Examination papers and Examiners reports 2008 033E045 Moderns Examination paper 99
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Diploma and BA in English 033E045 Moderns Examiner s report General remarks On the whole, responses to the questions in this paper covered a wide selection of answers which varied considerably in ability, tone and content. Almost all papers demonstrated a good level of intellectual engagement with the subject guide and readings. The pattern of responses showed a majority of candidates choosing prose over poetry in Section A and a definite preference towards a certain set of questions in Sections B and C. The issues and themes of the modern most favoured in their choice of questions by candidates in this paper were feminism, metafiction, the relationship between modernism and postmodernism, alienation, the absurd, language, realism and time. Significantly less addressed by candidates were those questions that asked candidates to consider the city, the law, technology, free verse, quotation and mimicry. The remit of the Moderns unit requires candidates to demonstrate an ability to carry out close textual reading that requires consideration of poetic language, genre and style. They are also expected to be able to talk fluently about the contexts of the modern in broader intellectual terms that encompasses historical changes and questions of gender, nation and notions of the writing subject. They are expected to show a facility to use critical terminology that covers aspects of both modernism and postmodernism in their answers. Candidates are also asked to be familiar with what exactly constitutes the notion of the modern often requiring complex formulation rather than a more general description and to correctly describe and comment on the kinds of connections and discontinuities discernible in literature of the early twentieth century covered by the unit. Candidates are additionally required to be attentive to the relationship between form and content in their answers, particularly in Sections B and C where good responses demand a capability to move between the more general terrain of the contextual and the particulars of individual texts that articulate these changes in literary language. Candidates would do well to remember that in all sections of this Moderns paper addressing context does not require a digressive approach that loses sight of the specific issues; rather that answers should remain as closely engaged as possible to relevant themes and issues emerging from their study of the literature and contexts of the period. The choice of primary texts to consider in responses is crucial in Sections B and C and an inappropriate choice of text inevitably limits the accuracy of the answer. In Section A it is vital that candidates remember to address the question of what is distinctively modern about the passages and not to simply write what they know about the author or the types of critical or theoretical approaches that one might take in analysing these passages. Comments on individual questions Section A Candidates could choose one of three pieces to discuss in terms of their distinctly modern quality, and it was striking that only two chose to discuss the poetry. Most chose passages (a) and (c) and the most successful responses among these answers were those who followed the rubric of the question very carefully. Some responses to the Perec passage were very good in their attention to both the broader intellectual and historical themes implicit in the writing and also to the details of stylistic features, 106
Examination papers and Examiners reports 2008 narrative voice and tone. More successful answers picked up on and were rewarded for looking at the question of language as a changing index of national, individual or subjective identity in the early twentieth century. The focus on the inadequacy of language to articulate increasingly alienated human experience was present in the best answers on both Perec and Beckett. The scrutiny of language and meaning was much less successfully carried out in the answers on the passage from Pirandello. In their responses candidates tended towards a much more descriptive and, at times, very literal answer that neglected to address the more profound philosophical implications of language as an increasingly arbitrary system progressively evacuated of the ability to describe the chaotic modern world. Some candidates did pick up on the idea of the death of the author in Pirandello and this was dealt with satisfactorily in most cases. In both (a) and (c) it is very important for candidates to remember that what is being asked here is to consider the intricate relationship between form and content and to draw this out, where appropriate, to other writers and relevant contextual issues. Less impressive answers on Beckett (c) rather sweepingly talked of the notion of the absurd ; this needs to be very carefully nuanced when looking at Beckett as his work does not neatly fit into such prescriptive aesthetic or intellectual categories. More generally speaking, candidates need to be mindful that terms such as the absurd, alienation, the modern and the subject need very meticulous consideration for each of the passages in Section A and for the paper as whole. Weaker responses over all three sections had a tendency to use these terms over-literally as if they are immovable and unchanging concepts that can be transferred unproblematically between all modern writers and texts. Section B The rubric requires that candidates answer each question in this section to at least two texts by any one writer. While the majority of candidates met this requirement it was noticeable that a few answers focused very much more fulsomely on one of the two required texts rather than a more balanced examination of both texts. Very limited reference to one of the texts is a serious weakness that candidates should do their best to avoid when answering questions from this section as it compromise their ability to fully engage with the question. Question 2 The quotation from James Joyce s Ulysses: History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake required candidates to consider the ways in which modern writers have engaged with history, both individual and collective. When successfully attempted, this question took in both modern and postmodern writers and the kinds of approaches they have taken in their works to address the idea of the historical from a variety of aesthetic and intellectual perspectives. This could cover familial, national or individual history but the response needed the candidate to address the central notion of how, as the twentieth century wore on, history is increasingly seen as a more fragmented or multiple set of narratives rather than an absolute authoritative truth. Question 3 Here candidates were asked for a critical account of the ways in which a modern writer has challenged the conventions of literary realism. This was a popular question, perhaps because of its ostensible simplicity. Critical was the essential word here and candidates who neglected to pay attention to this produced answers that were rather general in scope. Good responses needed to offer an insight into not only how realism was challenged but also into why this challenge occurred at a particular juncture in history. This kind of approach takes into account the variegated terrain of modernist literature and was rewarded by the Examiners. Most candidates chose to write on Virginia Woolf, specifically To the Lighthouse and Mrs Dalloway; others chose Beckett and these answers were less successful as they needed to pay close attention to the particular ways in which Beckett was an anti-realist. The same was true of those who looked at Joseph Conrad. Again, the need to consider the non-realism of the texts was 107
Diploma and BA in English most successfully carried out when critical consideration was given to the contexts of the individual writer s works. Also, it was vital that this question clearly distinguished between modernist and postmodernist anti-realisms and that they avoided overly descriptive answers that merely recapitulate events in the plot. Henri Bergson provides a very useful intellectual reference point here. Question 4 This was a relatively popular choice and was most competently undertaken when candidates grasped the complicated relationship between form and content in literary texts. Again, a clear distinction needs to be clearly drawn between the two aesthetic modes of writing covered on the unit, namely the modernist and the postmodernist. On the whole the question was answered well, with most candidates recognising that the means of representation called for a close examination of literary form that includes, but is not restricted to, questions of genre, point of view, fragmentation, silences, gaps and chronology. Candidates should avoid an overly literal understanding of the word reality in this question. Question 5 A Nabokov quotation in this question called for a response that examined the complicated notion of identity and the problems of defining the autobiographical in modern literature. This was generally proficiently attempted by candidates. A good response to this question would cover the changing concepts of selfhood and the subject, perhaps taking in Freud along the way and even Saussure on language as an arbitrary system of meaning. Joyce was a popular vehicle to discuss these ideas as were Woolf and Beckett. A good way of tackling such a question would be to provide a well balanced account of the contexts of the two texts under consideration and to ensure close attention is given to the precise ways in which the problematisation of the self is carried out on the texts. Question 6 This was a less popular question, but those who attempted it chose mainly irony. The idea here is not simply to define where examples of irony are to be found in a particular text or writer but to think about how and why irony might be used as part of a modernist aesthetic. Question 7 The question asks candidates to consider the role of myth or fairytale in modern writing. This was not always done very subtly. A good answer would have very carefully defined and delineated precisely how the terms were being used in the answer. For example, myth can be examined in modernist writers such Joyce, Eliot and Pound, but a diligent consideration would need to nuance the very different ways in which these writers choose to use myth in their writing with some relevant examples. A competent answer would refer to the question of temporal and cultural continuity as well as to discontinuity, fragmentation, societal change and the role that these older traditions can have in articulating the anxieties and concerns of the present. Responses referring to postmodernist writers could use magic realism as a central point of discussion or the ways in which postcolonial, African-American and feminist writers Angela Carter, Salman Rushdie, Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Toni Morrison have used mythological frameworks to subvert or burlesque dominant cultural narratives. Question 8 The best way to tackle this question is to set up the discussion of the texts within a broader understanding of the notion of doubt, opening it up to investigations of religion, rationality, family, nation, gender and class, and even the signifying power of language itself. This approach is much more critically competent than concentrating exclusively on individual characters doubts, which can be used as examples but placed in the broader intellectual contexts above. Candidates should avoid taking the word doubt too literally. 108
Examination papers and Examiners reports 2008 Question 9 This question asks candidates for a critical account of the relationship between feminism and form. While most answers concentrated on Woolf, other good writers to use here might include Angela Carter, Margaret Atwood or Katherine Mansfield. The best answers should show a good knowledge about the range of feminist theory, especially French feminist theories that link textual transgression to sexual politics, such as Helene Cixous and Luce Irigary and the notion of l écriture feminine. Candidates should avoid simply describing Woolf s stream of consciousness as a feminist strategy without saying why this might be the case. Question 10 This question asked the candidates to examine the treatment of the city by any modern writer. This was not a popular choice of question but one that could be answered by looking at one of the modernist writers such as Woolf, Joyce or Eliot. A good answer might take the city both as a literal and metaphorical space in which questions of identity, culture and time could be examined. Section C The rubric requires that answers refer to at least two different authors in this section. Again, the choice of writers is crucial in providing a good response here and less successful answers chose authors whose work was not always the most pertinent to the discussion. Question 11 This question took a quotation from Julia Kristeva on writing as simulation and mimicry as its starting point. This answer was best attempted by those who were knowledgeable about postmodernist techniques of writing. A good answer might cover the ideological function of mimicry in feminist and postcolonial authors as a form of subversion. Question 12 One of the most popular questions, this asked candidates to consider the usefulness of the terms modernism and postmodernism in the writing of two authors in the period covered. While most candidates chose to compare and contrast one writer under each term, more accomplished answers used this approach in addition to a very carefully nuanced examination of the possible continuities between the two terms and what this implies for literary history. The best answers clearly understood the salient features of both terms and recognised that these are often overlapping in modern writing, with a work like Ulysses demonstrating how modernism and postmodernism are not easily separable entities. Candidates should avoid treating the terms as chronologically based, distinct aesthetic or cultural movements as this produces very literal and basic responses. Question 13 This question requires candidates to address metafiction and self-consciousness in two modern writers. A successful answer to this question would entail both a definition of the terms metafiction and self-consciousness, and a demonstration of examples of these in two writers. It is important to look at the distinctive ways in which this drawing attention works across different writers and their works and also to consider why this might be the preferred style of writing for some authors. It is also useful to consider what kinds of things are at stake ideologically or aesthetically in drawing attention to the artifice of literature. As this self-consciousness is mostly, but not exclusively, the domain of postmodernist literature, detailed knowledge and consideration of this would be indispensable to any competent response. Question 14 This compare and contrast question asks candidates to look at one of the following issue in modern writing: childhood, race, technology, the body, the law. This question was not always successfully attempted, and where it was, race was the preferred theme closely 109
Diploma and BA in English followed by childhood. It is important to remember to provide a depth of analysis rather than simply a description of the occurrence of these in modern literature. Candidates are reminded to avoid summarising the plots of novels in their answers. Question 15 This question requires that the response address the notion of the social and the monstrous. This led many candidates to discuss Conrad s Heart of Darkness in which Kurtz chooses to live like a native outside of his fellow colonisers. Concepts of humanity and the ethics of conformity may be addressed in this answer. Other ways of approaching this question may take the notion of monstrosity less dramatically as someone who ideologically or inadvertently lives outside of what is termed society this may encompass Kafka s Gregor and texts where sexual dissidence is presented as a form of nonconformism. Question 16 This question asks for an analysis of the function of gaps, absences and incompleteness in modern writing. A high quality response to this would not simply state where these are to be located in at least two authors, but would also examine the functions aesthetic, philosophical or ideological of these aspects of the work. It would be good to contemplate how these gaps and absences resonate in many ways with the particular contexts of the works considered and how incompleteness may be a response to the changing role of narrative in society. Question 17 It was notable that this question, which asked candidates to examine the treatment of travel and/or the foreign in modern writing, did not elicit many responses. The question could be best embarked upon by providing a complex understanding of the implications of the word foreign and how this operates in literature set outside of Western Europe. This could include André Gide, Joseph Conrad or E.M. Forster and consider the metaphorical aspects of journeys undertaken in terms of race, class, empire and sexuality. Question 18 This question asks for a consideration of how modern writers have problematised the concept of time. Clearly, if the candidate looks at modernist writers such as Woolf, Eliot or Joyce,some detailed consideration of Henri Bergson and the idea of duration are necessary in the response. In modernism, candidates might look at the use of myth to forge temporal continuities between the ancient and the modern or at the notion of shellshock (Mrs Dalloway) that is seen to disrupt time after the First World War. Another approach would be a consideration of time and the nation in postmodernist fiction through the work of writers such as Rushdie and Marquez. 110