***2015 LC English Paper 2 - Higher Level - The Aftermath***

Peregrine

For all discussion after HL English P2.

WINGOLET

What poets came up?

Js1997

Just out of the exam now, definitely taught they were going to change it up a bit and give us a few shocks.
Possibly in my opinion the most predictable Leaving Cert English exam in years,
Othello - the weak role that desdemona and Emila played
Comparative - both literary genre and theme or issue came up
Poetry - Robert Frost, John Montague, E Ni C and Thomas Hardy came up.

Scout123

What were the questions on Theme and Issue?

lumosteph

That seems like such a nice paper!

GalwayGirl26

Delighted for ye lads! I don't think anybody can complain about that line up!
I know some will be gutted about Iago not being the star of the Othello show, but the role of women is a decent question too!

Peg14

Did Frost, Theme/ Issure [1] and the Emilia + Desdemona and the unseen poem was grand! So happy with that exam wow though te comparative was kinda weird but oh well its over!!!

Magnate

I really, really regret not learning the role of women, I had the essay printed and everything!

The rest of the paper was grand but I was forced do an othello question on how values played a significant part in the outcome of the play. It was messy. It definitely cost me a grade or two.

Oh well, we're finished english!!!

BlueWolf16

Okay, so can anyone explain me the literary genre question?? Were you only supposed to do 1 technique, like Narration or Dialogue ? I mean jesus, I can waffle pretty good, but 5-6 pages about Dialogue on Three texts is something of a PhD waffling exam from Cambridge.

Ignored that "one" and had 6 pages in total, talked about Narrative Structure, Narration, Dialogue, Tension&Suspense and Imagery&Symbolism.. good or no?

Overall the exam was shockingly predictable, great questions, Frost Q was beautiful, Othello very predictable, Unseen fairly straighforward.. Though I named one Frost poem "The bend in the undergrowth" because I forgot what it was actually called, haha.

TheSunderz

Taught that went very well did all my sons as our single text easy question, Eh theme and issue question was very approachable to anyone and montague was a little tricky but easy enough in the end very happy, hand is about to fall off though.

DarraghF197

Was a bit annoyed that the most predictable poets came up. Would have loved a Plath or Dickinson question to come up rather than Ni Chuilleanáin. Wanting to do something different sort of caught me out as the Hardy essay was not nice. It said that the bleak imagery overshadows the comforting reflections found in his work. I haven't studied a poem that was comforting from Hardy. So I had to manipulate my answer to disagree somehow and make it relevant.

The Othello essay was nice enough on the two central women. I had an essay prepared on them each so I was just picking my best overall points.

The comparative theme was really annoying. The question glosses over idealism and realism as the impression of the reader, whereas our three texts leave the reader with a pessimistic impression. Thought the question was poorly asked by the sec and didn't allow for all types of texts.

JungleJuice

I did the same, covered 5 techniques. Worried since might be marked only on best one and there mightn't be enough in it! What does anyone else think ?

Bah_Humbug

So happy I prepared Desdemona and Emilia just last night, and had setting mastered for comparative My Montague essay was quite rushed but whatev. Much joy at the end of English - Can't wait to read books again without analysing them!

MmmPancakes

FROST!! My man :')

Comparative was also fine

Othello questions were shocking though, what is 'values' even supposed to mean? Couldn't have been more vague, thought the first question was a bit meh too.

frie

Yo, what did that first theme/issue question actually mean? I did theme of relationships...

eoin12345

Actually quite happy with this one!!! Didn't get the unseen poetry done well but felt the rest went better that paper 1!!!

westernfrenzy

That was spectatularly sh*t.

naoisebrennan

A lot of people in my school did the values in Othello question, but did Othello the person not the play unfortunately....

eoin12345

MmmPancakes wrote: »

FROST!! My man :')

Comparative was also fine

Othello questions were shocking though, what is 'values' even supposed to mean? Couldn't have been more vague, thought the first question was a bit meh too.

I took values to mean values of characters and talked about deciet jealousy and greed... It was very misleading though, I first thought it was about Othello's values.

irishlad12345

Yesterday doom and gloom today happy out thank f**k montague and them and issue came up

DarraghF197

frie wrote: »

Yo, what did that first theme/issue question actually mean? I did theme of relationships...

Yeah, I understand where you're coming from. Poor question from the SEC, I'd imagine it was hard to make relationships relevant. I had trouble with it too as my texts were neither idealistic nor realistic, but pessimistic.

Hopefully they'll account for that when marking to make it fair for people who couldn't do the question properly.

Chef Tony

Yeah there seemed to be some confusion over who it was about. I presumed that since it was it italics that it must be about the play in general.

Did the Desdemona and Emila Q. The Hardy question and Literary Genre question and did it about symbolism.

Thought the unseen poem was surprisingly do-able, but had a moment of confusion over whether the "crane" referred to the bird or the machine reconstructing. Waffled some rubbish about it creating a sense of mystery.

Overall very happy with it, lots of audible "Yes!"es when everyone turned to the poetry section at the start. No surprises at all

Magnate

eoin12345 wrote: »

I took values to mean values of characters and talked about deciet jealousy and greed... It was very misleading though, I first thought it was about Othello's values.

Oh that makes more sense actually, I kinda waffled about honesty and Othello's trusting nature, it was pretty bad.

leavingcert15

If you said for values othello was too trustful and he had strong love for Desdemona would that be right?

frie

DarraghF197 wrote: »

Yeah, I understand where you're coming from. Poor question from the SEC, I'd imagine it was hard to make relationships relevant. I had trouble with it too as my texts were neither idealistic nor realistic, but pessimistic.

Hopefully they'll account for that when marking to make it fair for people who couldn't do the question properly.

I just talked about how the relationships were realistic rather than idealistic...

IrishLoriii

Delighted with the Othello question it was literally perfect! I couldn't figure out the comparative question at all it really confused me in the exam and I ended up doing the q2 because I was just lost(theme or issue)! Montague was so beautiful it was the nicest question they could have asked !!

Hashtag_HEEL

eoin12345 wrote: »

I took values to mean values of characters and talked about deciet jealousy and greed... It was very misleading though, I first thought it was about Othello's values.

I discussed Elizabethan values of Racism/Religious Prejudice, women being viewed as possessions and open trust and how each of these values had an impact on the outcome of the play.

Jijsaw

I thought it was a nice paper, geography tomorrow yuck!

Scirpt

Is doing Imagery for The Kings Speech okay for Q2 Literary Genre? I spoke about the microphone dominating the picture with Bertie etc.

Kat97

JungleJuice wrote: »

I did the same, covered 5 techniques. Worried since might be marked only on best one and there mightn't be enough in it! What does anyone else think ?

Im worried too. I talked about how characterisation was common across all three texts and then said how symbolism/the ending/tension and suspense/setting showed it.

Have no idea if that was right or not

DarraghF197

Chef Tony wrote: »

Yeah there seemed to be some confusion over who it was about. I presumed that since it was it italics that it must be about the play in general.

Did the Desdemona and Emila Q. The Hardy question and Literary Genre question and did it about symbolism.

Thought the unseen poem was surprisingly do-able, but had a moment of confusion over whether the "crane" referred to the bird or the machine reconstructing. Waffled some rubbish about it creating a sense of mystery.

Overall very happy with it, lots of audible "Yes!"es when everyone turned to the poetry section at the start. No surprises at all

How did you find Hardy? Did you cover any comforting poems or did you disagree? Was happy about the bleak imagery, but then to say it overshadowed the comforting reflections? I had to disagree with half of it and sort of said that the bleak imagery emphasised the pessimism in Hardy's poetry.

JungleJuice

Kat97 wrote: »

Im worried too. I talked about how characterisation was common across all three texts and then said how symbolism/the ending/tension and suspense/setting showed it.

Have no idea if that was right or not

I would say that is right it's what I would have done if I read the question properly the firsts time , but i didn't realise until the last 5 mins and took it as we had to talk about all of them!

gryfothegreat

Hashtag_HEEL wrote: »

I discussed Elizabethan values of Racism/Religious Prejudice, women being viewed as possessions and open trust and how each of these values had an impact on the outcome of the play.

That's what I did, I wrote about how racism led to Othello's insecurity and about how cultural attitudes towards women led to Desdemona and Emilia's submissiveness which led to the whole Cassio and handkerchief thing. I wrote 3 pages, not bad considering I made it all up!

Otherwise, the Ní Chuilleanáin q was lovely, would have preferred to do Montague but I hadn't studied the right poems for it. I did 5 techniques for Literary Genre, probably messed that one up!

Dianabluex

YESSSSS FROST AND THEME OF IDENTY

JungleJuice

gryfothegreat wrote: »

That's what I did, I wrote about how racism led to Othello's insecurity and about how cultural attitudes towards women led to Desdemona and Emilia's submissiveness which led to the whole Cassio and handkerchief thing. I wrote 3 pages, not bad considering I made it all up!

Otherwise, the Ní Chuilleanáin q was lovely, would have preferred to do Montague but I hadn't studied the right poems for it. I did 5 techniques for Literary Genre, probably messed that one up!

Same did you link your 5 techniques or not ?

ShaunDaSheep

Learned four poets and none came up. Rambled an a4 page and a half on ENC. Devastated is not the word, probably wont get my course now

AulBiddy

Absolutely elated. Des and Emilia question couldn't be better! Very doable, very easy to write about. Not very good at comparative, did the split theme question wanted to do literary genre but it was totally ridiculous! Extremely vague! Poetry was fantastic and predictable

Dianabluex

Wait was it othello the play or character

lumosteph

Paper 2 is up on examinations.ie if anyone wants to see it!

Cheerios

Does anyone know how much 50 marks is as a percentage? I didn't do the single text at all (ran out of time) so I'm guessing my grade overall has dropped significantly.

gryfothegreat

JungleJuice wrote: »

Same did you link your 5 techniques or not ?

Nope, talked about them all separately - setting, timeline, characterisation, tension and reversal of fortune. Tension and characterisation did of course end up in a few others but that was pure accident! Probably should have done theme and issue but my essay on that in the mocks didn't go over so well so I was reluctant to do it.

Chef Tony

DarraghF197 wrote: »

How did you find Hardy? Did you cover any comforting poems or did you disagree? Was happy about the bleak imagery, but then to say it overshadowed the comforting reflections? I had to disagree with half of it and sort of said that the bleak imagery emphasised the pessimism in Hardy's poetry.

Yeah not too many of his poems I studied had both bleak imagery and comforting reflections. I said fully bleak for Drummer Hodge anti war and all that. I said the humour in Channel Firing provides some comfort but mans need to make "red war redder" overpowered it with bleakness. I said reader can make their own choice in darkling thrush, follow the birds comfort or Hardys bleak pessimism. Through Wind and rain had comforting reflection on his wifes life but was overshadowed by the bleak imagery of "their carved names the raindrop ploughs". And then I said how in contrast Under the waterfall was the only non-bleak poem. Then I mentioned when I set out for lyonesse in the closing paragraph

MmmPancakes

Dianabluex wrote: »

Wait was it othello the play or character

play

Magnate

Cheerios wrote: »

Does anyone know how much 50 marks is as a percentage? I didn't do the single text at all (ran out of time) so I'm guessing my grade overall has dropped significantly.

12.5% I'm afraid.

Cheerios

Dianabluex wrote: »

Wait was it othello the play or character

I'm 99% sure it was the play. The word "Othello" was written in italics. If it was Othello the character, then Desdemona and Emilia in the first question would have been written in italics too.

Magnate wrote: »

12.5% I'm afraid.

Ah, blubber. The exact same thing happened in the JC too, haha. I'm so slow.

Gryffindor

eoin12345 wrote: »

I took values to mean values of characters and talked about deciet jealousy and greed... It was very misleading though, I first thought it was about Othello's values.

I did this too. I took it to mean personal values as opposed to racism and misogyny etc. I talked about the opposing Christian values vs Iago's devotion to an amoral/ immoral god/ Janus and the evil values that produced. I don't really see how it could be wrong to interpret it as such?

fin709

For the Hardy question i interpreted it wrong I think i disagreed with the statement and said his bleakness contributes to my overall reflection. Does that make sense? I said when i set out for lyonnesse defies the statement as its a magical delightful poem, i think i interpreted the question completely wrong, i thought they were criticising his bleakness

The_Mac

I could've done the Emilia/Desdemona one but I really didn't have enough quotes, so I took the values one. Talked about how Iago manipulated the value of honour and the value of the role of women in society to create the value of the racial stereotype of an animalistic Moor. Think it went alright.

Shanmcg97

What did people write for Emilia and Des question?

blackbird 49

Cheerios wrote: »

Does anyone know how much 50 marks is as a percentage? I didn't do the single text at all (ran out of time) so I'm guessing my grade overall has dropped significantly.

25%

Gryffindor

blackbird 49 wrote: »

25%

Yes in paper 2 but 12.5% overall