hello everybody welcome to today's video
as if learning one modern text 15 poems
and being ready to analyze two unseen
poems isn't enough the AQA English
literature paper to exam also requires
you to make two crucial choices your
choice of question in Section a and your
choice of comparative poem in Section B
in this video I'll give you some advice
on how to make the best choices now
let's start by looking at section a most
people study and inspector calls for
this section so I'll use some sample
questions for that text as an example in
this video but the same applies no
matter what text you study you'll be
presented with two questions on your
modern prose or drama text and you'll
need to choose one to answer so the
first question is how do I choose which
question to answer
now it's human nature to have a gut
reaction to the questions let me show
you what I mean
let's look at these two how does
Priestley use the character of sheila
Burling to explore ideas about gender
and then inspector calls
how does Priestley explore the
importance of time in an inspector calls
okay so your gut reaction here might be
that the first question is the hardest
it's restrictive it's very narrowly
focused because it's not just about
Sheila and it's not just about gender
it's about how Sheila is used to present
gender and these tightly focused
questions do put some people off some
people like them others are put off by
them the second question on time is more
open you could write about a number of
different things there but my advice is
don't just assume your gut reaction was
right and start writing your answer stop
and pause and think you might have one
good idea for one of the questions that
springs to mind but one idea is not
enough for a full answer this is a two
hour 15 minute exam with a total of 96
marks and that means you should spend
around 1.5 minutes per mark available so
something about 50 minutes on section a
40 minutes on section B and 45 minutes
on section C now if you're going to be
spending 50 minutes on this question
even allowing five minutes to check your
technical accuracy at the end for those
four marks awarded for spanning
punctuation and grammar you're going to
need more than one good idea to write
about so I personally would recommend
you ignore that gut reaction to the
questions and give yourself just
thirty seconds or so to think through
each question think about what you know
about the question think about the
points you could make if you feel
confident on both which question would
allow you to make your most
sophisticated points which question
would allow you to present a
conceptualized response a line of
argument a hypothesis which you can
explore throughout your answer so for me
I'd look at this question on Sheila and
gender and pretty quickly I'd realize
there's a great answer I could write
here despite my first impressions I'd
look at society's expectations of women
being different to society's
expectations of men as presented through
Sheila how at first she's presented as
immature her reference to her parents as
mummy and daddy infantilizes her she's
presented as materialistic looking at
the engagement ring admiringly I perhaps
draw out the wider message of women
being treated differently to men looking
at Priestley's message of inequality
that we see throughout the play I'd
bring in some context about attitudes to
women as well but of course Sheila
changes throughout the play and by the
end refers to mrs. Birling as mother two
simple words their mummy mother which
symbolized that change I'd explore her
by the end she's taken on not only the
message of the inspector but also his
words she mirrors his language of fire
and blood and anguish when he's left and
her sentences grow in length from the
beginning of the play to the end and
again linked to Priestley's message of
how we are members of one body we're
responsible for each other and being
members of that one body includes
different genders priests Lee's arguing
that the inequality experienced by women
is unjust how any inequality is unjust
is pretty much the whole message of the
play isn't it now with the time question
I might write about the choice to set
the play at a different time to when it
was written and why that matters how the
play takes place in one continual time
frame but I get the sense that my points
would be more disjointed and not as
conceptualized as the gender question so
for me I would choose that first
question and once you make your choice
you want to stick to it there's nothing
worse than wasting 15 minutes on a
question before realizing it's not the
one for you once you've chosen your
question stick to it write out a plan I
go through why you should do that in my
final tips video from a couple of days
ago and then write your answer and just
to say the plan is for your benefit it
doesn't have to be
neatly in full sentences and that kind
of thing here's an example from a 20-18
paper this is a full marks paper and the
students plan here is pretty messy
they're writing an abbreviation as
they're writing in single words and it's
all over the place but it's for their
benefit it did what it was supposed to
do it enabled them to think to plan and
order their thoughts and just to say
this student put a line through their
plan you don't have to do that you can
do it if you feel better doing that but
you don't have to and then you get
writing and I'm not going to go over how
you should write your answer in this
video check out my literature paper to
playlist for more advice on that okay
let's move on to Section B in Section B
you have another choice to make you're
presented with one poem and asked to
compare it to a different poem now let
me show you how I would personally
choose that second poem with a sample
question from power and conflict compare
how poets present the reality of war in
charge of the Light Brigade and one of
the poem okay so the first thing I would
do here is to read through and annotate
the named poem not annotate everything I
remember about it but anything I
remember or even see for the first time
there seems to be significant in light
of the question about the reality of war
so I might immediately remember the
repeated refrain and how this poem is a
ballad how a ballad is a form of poetry
used to present a message which should
be remembered and in this poem there are
really two messages number one the
bravery of the soldiers in the face of
suffering at the hands of a more
powerful enemy and number two the
mistakes which led to their unnecessary
deaths so I would think about how the
reality of war is that there is great
bravery involved in the face of
suffering but also that the need for
that suffering is in itself questionable
I might pick up the biblical imagery of
the valley of death linking to Psalm 23
the psalm of David and again think about
the great bravery of the soldiers who
like David when he took on Goliath in
the Bible are fighting a foe where they
are quite clearly the underdogs and
suffer terribly as a result and I might
pick up that line someone had blundered
and think about how this line breaks the
use of dactylic diameter to draw
emphasis to the blunder the mistake
which led to the pointless massacre and
on it goes so I'd have a strong grasp on
the question the reality of war is that
it demands great bravery from those in
as they face unimaginable suffering but
it is ultimately unnecessary and then
with that in mind I would think about my
second poem now the names of the poems
are printed in the question paper so I
would literally go through one by one
and think about which poem would make a
good comparison in light of the question
I'm being asked so Ozymandias know it's
not about war London no and on you go
and in this case I might choose exposure
it definitely points out the suffering
of the soldiers who suffered not at the
hands of a great armed enemy but at the
hands of the weather the iced east winds
that knife us but there's also a second
similarity the bravery and suffering is
pointless because nothing happens the
way it stands our builds up structurally
but then is anticlimactic at the end
shows that and by the way all of these
points I'm mentioning about the poems
are covered in my poetry analysis videos
I've made videos on every single poem so
make sure you have a look at those so
the point is simple don't just rush in
give yourself some time to think about
your question in Section a and your
second poem is section B and of course
I've not mentioned Section C unseen
poetry in this video but I do have three
videos on that in my literature paper to
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