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GCSE Literature Paper 2

Unseen Poetry Booklet

SUCCESS CRITERIA PRE-RAG POST-RAG
RATING RATING
I can spot particular word
choices in poems e.g. verbs,
adjectives, adverbs
I can spot ACOMPASS
techniques in poems
I can include quotes from
poems in my answers
I can spot structure of a poem
e.g. stanzas, rhyme scheme,
rhythm
I can spot structural techniques
e.g. sibilance, caesura,
enjambment
I can explain the connotations
of word choices in a poem
I can explain the effect of
ACOMPASS techniques
I can explain why the poem has
a particular structure
I can explain the effect of
structural techniques
I can give a second
interpretation of a quote and/or
a second quote

What should I look for in a poem?

LANGUAGE
Exposure by Wilfred Owen
Word choice:
• Verbs
• Adjectives
• Adverbs
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STRUCTURE / FORM
Rhythm and Rhyme:
 Is there a regular beat?
 Do the lines rhyme?

Stanzas:
 How many stanzas are there?
 Do the stanzas have the same length?
 Do the stanzas say the same tense?
 Is there a cyclical or linear structure?

Other techniques:
 Enjambment
 Caesura
 Repetition

Exposure
BY W I LFRE D OW E N

Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds that knive
us . . .
Wearied we keep awake because the night is silent . . .
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Low drooping flares confuse our memory of the salient . . .

Worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous,
But nothing happens.

Watching, we hear the mad gusts tugging on the wire,

Like twitching agonies of men among its brambles.
Northward, incessantly, the flickering gunnery rumbles,
Far off, like a dull rumour of some other war.
What are we doing here?

The poignant misery of dawn begins to grow . . .

We only know war lasts, rain soaks, and clouds sag stormy.
Dawn massing in the east her melancholy army
Attacks once more in ranks on shivering ranks of grey,
But nothing happens.

Sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence.

Less deadly than the air that shudders black with snow,
With sidelong flowing flakes that flock, pause, and renew,
We watch them wandering up and down the wind's
nonchalance,
But nothing happens.
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Connotations – what does the

word/phrase make you
THEME WORD /PHRASE
think/feel/imagine? How does it pr
the weather/sound/violence?

‘Merciless’ makes me think the wind is

‘merciless iced East unforgiving
winds’
Weather ‘Iced’ makes me think that it is very co

‘Mad gusts’

‘streak’

Violence
‘agony’

‘twitching’

‘silence’
Sound
‘rumbles’
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Quotation Explosion

I DO – Copy what I do

What picture does this

create in your mind and
why?

“merciless
What language iced East
technique is being used? winds that
knife us”
What are the key
describing words?
What do they make you
think/feel?

WE DO - Teamwork

What picture does this

create in your mind and
why? “Watching, we hear
the mad gusts tugging
What language on the wire / Like
technique is being used? twitching agonies of
men among its
What are the key brambles”
describing words?
What do they make you
YOU DO – Independent Work
think/feel?

What picture does this

create in your mind and
why?
“Sudden
successive
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YOU DO – Independent Work

What picture does this

create in your mind and
why?
“Less deadly
than the air that
What language
technique is being used? shudders black
with snow”
What are the key
describing words?
What do they make you
think/feel?
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Literature Paper 2 – What is it?

English Literature GCSE

• English Literature Paper 2:
• Section A = Animal Farm
• Section B = War and Conflict Poetry
• Section C = Unseen Poetry
• Given two poems you would have never seen
before. Asked two questions
• Look at one poem only. Ask to analyse how
something is presented – a theme/a
person/ a feeling (24 marks)
• Compare the similarities and differences in
the way the two poems present something
(8 marks)
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Autumn
By Alan Bold
Autumn arrives
Like an experienced robber
Grabbing the green stuff
Then cunningly covering his tracks
With a deep multitude
O colourful distractions.

And the wind,

The wind is his accomplice
Putting an air of chaos
Into the careful diversions
So branches shake
And dead leaves are suddenly brown
In the faces of inquisitive strangers.
The theft chills the world
Changes the tempers of the earth
Till the normally placid sky glows red with a quiet rage.

Model Essay - In ‘Autumn’, how does the poet present

the effects of the season of autumn?

In the poem ‘Autumn’ by Alan Bold, the poet presents the season in a
negative light. For example, Bold uses a simile to compare autumn to “like
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an experienced robber”. This simile implies that the season is almost

committing a crime by taking away the green leaves from the trees. The
adjective “experienced” implies that the season is very good at stealing.
The whole poem is an extended metaphor that presents autumn as
stealing the beauty from the world. The alliterative phrase “cunningly
covering his tracks” talks about autumn as if it was conscious about what
it is doing and is actually taking away the beauty on purpose. This makes
autumn sound selfish as it is presented as stealing the greenery for its
own gain.
Another way that the poet presents the effects of autumn is by depicting
it as destructive, writing how “The wind is his accomplice”. This metaphor
implies very strong imagery of the wind sweeping in at the start of
autumn and blowing all the dead leaves off their branches and into mini
hurricanes. This is one of the main symbols that autumn has arrived so it
is easy for the reader or listener to imagine the sight of the autumn
leaves. It also conveys that the wind is also conscious of the fact that it is
working together with autumn to assist in the theft of green.
A final way in which the poet presents the negative effects of autumn is
how at the end of the poem the sky is described as glowing “red with a
quiet rage”. This is also powerful imagery of an autumn sky with thick
clouds. The oxymoron “quiet rage” suggests that autumn acts with
silence, almost unnoticed by some but it affects the world in a massive
way. The quote “the theft chills the world” is unclear because it could
mean that the autumn makes the world colder. However, it could have a
deeper moral meaning saying that crime actually takes the warmth out of
the world.
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QUOTE TECHNIQUE ANALYSIS – what does it make you

think/feel/imagine?
‘But nothing happens’ Repetition Repeats phrase to reinforce that
impatient or worried feeling of waiting
and not knowing what might happen
next – there is no action or fighting

Q: How is war presented in the poem Exposure?

MAIN ARGUMENT: The poet Owen presents war as ________________________________________

Children in Wartime Exposure

Idea Quote Idea Quote
SIMILARITIES War is presented as a ‘it seemed the sky War is presented as ‘Worried by silence,
fearful experience lay broken on my a fearful experience sentries whisper,
floor’ curious, nervous’
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DIFFERENCES

Q2: Both ‘Children in Wartime’ and ‘Exposure’ describe the experience of war. What
are the similarities and/or differences in the way the poets present war?
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Quotation Explosion

I DO – Copy what I do

What picture does this

create in your mind and
why?

What
language/structrual
technique is being used?

What are the key

describing words?
What do they make you
think/feel?

WE DO - Teamwork

What picture does this

create in your mind and
why?

What
language/structrual
technique is being used?

What are the key

describing words?
YOU DOdo– they
What Independent
make you Work
think/feel?

What picture does this

create in your mind and
why?
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YOU DO – Independent Work

What picture does this

create in your mind and
why?

What
language/structrual
technique is being used?

What are the key

describing words?
What do they make you
think/feel?

Today
BY BILLY COLLI NS

If ever there were a spring day so perfect,

so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze
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that it made you want to throw

open all the windows in the house

and unlatch the door to the canary's cage,

indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,

a day when the cool brick paths

and the garden bursting with peonies

seemed so etched in sunlight

that you felt like taking

a hammer to the glass paperweight

on the living room end table,

releasing the inhabitants

from their snow-covered cottage

so they could walk out,

holding hands and squinting

into this larger dome of blue and white,

well, today is just that kind of day.

Q2: In both ‘Today’ and ‘Autumn’ the speakers describe

attitudes towards the
seasons. What are the similarities and/or differences
between the ways the poets present these attitudes?
Both poems create characters to enhance the narrative they are
presenting. For example, ‘Autumn’ creates “an experienced robber” and
‘Today’ depicts the “inhabitants” of a “glass paperweight”. The effect of
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this is that the poems each have a surreal atmosphere when the
characters are introduced, yet not so much that it is too far-fetched to be
understood by the reader.

Where ‘Autumn’ is negative towards the season it describes (describing

“dead leaves” and “quiet rage”), ‘Today’ is overwhelmingly positive. The
latter does not appear to have any hints of negativity except for, perhaps,
the destructive behaviour that is described. It speaks of “rip[ping] the
little door from its jamb”, which suggests that their feelings are so strong
that they must be suppressed physically.

Both poems talk about seasons in different ways. Both have no rhyming
patters which presents freedom of nature but in ‘Autumn’ also the evil of
nature. ‘Autumn’ is set out in one full text whereas ‘Today’ is set out in
pairs of lines which could represent the bright and happy nature of the
season of spring.