Task 2: How to Get Full Marks (OCR A Level English Literature)

Genre feature

Contextual considerations

Cultural diversity

• The unseen passage may reflect the cultural diversity and associated issues in America in the time period 1880-1940

• There may be a sense of a collective or individual ‘American identity’

• There may also be tensions and/or a sense of the cultural melting pot that was America during this time period

Class

• In a society where almost everyone is in pursuit of the rewards of capitalism, social divisions will naturally widen

The American Dream

• This covers a complex group of aspirations and frustrations, and can either be celebrated or satirised

Social mobility

• This may include the effect of technological progress and new inventions

Historical context

• The date of the unseen passage should give a clue as to how it relates to broad historical matters, but do not be tempted to focus on this

Contextual area

Contextual considerations

Presence of the past

• An often-used Gothic approach is to show how the past of a building or community can resonate in the imagination of its present-day inhabitants

Unusual narrative voice/viewpoint

• Writers of Gothic literature often make use of multiple narrators, unusual viewpoints and/or narrative voices

Suspense

• This style of writing is full of suspense in order to build tension and to strengthen the reader’s emotional response

The supernatural

• This is often a feature whereby the reader is invited to suspend their disbelief and read the story as a kind of metaphor

Dark humour

• Human resistance against horror often can involve the use of dark humour as a coping mechanism

Female victimhood

• These are the stereotypical ‘damsels in distress’

• However, it is also important to consider any subversion of this feature, such as a male character becoming the victim

Contextual area

Contextual considerations

Setting

• Is the passage set in the near or the distant future?

• A more technologically advanced setting suggests a more science fiction-led approach

• Whereas a setting which seems more plausible suggests a more speculative approach

Dystopia or fallen utopia

• Sometimes a dystopian society may start out with utopian aspirations or good intentions

Satirical purpose

• Often this genre satirises a tendency within human nature or an undesirable aspect of society

• Works of dystopian literature may also include the effects of the advancement of technology on humankind

Narrative approach

• Dystopian literature often makes use of a limited narrative viewpoint

• This controls what the reader learns of the world created

Totalitarian regimes, oppression and surveillance

• Dystopian worlds tend to restrict identity, freedoms and independent thought

• Being watched, or the threat of being watched, maintains control through fear and suspicion

Contextual area

Contextual considerations

Attitudes towards women

• The time span for this topic runs from the early 19th to the 21st century, so the handling of women’s issues will vary

• You may wish to look for efforts by novelists of either gender to expose the differences in the ways that male sexual promiscuity is treated much less harshly than that of women

• This may also incorporate consideration of the different waves of feminism

The female viewpoint

• Consider if the passage offers a female voice or point of view, or provides direct access to a woman’s inner life

• There may be opportunities to examine inner monologues

Marriage

• Before the industrial revolution, marriage was the most efficient means of transferring wealth, and therefore became a vocation for many women

• You might consider the impact marriage and its boundaries have upon any women in the passage

Women in the workplace

• Consider the fact that generally most of the work done by women in these texts will be unpaid

Women as defined by men

• Consider the conflict between what roles are sought by women, and what roles are given to them

Contextual area

Contextual considerations

Linguistic confusion

• This means the character(s) may be separated by language from the culture they join, furthering a sense of alienation and isolation

Generational conflict

• There may be conflict between the first generation immigrant not wanting to let go of the culture or identity of their homeland, versus the second generation wishing to (or feeling more pressure to) assimilate with their new, adopted culture

Social mobility

• Is there any? Are the characters trapped, or moving upwards socially?

Prejudice/discrimination

• Differences of ethnicity or faith set up tensions with the receiving culture

Staying true to cultural roots

• There is often pressure to assimilate with the receiving culture, which is at conflict with the desire to remain true to cultural traditions, beliefs and practices

When was the text written?

Where and when is the setting of the text?

What problems (social/economic/political) can you see in the text and do these reflect any social, political or economic problems or issues at the time and place of writing?

Who has the power in this text? What social issues does this represent?

How might the date of publication relate to events in the text or its setting?

What social issues are presented in the passage? How does the author engage with gender, race and/or class?

What are the gender dynamics in the passage? Do these reflect anything about the time of writing? Has anything changed?

How was the text received at the time of publication, versus how is it received today?

Have attitudes towards the text changed over time?

Proposition

The imagined settings of dystopian novels reflect the social and historical contexts in which they were written

Similarities and differences

The Handmaid’s Tale

1984

Atwood sets her novel in a fictional Cambridge, Massachusetts, indirectly linking the fictional setting of Gilead with the historical Puritan society which existed there hundreds of years earlier

The setting of Oceania and a totalitarian regime are reflective of Orwell’s experiences of the Spanish Civil War and consideration of Hitler’s Germany during WWII

Many of the practices of Gilead are reminiscent of those of 17th-century Puritanism in New England

The citizens of Oceania are indoctrinated into an alternative version of history which fits with the Party’s political narrative, similar to Nazi Germany

Being watched, or the threat of being watched, is ever present via the “Eyes”, with the fear of being deported to the Colonies or hanged used as a way of suppressing any active or thought of resistance

Orwell’s protagonist, Winston Smith, lives in a world of constant surveillance, via giant television screens and Big Brother “watching you”

Atwood wrote her novel in the 1980s, and the use of CCTV had become a more popular solution from the 1970s onwards to manage business security

Although written before the advent of CCTV, Orwell’s form of speculative fiction imagined a world in which increased surveillance would be a key feature