IB English paper 1: unseen tips

IB English PAPER 1 (Unseen) Tips

o Read the question - highlight key words within it. o Read the poem / extract o Read the question again o Read the text again and annotate / highlight Thesis Statement Start with a strong, confident and authoritative statement.

By all means use the question to help you get going – but then state your point and try to adopt a good academic register (perhaps even hinting at the structure of your essay with a tricolon, e.g. ‘In this sonnet, Shakespeare addresses the theme of marriage: what it isn’t (perhaps as a way for him, and the reader, to work towards the understanding true love); then he discusses its resilience; and finally how it is as powerful and eternal as Time itself.’ KEY TIP: Trust your instinct! If you think the poem is about ‘x’ – then it is. If you think the writer wrote this poem because of ‘y’ – then you are correct. If you think the effect is ‘z’ – then you are correct. Just remember to back up your points with apt quotations and evidence, evidence which you analyse.

WHAT CAN WE SAY ABOUT A POEM? • What attitude towards main theme (e.g. love) does the poet seem generally to have? • What is the significance of the title , if any? • Has the poet adopted a persona ? If so, who are they being? Why is this effective? • What are the main ideas (thoughts and feelings) about love in the poem? • Do the ideas and attitudes link in with ideas and attitudes that were prevalent at the time in which the poem was written? • What is the main tone in the poem ? Are there any tone shifts ? • Is there direct address: ‘you’ – and is he / she talking to the reader, or perhaps even himself / herself… • Which features of language (rhetorical devices/selection of images and words for effect) does the poet use to express his/her thoughts and feelings? Look especially at the use of the following as far as imagery is concerned: simile/metaphor/personification/symbolism/literal images. Look at the use of the following as far as sound is concerned: sibilance/assonance, onomatopoeia/alliteration/dissonance/hard consonant sounds. • For form , look how the poet uses the following: rhyme (including half rhymes)/rhythm/stanza lengths/line lengths/number of syllables in a line/special layout features (shape)/enjambment/end-stopped lines/caesuras. • Structure : What sort of effect would the beginning and end of the poem have on the reader? Why? • How does the poet develop his or her thoughts in the poem? Is there a line of argument that we can trace through the stanzas? Is the way s/he has done this effective? Why? • Has the poet tried to give the effect of c ontrast by his/her placing of the stanzas? Academic Register Caesura / enjambment / pivotal moment / connotations / elegy / unrequited loves / cathartic / sibilance / onomatopoeia / simile / metaphor / personification

The following was inspired by an incident during the writer’s time at school.

- Simon Armitage, ‘The Shout’, (2004). How does the writer portray the speaker’s recollections of the other character in this piece?

WHAT CAN WE SAY ABOUT A PLAY EXTRACT? • What attitude towards (main theme) does the playwright seem generally to have? • What are the main ideas about (main theme) in the extract? • Do the ideas and attitudes link in with ideas and attitudes that were prevalent at the time in which the play was written? • What is the main mood created on stage by the dialogue and action that are presented in the extract? Are there any mood shifts ? • How are the characters presented through what they say and what they do in the extract? Which features of language (rhetorical/ devices/selection of images and words for effect) does the playwright give the characters to express their thoughts and feelings ? • What use does the playwright make in the extract of stage directions: reference to props/settings (place)/lighting/sound/characters’ actions and reactions? Are the references to props /settings/lighting and sound to be taken at face value or do they have a symbolic significance? • What use does the playwright make of soliloquies/monologues/asides ? • What use does the playwright make of length of speeches/ types of speech sentences/pausing and rhythms ? • What use does the playwright make of switches between prose and verse ? • If the extract is in blank verse , how does the playwright manipulate the verse form (differences in metre ) to create effects? • What sort of effect would the beginning and end of the extract have on the audience? • What about the timing of entrances and exits ? • Is there a climax in the extract? If so, how is it built up to ? • Have the speeches been so placed (juxtaposed?) that a sense of contrast / similarity is created? Academic Register Soliloquy / monologue / denouement / rhetorical question / chiasmus / tricolon / anaphora / stichomythia / dramatic irony / empathy / sympathy

DRAMA EXTRACT

Arthur Miller, Death of a Salesman , (1949)

How does the writer portray family relationships in this extract?

WHAT CAN WE SAY ABOUT A PROSE EXTRACT? • What attitude towards the major theme (e.g. regret) does the writer seem generally to have? • What are the writer’s main thoughts and feelings (ideas) about love in the extract? • Do the ideas and attitudes link in with ideas and attitudes that were prevalent at the time in which the novel was written? • What is the writer’s main tone ? Are there any tone shifts ? • What verbs has the writer used – particularly as a short cut to character insights, e.g. strutted / skulked or smiled / smirked or laughed / chortled. • Free Indirect Discourse: ‘Perhaps I would win after all…’ / ‘Could I make it out alive?’ Look for FID embedded in the text as the writer takes us into the character’s head…’Perhaps’ / italics and rhetorical questions sometimes signify this. • How are the characters presented through what they say and what they do in the extract? Which features of language (rhetorical devices/selection of images and words for effect) does the novelist give the characters to express their thoughts and feelings and how does s/he describe them when they’re not speaking? • How are places (inside/outside) described? What mood or atmosphere of the place is created by the writer’s language? Does the way they’re described help us to understand the characters better, in terms of their natures and states of mind? (Symbolism - pathetic fallacy?) • What use does the writer make of narrative point of view (1 st /2 nd /3 rd person/omniscient narrator/multiple narrative voices/interior monologue/direct address to reader)? • What particular form does the prose extract take (letter/diary/description/extended reflection &c) and how does the choice of this form help him/her to achieve their purpose? • Is there an embedded narrative within the extract, such as a letter, diary, newspaper extract? If so, how does it help the writer achieve his/her purpose? • What use does the writer make of length of sentences? • What about the rhythms (i.e. patterned repetition) created by the writer in the writing.

• What sort of effect would the beginning and end of the extract have on the audience? Is it a linear structure or a cyclical one? Is the reader left in suspense/uncertain at the end because of the way the extract is finished? • What effect is made of contrast in the extract? • What use is made by the writer of the balance s/he makes in the extract between dialogue and narration , reflection and description ? • What use does the writer make in terms of his/her handling of time in the extract? What use is made of flashback in the extract, for instance, or the use of changes in tense ? • Is there a climax in the extract? If so, how is it built up to?

Academic Register Onomatopoeia / sibilance / personification / repetition / pivotal moment / catalyst / simile / metaphor / Free Indirect Discourse / veracity / verisimilitude

All that week she couldn't decide whether she was a lollipop or a roman candle--through her dreams, dreams that promised uninterrupted sleep through many vacation mornings, drove a series of long, incalculable murmuring in tune with the put-put-put of their cut-outs, "I love you--I love you," over and over. She wrote in the evening: Dear Ridge: When I think of not being able to come to the freshman dance with you this June, I could lie down and die, but mother is sort of narrow-minded in some ways, and she feels that sixteen is too young to go to a prom; and Lil Hammel's mother feels the same way. When I think of you dancing around with some other girl and hear you handing her a line, like you do to everybody, I could lie down and scream. Oh, I know-- because a girl here at school met you after I left Hot Springs at Easter. Anyhow, if you start rushing some other kid when you come out to Ed Bement's house party this summer, I intend to cut her throat, or my own, or something desperate. And probably no one will even be sorry I'm dead. Ha-ha-- Summer, summer, summer--bland inland sun and friendly rain. Lake Forest, with its thousand enchanted verandas, the dancing on the outdoor platform at the club, and always the boys, centaurs, in new cars. Her mother came East to meet her, and as they walked together out of the Grand Central Station, the symphony of promise became so loud that Josephine's face was puckered and distorted, as with the pressure of strong sunshine. "We've got the best plans," her mother said. "Oh, what? What, mother?" "A real change. I'll tell you all about it when we get to the hotel." There was a sudden discord; a shadow fell upon Josephine's heart. "What do you mean? Aren't we going to Lake Forest?" "Some place much better"--her mother's voice was alarmingly cheerful. "I'm saving it till we get to the hotel." Before Mrs. Perry had left Chicago, she and Josephine's father had decided, from observations of their own and some revelations on the part of their elder daughter, Constance, that Josephine knew her way around Lake Forest all too well. The place had changed in the twenty years that it had been the summer rendezvous of fashionable Chicago; less circumscribed children of new families were resoundingly in evidence and, like most parents, Mrs. Perry thought of her daughter as one easily led into mischief by others. The more impartial eyes of other members of the colony had long regarded Josephine herself as the principal agent of corruption. But, preventive or penalty, the appalling thing to Josephine was that the Perrys were going to a "nice quiet place" this summer. "Mother, I simply can't go to Island Farms. I simply--"

"Father feels--" "Why don't you take me to a reform school if I'm so awful? Or to state's penitentiary? I simply can't go to a horrible old farm with a lot of country jakes and no fun and no friends except a lot of hicks." "But, dear, it's not like that at all. They just call it Island Farms. In fact, your aunt's place isn't a farm; it's really a nice little resort up in Michigan where lots of people spend the summer. Tennis and swimming and--and fishing." "Fishing?" repeated Josephine incredulously. "Do you call that something to do?" She shook her head in mute incomprehension. "I'll just be forgotten, that's all. When it's my year to come out nobody will know who I am. They'll just say, 'Who in heck is this Josephine Perry? I never saw her around here.' 'Oh, she's just some hick from a horrible old farm up in Michigan. Let's not invite her.' Just when everybody else is having a wonderful time--" "Nobody'll forget you in one summer, dear." "Yes, they will. Everybody'll have new friends and know new dances, and I'll be up there in the backwoods, full of hayseed, forgetting everything I know. If it's so wonderful why isn't Constance coming?" Lying awake in their drawing-room on the Twentieth Century, Josephine brooded upon the terrible injustice of it all. She knew that her mother was going on her account, and mostly because of the gossip of a few ugly and jealous girls. These ugly and jealous girls, her relentless enemies, were not entirely creatures of Josephine's imagination. There was something in the frank sensuousness of her beauty that plain women found absolutely intolerable; they stared at her in a frightened, guarded way. It was only recently that gossip had begun to worry Josephine. Her own theory was that, though at thirteen or fourteen she had been "speedy"--a convenient word that lacked the vulgar implication of "fast"--she was now trying to do her best, and a difficult enough business it was, without the past being held against her; for the only thing she cared about in the world was being in love and being with the person she currently loved. Toward midnight her mother spoke to her softly and found that she was asleep. Turning on the berth light, she looked for a moment at the flushed young face, smoothed now of all its disappointment by a faint, peculiar smile. She leaned over and kissed Josephine's brow, behind which, doubtless, were passing in review those tender and eagerly awaited orgies of which she was to be deprived this summer. From F. Scott Fitzgerald, ‘A Nice Quiet Place’, (1930) How does the writer present the protagonist in this extract?

As the streets that lead from the Strand to the Embankment are very narrow, it is better not to walk down them arm-in-arm. If you persist, lawyers’ clerks will have to make flying leaps into the mud; young lady typists will have to fidget behind you. In the streets of London where beauty goes unregarded, eccentricity must pay the penalty, and it is better not to be very tall, to wear a long blue cloak, or to beat the air with your left hand. One afternoon in the beginning of October when the traffic was becoming brisk a tall man strode along the edge of the pavement with a lady on his arm. Angry glances struck upon their backs. The small, agitated figures—for in comparison with this couple most people looked small—decorated with fountain pens, and burdened with despatch-boxes, had appointments to keep, and drew a weekly salary, so that there was some reason for the unfriendly stare which was bestowed upon Mr. Ambrose’s height and upon Mrs. Ambrose’s cloak. But some enchantment had put both man and woman beyond the reach of malice and unpopularity. In his case one might guess from the moving lips that it was thought; and in hers from the eyes fixed stonily straight in front of her at a level above the eyes of most that it was sorrow. It was only by scorning all she met that she kept herself from tears, and the friction of people brushing past her was evidently painful. After watching the traffic on the Embankment for a minute or two with a stoical gaze she twitched her husband’s sleeve, and they crossed between the swift discharge of motor cars. When they were safe on the further side, she gently withdrew her arm from his, allowing her mouth at the same time to relax, to tremble; then tears rolled down, and leaning her elbows on the balustrade, she shielded her face from the curious. Mr. Ambrose attempted consolation; he patted her shoulder; but she showed no signs of admitting him, and feeling it awkward to stand beside a grief that was greater than his, he crossed his arms behind him, and took a turn along the pavement. The embankment juts out in angles here and there, like pulpits; instead of preachers, however, small boys occupy them, dangling string, dropping pebbles, or launching wads of paper for a cruise. With their sharp eye for eccentricity, they were inclined to think Mr. Ambrose awful; but the quickest witted cried “Bluebeard!” as he passed. In case they should proceed to tease his wife, Mr. Ambrose flourished his stick at them, upon which they decided that he was grotesque merely, and four instead of one cried “Bluebeard!” in chorus. Although Mrs. Ambrose stood quite still, much longer than is natural, the little boys let her be. Some one is always looking into the river near Waterloo Bridge; a couple will stand there talking for half an hour on a fine afternoon; most people, walking for pleasure, contemplate for three minutes; when, having compared the occasion with other occasions, or made some sentence, they pass on. Sometimes the flats and churches and hotels of Westminster are like the outlines of Constantinople in a mist; sometimes the river is an opulent purple, sometimes mud-coloured, sometimes sparkling blue like the sea. It is always worth while to look down and see what is happening. But this lady looked neither up nor down; the only thing she had seen, since she stood there, was a circular iridescent patch slowly floating past

with a straw in the middle of it. The straw and the patch swam again and again behind the tremulous medium of a great welling tear, and the tear rose and fell and dropped into the river. Then there struck close upon her ears— Lars Porsena of Clusium By the nine Gods he swore— and then more faintly, as if the speaker had passed her on his walk— Yes, she knew she must go back to all that, but at present she must weep. Screening her face she sobbed more steadily than she had yet done, her shoulders rising and falling with great regularity. It was this figure that her husband saw when, having reached the polished Sphinx, having entangled himself with a man selling picture postcards, he turned; the stanza instantly stopped. He came up to her, laid his hand on her shoulder, and said, “Dearest.” His voice was supplicating. But she shut her face away from him, as much as to say, “You can’t possibly understand.” As he did not leave her, however, she had to wipe her eyes, and to raise them to the level of the factory chimneys on the other bank. She saw also the arches of Waterloo Bridge and the carts moving across them, like the line of animals in a shooting gallery. They were seen blankly, but to see anything was of course to end her weeping and begin to walk. “I would rather walk,” she said, her husband having hailed a cab already occupied by two city men. The fixity of her mood was broken by the action of walking. The shooting motor cars, more like spiders in the moon than terrestrial objects, the thundering drays, the jingling hansoms, and little black broughams, made her think of the world she lived in. Somewhere up there above the pinnacles where the smoke rose in a pointed hill, her children were now asking for her, and getting a soothing reply. As for the mass of streets, squares, and public buildings which parted them, she only felt at this moment how little London had done to make her love it, although thirty of her forty years had been spent in a street. She knew how to read the people who were passing her; there were the rich who were running to and from each others’ houses at this hour; there were the bigoted workers driving in a straight line to their offices; there were the poor who were unhappy and rightly malignant. Already, though there was sunlight in the haze, tattered old men and women were nodding off to sleep upon the seats. When one gave up seeing the beauty that clothed things, this was the skeleton beneath From Virginia Woolf, The Voyage Out , (1915) How does the writer present human relationships in this extract? That the Great House of Tarquin Should suffer wrong no more.

Essay Tips: The Conclusion A conclusion is arguably the most important part of your essay: the culmination of your thoughts and analysis. o Re-read the question – address it. o End with a flourish – perhaps using rhetorical devices to do so with style. o Perhaps show some personal engagement: Having thought about it…It was very moving when… o It may not hurt to show that you know how to use punctuation for effect, e.g. There is one overriding theme in this poem: guilt.