Criterion A rewards interpretation of the works and criterion C rewards a logical, effectively developed structure.
Examiners assess whether that structure is established early, exactly what a strong introduction signals.
Component 1: Conceptual Opening (Criterion A)
Open with a claim about the thematic territory the question addresses.
It must be specific enough to belong to the argument, not generic enough to precede any essay on any topic.
Example
Question: "How do writers explore the relationship between power and silence?"
Weak: "Writers have always explored the theme of power."
Strong: "In both The Handmaid's Tale and A Doll's House, silence is not the absence of resistance, it is the form resistance is forced to take. Atwood and Ibsen construct systems of power that leave women no legitimate channel for dissent, so the significant acts in both texts are the ones that operate beneath language: Offred's interior narrative, Nora's departure without explanation."
Note
This weak example fails Criterion A because:
It contains no interpretation.
It could open any essay on any pair of texts.
An examiner reading this learns nothing about how the response reads either the question or the works.
The strong example satisfies Criterion A because:
It reframes the question's key term: power is not named as a theme to be discussed, it is shown operating through a specific mechanism.
It names both texts and both writers, signalling from the first sentence that this is a comparative essay.
The final clause gestures toward the body paragraphs without summarising them, giving examiners evidence of structural intent (Criterion C)
Component 2: Text, Author, and Context (Criterion A)
Introduce both works with full title, author, and one piece of context that connects directly to the question.
Context that cannot be linked to the question does not belong in the introduction.
Example
Question: "How do writers explore the relationship between power and silence?"
Weak: "Margaret Atwood wrote The Handmaid's Tale in 1985. Henrik Ibsen wrote A Doll's House in 1879."
Strong: "Atwood, writing in the aftermath of second-wave feminism and the rise of the American religious right, constructs a theocratic state in which women's silence is legislated through law and ritual. Ibsen, writing against the legal framework of coverture that made wives the property of their husbands, stages a marriage in which Nora's competence is systematically disbelieved."
Note
This weak example fails Criterion A because:
The dates have no interpretive function. An examiner cannot tell why either date matters to this argument.
The strong example satisfies Criterion A because:
Each sentence uses context to explain why the writer made the choices they made.
It gives the reason why the question applies to each text in this specific way.
Component 3: Thesis (Criteria A, B1, B2, C)
The thesis must respond to the question's command term, name both texts, and signal the analytical direction of the essay.
A thesis that could apply to a different pair of texts is too vague.
Example
Question: "How do writers explore the relationship between power and silence?"
Weak: "Both texts explore how power silences women in different ways."
Strong: "Where Atwood's Offred preserves selfhood through a clandestine first-person narrative that the regime cannot hear, Ibsen's Nora terminates hers entirely, slamming a door that says more than any speech act could. Both writers locate resistance not in confrontation but in the forms of expression that power has failed to legislate against."
Note
This weak example fails across multiple criteria because:
It describes what the texts contain, not what they mean.
It could apply to any two texts on any question about power.
The strong example satisfies multiple criteria simultaneously because:
It names a specific technique and its function for B1.
It makes an explicit comparative claim (alignment of method, divergence of outcome) for B2.
It responds to the command term "how do writers explore" by identifying the precise formal mechanism each writer uses for Criterion A.
It gives the essay a clearorganisationallogic that Criterion C will reward.
