Lit Exam Discussion

[kandinsky]

They weren't the greatest, passage one was on Antony and octavia's marriage, passage two was the scene where Cleopatra betrayed Antony and he got defeated, third was the discussion between Cleopatra and Dolabella about her fate

So all in all, these passages mostly concentrates on Antony (even in passage three)

So glad they put passages with dialogue of Antony / Cleopatra (which they didn't last year) - but disappointed that examiners seem to be avoiding passages from the very end of plays/novels. It would make the discussion so much more interesting. I do think it's a bit annoying that Caesar didn't make an appearance - but oh well!

I look forward to the day they put Caesar's final speech/scene on the exam

Did anyone do Jane Eyre/Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? I'd like to know what passages you were given

[drmockingbird]

Kon the Jane Eyre and WAOVW were just fantastic

I'll scan them up when I have the time

[fareseru]

Yep the Jane ones were beautiful, Doll's House not so great... but anyway, it's done

Plus they were a short one from Jane's time at Lowood and the first and second times that Rochester proposes to Jane (ie Thornfield/Ferndean)!

[Telephone Booth]

I did Jane Eyre and T.S. Eliot. With Eliot I focused on
 

• Life and death and the cyclical nature of life and death.
• The transcendence above the unreal city of Rhapsody to the temperate valley of Journey of the Magi.
• The use of senses to reject and satirize the Romantic poetry for causing the dissociation of sensibility.

For Jane Eyre the passages were:

• Young Jane at Lowood wanting freedom.
• Mr. Rochester proposing to Jane; "do you think because I am poor, plain obscure and little..."
• Jane returns to Thornfield to find Mr. Rochester is blind and they marry each other.

I found the passages really good and I actually guessed that two of those were going to be on the paper. I wrote about:

• Conformity and self-oppression contrasted with passion.
• How Bronte believes that true love cannot be found when one person is superior to the other, where Rochester was superior based on class but Jane was morally superior.
• How Bronte believes that actions of others can oppress, where it was the Lowood Institute and the undeveloped Mr. Rochester that oppressed Jane, however, it is the actions of one's self that brings freedom, where Jane leaves Mr. Rochester of her own free will.

[Coralista]

So glad they put passages with dialogue of Antony / Cleopatra (which they didn't last year) - but disappointed that examiners seem to be avoiding passages from the very end of plays/novels. It would make the discussion so much more interesting. I do think it's a bit annoying that Caesar didn't make an appearance - but oh well!

Yeah, however in the second passage Cleopatra only had one line, the rest was Antony babbling on about how Cleo betrayed him, I would've liked more focus on Cleopatra and her self-absorption to be honest! Also, Caesar made an appearance in passage one, saying farewell to Octavia, making sure she fulfils her duty as Antony's wife and whatnot 

[Telephone Booth]

I wish our school did Antony and Cleopatra, it is one of my favourite Shakespeare works, but I found that especially with Jane Eyre, the in depth study of the text actually has driven me away from the novel so in that sense I am glad I didn't study Antony and Cleopatra.

[Nerd182]

What did people think of the Mrs. Dalloway passages?
I thought they were really good but perhaps filled with too much to really cover properly. I don't know. Don't feel too great about it.

I did Adrienne Rich poetry and it was really quite excellent. Super happy about those poems.

[thaaanyan]

Hahah did you predict that the last scene would be one of the passages for 2 bros? I was almost certain haha given that it is the last year for this text :p

i thought so too but for some stupid reason i didnt revise it idk why haha...oh well its over now...at least i got words on the page!! chilling now with the rest of my easy breezy yr 11 exams haha 

[kandinsky]

Kon the Jane Eyre and WAOVW were just fantastic

I'll scan them up when I have the time

Glad to hear it

[miaow]

The passages for My Brilliant Career and The Tempest were excellent! I thought so anyway. I'd actually picked both the beginning and end passages for both texts as good for close passage analysis and I'd done a few practice exams on them. Shit thing was that for whatever reason Friday was just not my day. I did My Brilliant Career first, which I was pretty happy with though there were a couple of things I was meaning to talk about but forgot to from sheer lack of time, then with The Tempest it went a bit awry. My intro was alright but then I got this almighty blood nose which kinda disrupted everything, like there was blood all over me obviously but also on my exam and the passages and the exam supervisor lady spent a good ten or so minutes trying to mop me up and supplying tissues, and then ended up putting a wet towel across my back and neck so I'd cool down? Idk. Haven't had a blood nose in months, great timing.  So yea from that point onwards I was just really distracted, slightly humiliated and had even less time cause its hard to mop up blood and write at the same time so my tempest essay was absolutely fucked, it made no sense, my ideas went shonky, my expression was disgusting, I wrote two paragraphs in 10 minutes barely referring to the passages cause I was so pushed for time, and it was absolutely horrid. All chance of a good mark for Lit are pretty much gone now but for some reason I don't really care I'm just glad its over.

Does anyone know anything about incident reports? Cause the lady took my VCAA number and said she was reporting it or something but I don't think there'd be a follow up just for a little blood like it sucked for me but its not a big thing really.

Oh yea did people get actual Lit script books? Cause we had to start our exam late cause they couldn't find them or something, and they were going to use the English ones but ended up using General books. One of the supervisors said they always do, but another was fretting because apparently you're meant to shade a box indicating which text you've chosen? Idk. It was a weird day.

[Telephone Booth]

We got given general books and were told to just write on the front cover the two texts we were doing.

[Sunshine98]

We got given general books and were told to just write on the front cover the two texts we were doing.

Same

[miaow]

We got given general books and were told to just write on the front cover the two texts we were doing.

Oh good not the only ones then! We didn't get told to write our texts but I guess they'll figure it out easily enough.

[clidedescope]

Oh good not the only ones then! We didn't get told to write our texts but I guess they'll figure it out easily enough.

Same with my school. The supervisor didn't realise any of this until we'd actually started the exam though, and she was whispering to another lady who was coming in and out of the room after she tried to get in touch with VCAA to figure out what to do. Pretty distracting, which was annoying. (There's no way I'm gonna blame my poor study score on that, though. Lit has never been my subject )

Also, our supervisor forgot to start our writing time. We had to remind her. Oh VCAA, your neglect slays me.

[DJA]

Favourite exam out of all the exams. I’m such an english nerd - I actually enjoyed the exam!
The antony and cleopatra passages were really nice imo - lots of opportunity for gushing and talking about humanism. The last passage was awesome.
Eliot similarly was great - bit of shame they went with 2 ‘religious’ passages - but it’s a minor thing - overall nice passages.

Loved writing this exam.