The Course Guide says, 'Students are expected to make detailed reference to the works in their answer, but they are not expected to include quotations from them.'. I recommend that you have a number of key quotations at your metaphorical fingertips. It will be really tricky to explore language, for example, with no quotations. 

That choice is yours. I will suggest pairs of texts that I think work together well. But the ultimate decision is yours. You CANNOT, however, use the literary work that you used in the IO or the HL essay.

In a nutshell, very broad. Remember, they need to be broad enough to cover any literary work that might have been studied. The question could focus on an Area of Exploration (Readers, Writers & Texts; Time and Space or Intertextuality) or a key concept. Here are some examples from the IB:

• Often the appeal for the reader of a literary work is the atmosphere a writer creates (for example, peaceful, menacing or ironic). Discuss some of the ways atmospheres are conveyed and to what effect in two of the works you have studied.

• Some say ignorance is bliss. How is “not knowing” presented in two of the works you have studied and to what effect?

There is nothing more important than knowing the texts you have chosen inside out. You need to know the plot, the narrative structure, the characters (major and minor), the settings, themes and style too.

Make comparison charts where you identify patterns and parallels between the texts. For example, characters with similar journeys or the same theme explored in different ways.

Identify a range of key quotations to have at your fingertips.

Go through the example questions we hoe looked at in lessons and plan your answer.

Analysing Fiction: Prose

When analysing prose, you can comment on the following aspects. Remember, that you may not have time to cover them all in the IO, Paper 2 or for the HL essay. For the EE, you should consider as many as you can.

1. Characterisation: what we know about the characters and how they are presented by the author. You could analyse:

• what they say and do;

• how the author describes them;

•  their relationships;

•  how they develop; and

• what they symbolise.

2. Plot and structure: what happens and how it is organised (either into parts or episodes). Does the novel/story progress in a linear fashion (beginning-middle-end) or does it use flashbacks/forwards and is non-linear?

3. Setting and atmosphere: the changing location and how it reflects the story. Consider the relationship between character and their setting such as Hamlet feeling the castle in which he lives has become a prison.

4. Style and language: the author’s choice of words and literary devices and how these reflect the mood. Mood is the  emotional response in the reader that the writer has sought to evoke.

5. Symbolism: concrete objects that symbolise ideas, themes or characters. Consider if any of these are recurring and are therefore motifs.

6. Viewpoint/narrative style: how the story is told. Either first person narration (singular = I , plural = we) where a character tells a story or third person narration (singular = s/he, plural = they). The narrator could be omniscient and know everything, especially the inner thoughts of each character. Or a third person limited perspective could have been adopted, where the readers sees events from the perspective of one character but using the third person. This is the case in Harry Potter. Remember, first person narrators are not always reliable.

7. Social and historical background/context: when the story was written and how the events happening at this time are reflected in the novel’s plot or themes.

8. Themes: what the main ideas are in the novel. Themes are sustained and developed throughout and there can be many themes.

9. Critical lenses: There are many different lenses through which we can read a literary work. Does the application of a feminist critical lens help you appreciate the condition of women at the time the novel was set?  Does a Marxist lens shed greater light on the class inequality evident in the story?