2024_OCR: A Level English Literature H472/02 Comparative and Contextual Study (Merged Question Paper & Marking Scheme)

2024_OCR: A Level English Literature H472/02 Comparative and Contextual Study (Merged Question Paper & Marking Scheme) Key Areas to Revise: 1. Comparative Analysis  Textual Comparison: Compare themes, characters, and stylistic elements.  Themes: Explore key themes (e.g., power, identity, love) and their development.  Characters: Analyze character roles and relationships across texts.  Language & Style: Examine how language, imagery, and structure convey meaning. 2. Contextual Study  Historical & Social Context: Understand the period's influence on themes and characters. 3. Intertextuality  Connections: Explore references or influences between texts. 4. Critical Perspectives  Approaches: Use readings like feminism, Marxism, etc., for deeper analysis.  Multiple Readings: Be open to different interpretations. 5. Exam Technique  Focused Comparisons: Directly compare key elements.  Evidence: Support with specific textual references.  Contextual Awareness: Link analysis to context for deeper insight. Wednesday 5 June 2024 – Morning A Level English Literature H472/02 Comparative and contextual study Time allowed: 2 hours 30 minutes You must have: • the OCR 12-page Answer Booklet Oxford Cambridge and RSA INSTRUCTIONS • Use black ink. • Write your answer to each question in the Answer Booklet. The question numbers must be clearly shown. • Fill in the boxes on the front of the Answer Booklet. • Answer two questions from the topic you have chosen. INFORMATION • The total mark for this paper is 60. • The marks for each question are shown in brackets [ ]. • This document has 16 pages. ADVICE • Read each question carefully before you start your answer. © OCR 2024 [601/4725/8] DC (ST) 318956/5 OCR is an exempt Charity Turn over ** 2 BLANK PAGE © OCR 2024 H472/02 Jun24 3 Answer two questions from the topic you have chosen. Topics Questions American Literature 1880–1940 Pages 1 & 2 The Gothic 4–5 3 & 4 Dystopia 6–7 5 & 6 Women in Literature 8–9 7 & 8 The Immigrant Experience 10–11 9 & 10 12–13 Turn over © OCR 2024 H472/02 Jun24 American Literature 1880–1940 4 Answer Question 1. Then answer Question 2(a) or 2(b) or 2(c). You should spend about 1 hour and 15 minutes on each question. 1 Write a critical appreciation of this passage, relating your discussion to your reading of American Literature 1880–1940. [30] This story concerns two married couples, the Hallorans and the McCorkerys. Mrs Halloran (born Lacey Mahaffy) disapproves of Mr McCorkery and his wife, Rosie. Mr McCorkery is involved in the world of city politics in New York. The McCorkerys for years had invited [Mr. Halloran] and Lacey to come over to the house and be sociable with the crowd, but Lacey would not. ‘You can’t run with that fast set and drink and stay out nights and hold your job,’ said Lacey, ‘and you should know better than to ask your wife to associate with that woman.’ Mr. Halloran had got into the habit of dropping around by himself, now and again, for McCorkery still liked him, was still willing to give him a foothold in the right places, still asked him for favors at election time. There was always a good lively crowd at the McCorkerys, wherever they were; for they moved ever so often to a better place, with more furniture. Rosie helped hand around the drinks, taking a few herself with a good word for everybody. The player piano or the victrola1 would be going full blast, with everybody dancing, all looking like ready money and a bright future. He would get home late these evenings, back to the same little cold-water walk-up flat, because Lacey would not spend a dollar for show. It must all go into savings against old age, she said. He would be full of good food and drink, and find Lacey, in a bungalow apron2, warming up the fried potatoes once more, cross and bitterly silent, hanging her head and frowning at the smell of liquor on his breath. ‘You might at least eat the potatoes when I’ve fried them and waited all this time,’ she would say. ‘Ah, eat them yourself, they’re none of mine,’ he would snarl in his disappointment with her, and with the life she was leading him. He had believed with all his heart for years that he would one day be manager of one of the G. and I. chain grocery stores he worked for, and when that hope gave out there was still his pension when they retired him. But two years before it was due they fired him, on account of the depression, they said. Overnight he was on the sidewalk, with no place to go with the news but home. ‘Jesus,’ said Mr. Halloran, still remembering that day after nearly seven years of idleness. The depression hadn’t touched McCorkery. He went on and on up the ladder, giving beefsteaks and beanfests and beer parties for the boys in Billy’s Place, standing in with the right men and never missing a trick. At last the Gerald J. McCorkery Club chartered a whole boat for a big excursion up the river. It was a great day, with Lacey sitting at home sulking. After the election Rosie had her picture in the papers, smiling at McCorkery; not fat exactly, just a fine figure of a woman with flowers pinned on her spotted fur coat, her teeth as good as ever. Oh, God, there was a girl for any man’s money. Mr. Halloran saw out of his eye-corner the bony stooped back of Lacey Mahaffy, standing on one foot to rest the other like a tired old horse, leaning on her hands waiting for the iron to heat. Katherine Anne Porter, ‘A Day’s Work’ (1940) 1The player piano or the victrola: both means of playing music 2bungalow apron: a kind of overall 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 © OCR 2024 H472/02 Jun24 5 In your answer to Question 2, you must compare at least two texts from the list. At least one text must be from the two texts at the top of the list in bold. F Scott Fitzgerald: The Great Gatsby John Steinbeck: The Grapes of Wrath Henry James: The Portrait of a Lady Mark Twain: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Theodore Dreiser: Sister Carrie Willa Cather: My Ántonia Edith Wharton: The Age of Innocence William Faulkner: The Sound and the Fury Ernest Hemingway: A Farewell to Arms Nella Larsen: Passing Richard Wright: Native Son Either 2 (a) F Scott Fitzgerald: The Great Gatsby ‘American literature shows us that the most attractive characters are also the most dangerous.’ By comparing The Great Gatsby with at least one other text prescribed for this topic, discuss how far you agree with this view. Or (b) John Steinbeck: The Grapes of Wrath ‘American literature suggests that equality will always be a distant dream.’ [30] By comparing The Grapes of Wrath with at least one other text prescribed for this topic, discuss how far you agree with this view. [30] Or (c) ‘American literature shows us characters who need something to believe in.’ By comparing at least two texts prescribed for this topic, discuss how far you have found this to be the case. In your answer you must include discussion of either The Great Gatsby and/or The Grapes of Wrath. © OCR 2024 [30] Turn over H472/02 Jun24 The Gothic 6 Answer Question 3. Then answer Question 4(a) or 4(b) or 4(c). You should spend about 1 hour and 15 minutes on each question. 3 Write a critical appreciation of this passage, relating your discussion to your reading of the Gothic. [30] The narrator of this story is Rev. Dr Gottlieb Michael Gosschen, a Catholic priest. Gosschen has gone into a prison to hear the confession of a young man who is to be executed for murder. The man under sentence of death was, in all the beauty of youth, distinguished above his fellows for graceful accomplishments, and the last of a noble family. He had lain a month in his dungeon, heavily laden with irons. Only the first week he had been visited by several religionists, but he then fiercely ordered the jailor to admit no more ‘men of God,’ – and till the eve of his execution, he had lain in dark solitude, abandoned to his own soul. It was near midnight when a message was sent to me by a magistrate, that the murderer was desirous of seeing me. I had been with many men in his unhappy situation, and in no case had I failed to calm the agonies of grief, and the fears of the world to come. But I had known this youth – had sat with him at his father’s table – I knew also that there was in him a strange and fearful mixture of good and evil – I was aware that there were circumstances in the history of his progenitors1 not generally known – nay, in his own life – that made him an object of awful commiseration2 – and I went to his cell with an agitating sense of the enormity of his guilt, but a still more agitating one of the depth of his misery, and the wildness of his misfortunes. I entered his cell, and the phantom struck me with terror. He stood erect in his irons, like a corpse that had risen from the grave. His face, once so beautiful, was pale as a shroud, and drawn into ghastly wrinkles. His black- matted hair hung over it with a terrible expression of wrathful and savage misery. And his large eyes, which once were black, glared with a light in which all colour was lost, and seemed to fill the whole dungeon with their flashings. I saw his guilt – I saw what was more terrible than his guilt – his insanity – not in emaciation3 only – not in that more than death-like whiteness of his face – but in all that stood before me – the figure, round which was gathered the agonies of so many long days and nights of remorse and phrenzy4 – and of a despair that had no fears of this world or its terrors, but that was plunged in the abyss of eternity. For a while the figure said nothing. He then waved his arm, that made his irons clank, motioning me to sit down on the iron frame-work of his bed; and when I did so, the murderer took his place by my side. A lamp burned on a table before us – and on that table there had been drawn by the maniac – for I must indeed so call him – a decapitated human body – the neck as if streaming with gore – and the face writhed – into horrible convulsions, but bearing a resemblance not to be mistaken to that of him who had traced the horrid picture. He saw that my eyes rested on this fearful mockery – and, with a recklessness fighting with despair, he burst out into a broken peal of laughter, and said, ‘to-morrow will you see that picture drawn in blood!’ Anonymous, ‘Extracts from Gosschen’s Diary’ (1818) 1progenitors: ancestors, family 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 3emaciation: the state of being abnormally thin or weak 2awful commiseration: deep sympathy 4phrenzy: an old spelling of ‘frenzy’ © OCR 2024 H472/02 Jun24 7 In your answer to Question 4, you must compare at least two texts from the list. At least one text must be from the two texts at the top of the list in bold. Bram Stoker: Dracula Angela Carter: The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories* William Beckford: Vathek Ann Radcliffe: The Italian Mary Shelley: Frankenstein Oscar Wilde: The Picture of Dorian Gray William Faulkner: Light in August Daphne du Maurier: Rebecca Cormac McCarthy: Outer Dark Iain Banks: The Wasp Factory Toni Morrison: Beloved *Candidates writing about The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories should select material from the whole text. Either 4 (a) Bram Stoker: Dracula ‘Gothic writing explores both the attraction and the fear of taking risks.’ Consider how far you agree with this statement by comparing Dracula with at least one other text prescribed for this topic. Or (b) Angela Carter: The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories* [30] ‘Gothic writing often depends on the idea of being trapped in a situation from which there seems to be no escape.’ By comparing The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories* with at least one other text prescribed for this topic, discuss how far you agree with this vi