This post is designed for the two groups I teach. One group is writing about Philip Larkin and the other group is writing about Betjeman.
- Firstly respond directly to the key words in the essay title - such as 'outsiders', 'bleak view of the human condition', 'love' and 'suffering'. These will be broad and abstract concepts. Try and define these concepts using your own words. Why not use a dictionary and a thesaurus to help you do this. What do you think they mean?
- Then show how these concepts can be applied to the three texts. In general what does text a, b and c say about the key theme. This will involve you naming each text and the writer as well as a brief summary of the text - no more than a sentence. What do your writers say specifically about these concepts?
- Then go on to make general comparative and or contrasting points with the texts. I expect there will be similarities and differences between the three texts. You may find especially with Betjeman differences between poems. Although Larkin's poetry has a consistent and sustained vision of the world.
- Follow this up by identifying briefly broad contextual features of their writing. Avoid writing specific biographical facts about the life of [Larkin] or [Betjeman], Hartley and Miller.
- Also make a comment about how each of the three writers and their work have been received by society or specific critics either at the time they were written or in the present time.
- Finally you should identify some of the important literary features from each of the texts. You should focus on the dominant literary features and make comparative and or contrasting points. You can make specific references to the different genres here. Perhaps emphasise the dramatic conflict of the drama, the poetic techniques of the poetry like rhyme and rhythm and the first person narrator of the prose text.
If you are able to incorporate all the above elements in an introduction - as well as write clearly, accurately and concisely you have begun to address the Assessment Objectives.
