AS
ENGLISH LITERATURE B ACTUAL 2025
PAPER MERGED WITH MARK SCHEME
Paper 2A Literary genres: Prose and Poetry: Aspects of tragedy
Friday 23 May 2025 Morning Time allowed: 1 hour 30 minutes
Materials
For this paper you must have:
• an AQA 12-page answer book
• a copy of the set text(s) you have studied. These texts must not be annotated and must not contain
additional notes or materials.
Instructions
• Use black ink or black ball-point pen.
• Write the information required on the front of your answer book. The Paper Reference is 7716/2A.
• Do all rough work in your answer book. Cross through any work you do not want to be marked.
• You must answer one question from Section A and one question from Section B.
Information
• The maximum mark for this paper is 50.
• The marks for questions are shown in brackets.
• You will be marked on your ability to:
– use good English
– organise information clearly
– use specialist vocabulary where appropriate.
• In your response you need to:
– analyse carefully the writers’ methods
– explore the contexts of the texts you are writing about – explore the connections across the texts
you have studied – explore different interpretations of your texts.
, 2
IB/G/Jun25/G4003/E2 7716/2A
Section A
Answer one question from this section.
Either
0 1 John Keats selection
Explore the significance of the endings of Keats’ poems in relation to aspects of tragedy.
You must refer to The Eve of St Agnes and at least one other poem.
In your answer you need to analyse closely Keats’ authorial methods and include
comments on the extract below.
[25 marks]
From The Eve of St Agnes
XL
She hurried at his words, beset with fears,
For there were sleeping dragons all around, At
glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears –
Down the wide stairs a darkling way they
found.
In all the house was heard no human sound.
A chain-drooped lamp was flickering by each door;
The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hound,
Fluttered in the besieging wind’s uproar; And
the long carpets rose along the gusty floor.
XLI
They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall;
Like phantoms, to the iron porch, they glide;
Where lay the Porter, in uneasy sprawl, With
a huge empty flaggon by his side:
The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide,
But his sagacious eye an inmate owns.
By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide –
The chains lie silent on the footworn stones – The
key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans.
IB/G/Jun25/7716/2A
, 3
XLII
And they are gone – ay, ages long ago
These lovers fled away into the storm. That
night the Baron dreamt of many a woe,
And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form
Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm,
Were long be-nightmared. Angela the old
Died palsy-twitched, with meagre face deform;
The Beadsman, after thousand aves told,
For aye unsought for slept among his ashes cold.
or
0 2 Thomas Hardy selection
Explore the significance of the endings of Hardy’s poems in relation to aspects of tragedy.
You must refer to The Going and at least one other poem.
In your answer you need to analyse closely Hardy’s authorial methods and include
comments on the extract below.
[25 marks]
From The Going
Why, then, latterly did we not speak,
Did we not think of those days long dead,
And ere your vanishing strive to seek
That time’s renewal? We might have said,
‘In this bright spring weather We’ll
visit together
Those places that once we visited.’
Well, well! All’s past amend, Unchangeable.
It must go.
I seem but a dead man held on end
To sink down soon . . . O you could not know
That such swift fleeing
No soul foreseeing –
Not even I – would undo me so!
December 1912
Turn over for the next question
IB/G/Jun25/7716/2A
, 4
Turn over ►
or
0 3 Poetry Anthology: Tragedy
Explore the significance of the endings of poems in Poetry Anthology: Tragedy in relation
to aspects of tragedy.
You must refer to The Convergence of the Twain and at least one other poem.
In your answer you need to analyse closely the poets’ authorial methods and include
comments on the extract below.
[25 marks]
From The Convergence of the Twain
8
And as the smart ship grew
In stature, grace, and hue,
In shadowy silent distance grew the Iceberg too.
9
Alien they seemed to be:
No mortal eye could see
The intimate welding of their later history,
10
Or sign that they were bent
By paths coincident
On being anon twin halves of one august event.
11
IB/G/Jun25/7716/2A
ENGLISH LITERATURE B ACTUAL 2025
PAPER MERGED WITH MARK SCHEME
Paper 2A Literary genres: Prose and Poetry: Aspects of tragedy
Friday 23 May 2025 Morning Time allowed: 1 hour 30 minutes
Materials
For this paper you must have:
• an AQA 12-page answer book
• a copy of the set text(s) you have studied. These texts must not be annotated and must not contain
additional notes or materials.
Instructions
• Use black ink or black ball-point pen.
• Write the information required on the front of your answer book. The Paper Reference is 7716/2A.
• Do all rough work in your answer book. Cross through any work you do not want to be marked.
• You must answer one question from Section A and one question from Section B.
Information
• The maximum mark for this paper is 50.
• The marks for questions are shown in brackets.
• You will be marked on your ability to:
– use good English
– organise information clearly
– use specialist vocabulary where appropriate.
• In your response you need to:
– analyse carefully the writers’ methods
– explore the contexts of the texts you are writing about – explore the connections across the texts
you have studied – explore different interpretations of your texts.
, 2
IB/G/Jun25/G4003/E2 7716/2A
Section A
Answer one question from this section.
Either
0 1 John Keats selection
Explore the significance of the endings of Keats’ poems in relation to aspects of tragedy.
You must refer to The Eve of St Agnes and at least one other poem.
In your answer you need to analyse closely Keats’ authorial methods and include
comments on the extract below.
[25 marks]
From The Eve of St Agnes
XL
She hurried at his words, beset with fears,
For there were sleeping dragons all around, At
glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears –
Down the wide stairs a darkling way they
found.
In all the house was heard no human sound.
A chain-drooped lamp was flickering by each door;
The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hound,
Fluttered in the besieging wind’s uproar; And
the long carpets rose along the gusty floor.
XLI
They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall;
Like phantoms, to the iron porch, they glide;
Where lay the Porter, in uneasy sprawl, With
a huge empty flaggon by his side:
The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide,
But his sagacious eye an inmate owns.
By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide –
The chains lie silent on the footworn stones – The
key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans.
IB/G/Jun25/7716/2A
, 3
XLII
And they are gone – ay, ages long ago
These lovers fled away into the storm. That
night the Baron dreamt of many a woe,
And all his warrior-guests, with shade and form
Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm,
Were long be-nightmared. Angela the old
Died palsy-twitched, with meagre face deform;
The Beadsman, after thousand aves told,
For aye unsought for slept among his ashes cold.
or
0 2 Thomas Hardy selection
Explore the significance of the endings of Hardy’s poems in relation to aspects of tragedy.
You must refer to The Going and at least one other poem.
In your answer you need to analyse closely Hardy’s authorial methods and include
comments on the extract below.
[25 marks]
From The Going
Why, then, latterly did we not speak,
Did we not think of those days long dead,
And ere your vanishing strive to seek
That time’s renewal? We might have said,
‘In this bright spring weather We’ll
visit together
Those places that once we visited.’
Well, well! All’s past amend, Unchangeable.
It must go.
I seem but a dead man held on end
To sink down soon . . . O you could not know
That such swift fleeing
No soul foreseeing –
Not even I – would undo me so!
December 1912
Turn over for the next question
IB/G/Jun25/7716/2A
, 4
Turn over ►
or
0 3 Poetry Anthology: Tragedy
Explore the significance of the endings of poems in Poetry Anthology: Tragedy in relation
to aspects of tragedy.
You must refer to The Convergence of the Twain and at least one other poem.
In your answer you need to analyse closely the poets’ authorial methods and include
comments on the extract below.
[25 marks]
From The Convergence of the Twain
8
And as the smart ship grew
In stature, grace, and hue,
In shadowy silent distance grew the Iceberg too.
9
Alien they seemed to be:
No mortal eye could see
The intimate welding of their later history,
10
Or sign that they were bent
By paths coincident
On being anon twin halves of one august event.
11
IB/G/Jun25/7716/2A
