
Practice Paper 10

(Lockwood, who is spending the night at Wuthering Heights, has

awoken from a bad dream.)

This time, I remembered I was lying in the oak closet, and I heard
distinctly the gusty wind, and the driving of the snow; I heard, also,
the fir bough repeat its teasing sound, and ascribed it to the right
cause: but it annoyed me so much, that I resolved to silence it, if
possible; and, I thought, I rose and endeavoured to unhasp the
casement. The hook was soldered into the staple: a circumstance
observed by me when awake, but forgotten. ‘I must stop it,
nevertheless!’ I muttered, knocking my knuckles through the glass,
and stretching an arm out to seize the importunate branch; instead of
which, my fingers closed on the fingers of a little, ice-cold hand! The
intense horror of nightmare came over me: I tried to draw back my
arm, but the hand clung to it, and a most melancholy voice sobbed,
‘Let me in—let me in!’ ‘Who are you?’ I asked, struggling, meanwhile,
to disengage myself. ‘Catherine Linton,’ it replied, shiveringly (why did
I think of Linton? I had read Earnshaw twenty times for Linton) ‘I’m
come home: I’d lost my way on the moor!’ As it spoke, I discerned,
obscurely, a child’s face looking through the window. Terror made me
cruel; and, finding it useless to attempt shaking the creature off, I
pulled its wrist on to the broken pane, and rubbed it to and fro till the
blood ran down and soaked the bedclothes: still it wailed, ‘Let me in!’
and maintained its tenacious gripe, almost maddening me with fear.
‘How can I!’ I said at length. ‘Let me go, if you want me to let you in!’
The fingers relaxed, I snatched mine through the hole, hurriedly piled
the books up in a pyramid against it, and stopped my ears to exclude
the lamentable prayer. I seemed to keep them closed above a quarter

64
of an hour; yet, the instant I listened again, there was the doleful cry
moaning on! ‘Begone!’ I shouted. ‘I’ll never let you in, not if you beg for
twenty years.’ ‘It is twenty years,’ mourned the voice: ‘twenty years.
I’ve been a waif for twenty years!’ Thereat began a feeble scratching
outside, and the pile of books moved as if thrust forward. I tried to
jump up; but could not stir a limb; and so yelled aloud, in a frenzy of
fright. To my confusion, I discovered the yell was not ideal: hasty
footsteps approached my chamber door; somebody pushed it open,
with a vigorous hand, and a light glimmered through the squares at
the top of the bed. I sat shuddering yet, and wiping the perspiration
from my forehead: the intruder appeared to hesitate, and muttered to
himself. At last, he said, in a half-whisper, plainly not expecting an
answer, ‘Is any-one here?’ I considered it best to confess my presence;
for I knew Heathcliff’s accents, and feared he might search further, if I
kept quiet. With this intention, I turned and opened the panels. I shall
not soon forget the effect my action produced.
Heathcliff stood near the entrance, in his shirt and trousers; with a
candle dripping over his fingers, and his face as white as the wall
behind him. The first creak of the oak startled him like an electric
shock: the light leaped from his hold to a distance of some feet, and
his agitation was so extreme, that he could hardly pick it up.
‘It is only your guest, sir,’ I called out, desirous to spare him the
humiliation of exposing his cowardice further. ‘I had the misfortune to
scream in my sleep, owing to a frightful nightmare. I’m sorry I
disturbed you.’
‘Oh, God confound you, Mr. Lockwood! I wish you were at the—’
commenced my host, setting the candle on a chair, because he found
it impossible to hold it steady. ‘And who showed you up into this
room?’ he continued, crushing his nails into his palms, and grinding
his teeth to subdue the maxillary convulsions. ‘Who was it? I’ve a good
mind to turn them out of the house this moment?’

Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte

Show how the writer of the extract engages the reader.

65
You may wish to consider:
• the characters’ feelings and reactions;
• the writer’s use of language, structure and form.

GLOSSARY

Adjective a descriptive word

It was a hot summer

Adverb a word which provides more information about a verb, an adjective or

another adverb
I always have toast
It was a very hot summer

Alliteration the use of a number of words close together starting with the same
letter or sound, to create a particular effect
A mountain of moving muck

Assonance the use of a number of similar vowel sounds close together

She'll have to go home alone

Autobiography the story of the writer's own life

Dramatic irony the audience is aware of the fate of a character whilst the character
themselves displays ignorance of their fate

Euphemism a figure of speech by which a harsh or unpleasant fact is given a milder

or more gentle expression
He passed away

66
Hyperbole exaggeration for the sake of emphasis, but without intending to deceive
A thousand, thousand thanks for your help

Image a picture formed in the reader's mind by the writer's use of language,
often with the help of special literary devices such as metaphor,
personification and simile

Irony the writer says the opposite of what he means, in order to make the real
meaning more emphatic
What a clever boy you are (when the writer means 'you aren't very
bright!')

Metonym a figure of speech whereby a part of an object or an idea is used to

represent or suggest the whole
The crown represents the whole of the monarchy
No 10 Downing Street represents the government

Metaphor an image in which the writer refers to one thing as being another
The moon is a balloon

Mood the sort of emotions and atmosphere evoked by a piece of writing

Happy, sad, tense

Narrative the story as told by the writer

Narrator the voice telling a story. Either the writer telling the story in the third
person or a character speaking in the first person

Noun the name of something

Either a proper noun Fleet Street, Christmas Day or a common noun
dog, tree

Onomatopoeia words that sound like their meaning

67
 Snap, snip, crackle, spit

Paradox a statement that is superficially self-contradictory or non-sensical, but

on closer inspection says something of sense or wisdom
The child is father of the man

Personification giving an object human characteristics

The sound of the stream chattering away to itself

Plot all the events in a story or drama in a logical sequence

Pronoun a word which stands for a person's name or a noun

I, me, he, she, they, it, them, us

Prose continuous writing, not structured in separate lines like poetry, and
usually divided into paragraphs

Pun A play on words where two words have a similar sound but different
meanings, usually for comic effect.
In what place will I find the plaice
Shakespeare used them a lot!

Rhetorical question a question asked for effect only, not requiring an answer
Are we downhearted?

Sarcasm the use of mocking or contemptuous language to wound or hurt

You ought to live in a pigsty. Your manners would be perfect there.

Setting the time and place in which the events of a story or drama take place

Simile describing one thing as being like another using like or as

The moon is like a balloon

68
Structure the way a piece of writing is organised and constructed

Style the approach a writer uses to produce a particular effect

Images, descriptive language, suspense

Tense the way a verb is formed to show when something takes place
He kicked the ball
She will go to the cinema
I go shopping

Theme the general subject/s that a piece of writing is about

Tone the attitude in which a text is written

Angry, formal, humorous
http://writerswrite.co.za/155-words-to-describe-an-authors-tone/

Absurd illogical; ridiculous; silly; implausible; foolish

Accusatory suggesting someone has done something wrong, complaining

Acerbic sharp; forthright; biting; hurtful; abrasive; severe

Admiring approving; think highly of; respectful; praising

Aggressive hostile; determined; forceful; argumentative

Aggrieved indignant; annoyed; offended; disgruntled

Ambivalent having mixed feelings; uncertain; in a dilemma; undecided

Amused entertained; diverted; pleased

Angry incensed or enraged; threatening or menacing

Animated full of life or excitement; lively; spirited; impassioned; vibrant

Apathetic showing little interest; lacking concern; indifferent; unemotional

Apologetic full of regret; repentant; remorseful; acknowledging failure

Appreciative grateful; thankful; showing pleasure; enthusiastic

69
 Ardent enthusiastic; passionate

Arrogant pompous; disdainful; overbearing; condescending; vain; scoffing

Assertive self-confident; strong-willed; authoritative; insistent

Awestruck amazed, filled with wonder/awe; reverential

Belligerent hostile; aggressive; combatant

Benevolent sympathetic; tolerant; generous; caring; well meaning

Bitter angry; acrimonious; antagonistic; spiteful; nasty

Callous cruel disregard; unfeeling; uncaring; indifferent; ruthless

Candid truthful, straightforward; honest; unreserved

Caustic making biting, corrosive comments; critical

Cautionary gives warning; raises awareness; reminding

Celebratory praising; pay tribute to; glorify; honour

Chatty informal; lively; conversational; familiar

Colloquial familiar; everyday language; informal; colloquial; casual

Comic humorous; witty; entertaining; diverting

Compassionate sympathetic; empathetic; warm-hearted; tolerant; kind

Complex having many varying characteristics; complicated

Compliant agree or obey rules; acquiescent; flexible; submissive

Concerned worried; anxious; apprehensive

Conciliatory intended to placate or pacify; appeasing

Condescending stooping to the level of one’s inferiors; patronising

Confused unable to think clearly; bewildered; vague

Contemptuous showing contempt; scornful; insolent; mocking

Critical finding fault; disapproving; scathing; criticizing

Cruel causing pain and suffering; unkind; spiteful; severe

Curious wanting to find out more; inquisitive; questioning

Cynical scornful of motives/virtues of others; mocking; sneering

Defensive defending a position; shielding; guarding; watchful

Defiant obstinate; argumentative; defiant; contentious

70
 Demeaning disrespectful; undignified

Depressing sad, melancholic; discouraging; pessimistic

Derisive snide; sarcastic; mocking; dismissive; scornful

Detached aloof; objective; unfeeling; distant

Dignified serious; respectful; formal; proper

Diplomatic tactful; subtle; sensitive; thoughtful

Disapproving displeased; critical; condemnatory

Disheartening discouraging; demoralising; undermining; depressing

Disparaging dismissive; critical; scornful

Direct straightforward; honest

Disappointed discouraged; unhappy because something has gone wrong

Dispassionate impartial; indifferent; unsentimental; cold; unsympathetic

Distressing heart-breaking; sad; troubling

Docile compliant; submissive; deferential; accommodating

Earnest showing deep sincerity or feeling; serious

Egotistical self-absorbed; selfish; conceited; boastful

Empathetic understanding; kind; sensitive

Encouraging optimistic; supportive

Enthusiastic excited; energetic

Evasive ambiguous; cryptic; unclear

Excited emotionally aroused; stirred

Facetious inappropriate; flippant

Farcical ludicrous; absurd; mocking; humorous and highly improbable

Flippant superficial; glib; shallow; thoughtless; frivolous

Forceful powerful; energetic; confident; assertive

Formal respectful; stilted; factual; following accepted styles/rules

Frank honest; direct; plain; matter-of-fact

Frustrated annoyed; discouraged

Gentle kind; considerate; mild; soft

71
 Ghoulish delighting in the revolting or the loathsome

Grim serious; gloomy; depressing; lacking humour;macabre

Gullible naïve; innocent; ignorant

Hard unfeeling; hard-hearted; unyielding

Humble deferential; modest

Humorous amusing; entertaining; playful

Hypercritical unreasonably critical; hair splitting; nitpicking

Impartial unbiased; neutral; objective

Impassioned filled with emotion; ardent

Imploring pleading; begging

Impressionable trusting; child-like

Inane silly; foolish; stupid; nonsensical

Incensed enraged

Incredulous disbelieving; unconvinced; questioning; suspicious

Indignant annoyed; angry; dissatisfied

Informative instructive; factual; educational

Inspirational encouraging; reassuring

Intense earnest; passionate; concentrated; deeply felt

Intimate familiar; informal; confidential; confessional

Ironic the opposite of what is meant

Irreverent lacking respect for things that are generally taken seriously

Jaded bored; having had too much of the same thing; lack enthusiasm

Joyful positive; optimistic; cheerful; elated

Judgmental critical; finding fault; disparaging

Laudatory praising; recommending

Light-Hearted carefree; relaxed; chatty; humorous

Loving affectionate; showing intense, deep concern

Macabre gruesome; horrifying; frightening

Malicious desiring to harm others or to see others suffer; ill-willed; spiteful

72
 Mean-Spirited inconsiderate; unsympathetic

Mocking scornful; ridiculing; making fun of someone

Mourning grieving; lamenting; woeful

Naïve innocent; unsophisticated; immature

Narcissistic self-admiring; selfish; boastful; self-pitying

Nasty unpleasant; unkind; disagreeable; abusive

Negative unhappy, pessimistic

Nostalgic thinking about the past; wishing for something from the past

Objective without prejudice; without discrimination; fair; based on fact

Obsequious overly obedient and/or submissive; fawning; grovelling

Optimistic hopeful; cheerful

Outraged angered and resentful; furious; extremely angered

Outspoken frank; candid; spoken without reserve

Pathetic expressing pity, sympathy, tenderness

Patronising condescending; scornful; pompous

Pensive reflective; introspective; philosophical; contemplative

Persuasive convincing; eloquent; influential; plausible

Pessimistic seeing the negative side of things

Philosophical theoretical; analytical; rational; logical

Playful full of fun and good spirits; humorous; jesting

Pragmatic realistic; sensible

Pretentious affected; artificial; grandiose; rhetorical; flashy

Regretful apologetic; remorseful

Resentful aggrieved; offended; displeased; bitter

Resigned accepting; unhappy

Restrained controlled; quiet; unemotional

Reverent showing deep respect and esteem

Righteous morally right and just; guiltless; pious; god-fearing

Satirical making fun to show a weakness; ridiculing; derisive

73
 Sarcastic scornful; mocking; ridiculing

Scathing critical; stinging; unsparing; harsh

Scornful expressing contempt or derision; scathing; dismissive

Sensationalisti
provocative; inaccurate; distasteful
c
Sentimental thinking about feelings, especially when remembering the past

Sincere honest; truthful; earnest

Sceptical disbelieving; unconvinced; doubting

Solemn not funny; in earnest; serious

Subjective prejudiced; biased

Submissive compliant; passive; accommodating; obedient

Sulking bad-tempered; grumpy; resentful; sullen

Sympathetic compassionate; understanding of how someone feels

Thoughtful reflective; serious; absorbed

Tolerant open-minded; charitable; patient; sympathetic; lenient

Tragic disastrous; calamitous

Unassuming modest; self-effacing; restrained

Uneasy worried; uncomfortable; edgy; nervous

Urgent insistent; saying something must be done soon

Vindictive vengeful; spiteful; bitter; unforgiving

Virtuous lawful; righteous; moral; upstanding

Whimsical quaint; playful; mischievous; offbeat

Witty clever; quick-witted; entertaining

Wonder awe-struck; admiring; fascinating

World-Weary bored; cynical; tired

Worried anxious; stressed; fearful

Wretched miserable; despairing; sorrowful; distressed

74
75