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EnglandEnglish LiteratureQuick questions
Component 2: Prose
Quick questions on Comparing two prose texts: the integrated comparative essay - Edexcel A-Level English Literature
5short Q&A pairs drawn directly from our worked dot-point answer. For full context and worked exam questions, read the parent dot-point page.
What is a model integrated paragraph?Show answer
"Both novels present the supernatural as a force that exposes the limits of reason, but they place the reader differently in relation to it. The first novel filters the uncanny through a sceptical, educated narrator whose measured prose tries and fails to explain it away, so the reader's growing dread is the reader watching reason lose; the rational diction is undermined by the events it cannot contain. The second novel, by contrast, gives the supernatural no rational frame at all, presenting it in plain, unastonished narration that normalises horror, so the reader's unease comes from the text's refusal to be disturbed.
What is a weak paragraph upgraded?Show answer
A text-by-text answer might give three paragraphs to text A's supernatural and three to text B's, then a closing paragraph noting "both use the supernatural to question reason". Upgraded, those become idea-led paragraphs (the supernatural and the narrator, the supernatural and structure, the supernatural and the reader's fear), each comparing both novels within it. The content is unchanged; the AO4 band rises because the comparison is continuous.
What is q1?Show answer
What should a comparative thesis name? [2 marks]
What is q2?Show answer
Why is idea-led structure better than text-by-text for AO4? [2 marks]
What is q3?Show answer
Compare how your two prose texts present a shared aspect of the theme, keeping both texts live in every paragraph. [20 marks]
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