AQA AS ENGLISH LITERATURE A Paper 2 Love through the ages: Prose Friday 26 May 2023

AQA AS ENGLISH LITERATURE A Paper 2 Love through the ages: Prose Friday 26 May 2023 Morning Time allowed: 1 hour 30 minutes Materials For this paper you must have: • an AQA 12-page answer book • a copy of each of the set texts you have studied for Section B. 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 7711/2. • Do all rough work in your answer book. Cross through any work you do not want to be marked. • Answer the question in 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 connections across the texts you have studied – explore different interpretations of your texts. Section A: Unseen prose Answer the question in this section. Call Me By Your Name by André Aciman was published in 2007. In this extract the narrator, a young man called Elio, is talking with his father. Elio has met and had a summer romance with Oliver, who has stayed with Elio’s family in Italy while studying. Oliver has now returned to his home in America. Examine the view that Aciman presents the father as dominating and intrusive when giving advice to his son. Make close reference to the writer’s methods in your answer. [25 marks] He was about to tap his cigarette and, in leaning toward the ashtray, he reached out and touched my hand. “What lies ahead is going to be very difficult,” he started to say, altering his voice. His tone said: We don’t have to speak about it, but let’s not pretend we don’t know what I’m saying. Speaking abstractly was the only way to speak the truth to him. “Fear not. It will come. At least I hope it does. And when you least expect it. Nature has cunning ways of finding our weakest spot. Just remember: I am here. Right now you may not want to feel anything. Perhaps you never wished to feel anything. And perhaps it’s not with me that you’ll want to speak about these things. But feel something you did.” I looked at him. This was the moment when I should lie and tell him he was totally off course. I was about to. “Look,” he interrupted. “You had a beautiful friendship. Maybe more than a friendship. And I envy you. In my place, most parents would hope the whole thing goes away, or pray that their sons land on their feet soon enough. But I am not such a parent. In your place, if there is pain, nurse it, and if there is a flame, don’t snuff it out, don’t be brutal with it. Withdrawal can be a terrible thing when it keeps us awake at night, and watching others forget us sooner than we’d want to be forgotten is no better. We rip out so much of ourselves to be cured of things faster than we should that we go bankrupt by the age of thirty and have less to offer each time we start with someone new. But to feel nothing so as not to feel anything—what a waste!” I couldn’t begin to take all this in. I was dumbstruck. “Have I spoken out of turn?” he asked. I shook my head. “Then let me say one more thing. It will clear the air. I may have come close, but I never had what you had. Something always held me back or stood in the way. How you live your life is your business. But remember, our hearts and our bodies are given to us only once. Most of us can’t help but live as though we’ve got two lives to live, one is the mockup, the other the finished version, and then there are all those versions in between. But there’s only one, and before you know it, your heart is worn out, and, as for your body, there comes a point when no one looks at it, much less wants to come near it. Right now there’s sorrow. I don’t envy the pain. But I envy you the pain.” He took a breath. “We may never speak about this again. But I hope you’ll never hold it against me that we did. I will have been a terrible father if, one day, you’d want to speak to me and felt that the door was shut or not sufficiently open.” I wanted to ask him how he knew. But then how could he not have known? How could anyone not have known? “Does Mother know?” I asked. I was going to say suspect but corrected myself. “I don’t think she does.” His voice meant, But even if she did, I am sure her attitude would be no different than mine. We said good night. On my way upstairs I vowed to ask him about his life. We’d all heard about his women when he was young, but I’d never even had an inkling of anything else. Was my father someone else? And if he was someone else, who was I? Turn over for Section B Turn over ►