Ground rules Notes

The Ascent: Building Depth in Stages

1. To develop a truly analytical understanding of your Paper 2 texts, you'll need to move through a structured, multi-layered process.
2. Below is a guide to help you ascend from basic comprehension to advanced comparative insight.

How This Works

1. The questions you’ll encounter are open-ended prompts, they are designed to guide your thinking, not produce ‘correct’ answers.
2. These are not checklist questions. They're starting points for inquiry and reflection.
3. To respond meaningfully, expect to:
   1. Read and re-read key sections of your texts
   2. Search for relevant quotations that support nuanced analysis
   3. Use trusted resources like LitCharts, SparkNotes, or class notes
   4. Use ChatGPT as a brainstorming assistant, but fact-check independently

Time and Effort

1. Some prompts may take up to 30 minutes, this is normal. Deeper insights take time to uncover and verify.
2. Spread the work across a week or more. You're constructing what we might call a Pyramid of Literary Insight, and pyramids aren’t built overnight.
3. If you're cramming, you may need to compress this process, but understand that depth takes time.

Order Matters

1. You should work through Levels 1 to 4 in sequence.
2. Each level builds on the last, from foundational understanding to sophisticated intertextual comparison.

Level 1: Essential Knowledge-Gathering Tasks

1. This stage is about building a solid foundation of understanding across four key areas: themes, characters, techniques, and context.
2. Use the prompts below to explore each text deeply and analytically.

1. Themes

1. Identify at least three central themes in each of your texts.
2. Can you also identify two subtler or overlooked themes?
3. Trace the development of each theme across the text: How is it introduced, complicated, or resolved?
4. Map the theme’s trajectory:
   1. Chapter 3: Zara hides her identity (theme: repression)
   2. Chapter 7: Repression spreads through the town
   3. Chapter 11: Zara embraces her truth despite the cost
5. By the final chapter, what message or conclusion does the writer present about this theme?
6. Select a layered quote for each theme that uses at least two techniques.

2. Characters

1. Name the three most significant characters in each text.
2. Identify two secondary characters whose roles are meaningful thematically or structurally.
3. When are they introduced and how are they initially presented?
4. Outline the character arc for each: What changes do they undergo? What causes that change?
   1. Example: A quiet caretaker is slowly pushed to violence through injustice.
5. Choose a defining quote for each character, preferably rich in language and technique.

3. Techniques

1. Note three prominent literary or stylistic techniques used in each text.
2. Identify two less conventional techniques (e.g., unreliable narration, interrupted syntax, framing devices).
3. For each technique, choose one well-crafted quote that offers depth of analysis.

4. Context

1. When was the text published?
2. List five key biographical or cultural details about the author that inform their writing.
3. Define the genre or subgenre (e.g., political allegory, modern tragedy, coming-of-age memoir).
4. Research the historical, political, or social influences that shaped the text’s concerns or structure.
   1. Example: Economic collapse influencing themes of survival and moral ambiguity
5. Consider how context interacts with each element of the work: What pressures or norms is the text responding to?

Level 2: Building Contextual Understanding

1. This stage requires deeper research.
2. You’ll need to explore how historical, social, and cultural contexts have shaped your texts and support your ideas with well-chosen evidence.

1. Context and Themes

1. How does the context influence the key themes in each text?
2. Refer back to your Level 1 notes to review the main themes.
3. Can you identify a strong quote from each text that shows how context shapes or deepens a particular theme?