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Question 1
In from At Home by Christina Rossetti (1862), a dead speaker returns to a familiar house and observes friends feasting and discussing their future.
How does the writer use imagery and figurative language to convey the speaker’s exclusion from the lives of the friends?
Identify three examples of sensory imagery in lines 1–8 and state what each suggests about the friends’ enjoyment of life. Quote the relevant words.
[3]
Identify three choices of language in the friends’ speeches in lines 10–16 that convey their expectations of the future. Quote each choice and briefly explain what it suggests.
[3]
Identify three expressions in lines 25–32 that reveal the speaker’s emotional response to being forgotten. Quote each expression and state what it reveals.
[3]
Analyse how the temporal expressions and the metaphor of “blessed noon” work together in lines 17–24 to separate the speaker from the friends.
[6]
Comment on how pronouns, repetition and the arrangement of actions in lines 1–8 establish the speaker’s position in relation to the feast.
[6]
Analyse how the simile and line breaks in the final four lines shape the significance of the speaker’s departure.
[6]
To what extent does the imagery of the friends’ pleasure in lines 1–24 invite the reader to judge them as unfeeling towards the speaker?
[9]
Evaluate how effectively the imagery of the house, the feast and the speaker’s shivering presents exclusion as a failure of connection rather than a physical barrier. Refer to lines 1–8 and 25–30.
[9]
Discuss how the opposition between “blessed noon” and “yesterday” in lines 21–24 works with the closing image of a briefly remembered guest in lines 29–32 to shape the reader’s final understanding of the speaker’s loss.
[9]
Question 2
In from Song of the Open Road by Walt Whitman (1856), the speaker urges an unnamed addressee to leave the house and claims to expose the suffering concealed beneath ordinary social appearances.
How does the writer use the speaker’s voice to challenge the concealment of inner suffering?
Identify three features of the speaker’s address from “Allons! whoever you are!” to “I know all, and expose it”. Quote each feature and briefly explain its effect on the relationship with the addressee.
[3]
Identify three choices of language in “No husband, no wife, no friend, trusted to hear the confession” and state what each suggests about the possibility of confiding in others. Quote the relevant words.
[3]
Identify three details of outward respectability in from “Smartly attired” to “ribbons and artificial flowers”. Quote each detail and state what it suggests about the appearance presented to others.
[3]
Analyse how repetition and the movement from surfaces to interiors shape the speaker’s revelation in from “Behold, through you” to “a secret silent loathing and despair”.
[6]
Comment on how the description of “Another self” and the catalogue of places, from “the streets of the cities” to “everywhere”, develop the speaker’s account of concealment.
[6]
Analyse how parallel phrasing and negation in the final two lines, beginning “Keeping fair with the customs”, shape the meaning of ordinary speech.
[6]
To what extent is the speaker’s challenge to concealment an invitation rather than an act of coercion? Refer to the opening address through “I know all, and expose it” and the subsequent address “through you as bad as the rest”.
[9]
Evaluate how effectively the speaker’s accumulating lists, from “laughter, dancing, dining, supping” through the catalogue of places and clothing, support the claim that concealment extends across social life.
[9]
Discuss how the tension between “I know all, and expose it” and the later description of a “Formless and wordless” self shapes the authority of the speaker’s voice. Refer also to the bodily images of torment and the final two lines.
[9]
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