5e. Literature post-1900 (Non-exam assessment component) suggested texts - RELATIONSHIPS AND CHANGE — OCR A-Level English Literature
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5e. Literature post-1900 (Non-exam assessment component) suggested texts - RELATIONSHIPS AND CHANGE explained
Jo Shapcott’s 2011 poetry collection 'Of Mutability' addresses the theme of 'Relationships and Change' through its visceral exploration of bodily transformation and mortality.
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Written following the poet's experience with breast cancer, the poems examine the profound changes inflicted upon the physical self and how these alter relationships with the environment and one's own identity. Shapcott employs fluid imagery, scientific terminology, and a tone of surprising wonder rather than despair to navigate cellular mutation. By focusing on the transient nature of existence, the collection allows students to explore how poetic form, such as free verse and shifting perspectives, mirrors the unpredictable nature of human biology and our fragile connections to the wider world.
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Edward Albee 1962 Drama
Edward Albee’s 1962 drama, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, is a seminal post-1900 text exploring the destructive nature of relationships. Set during a single, alcohol-fuelled night, the play exposes the fragile marriage of George and Martha, using their bitter psychological games to deconstruct the American Dream. For the Non-exam assessment (NEA) focusing on 'Relationships and Change', students should analyse Albee’s dramatic methods, such as rapid-fire dialogue, claustrophobic staging, and the blurring of truth and illusion. By examining how the characters' relationship shifts from toxic codependency to a stripped-back reality, students can evaluate how Albee critiques 1960s societal expectations and marital performativity.
Revolutionary Road Richard Yates 1961 Prose
Richard Yates’s 1961 prose novel, Revolutionary Road, offers a devastating critique of suburban conformity and its impact on relationships. Set in 1955, the narrative follows Frank and April Wheeler, a couple whose marriage deteriorates as they struggle against the stifling expectations of middle-class American life. For the post-1900 Non-exam assessment (NEA) on 'Relationships and Change', students must analyse Yates’s narrative methods, including his shifting third-person perspective and tragic irony. By exploring the Wheelers' failed attempt to escape to Paris, students can evaluate how the novel portrays the tragic consequences of self-delusion, rigid 1950s gender roles, and the collapse of a relationship built on mutual deception.
Your focus
- Identify and analyse the use of scientific and natural imagery in Shapcott's poetry.
- Evaluate how poetic structure and form reflect the thematic concept of mutability.
- Construct a comparative argument linking the collection's exploration of bodily change to broader concepts of relationships and transformation.
Show all 9 objectives
- Analyse how Albee uses dramatic techniques to present the breakdown and transformation of a marriage.
- Evaluate the contextual significance of the 1962 setting in shaping the characters' relationship dynamics.
- Synthesise connections between the play's exploration of truth and illusion and the broader NEA theme of relationships and change.
- Analyse Yates's use of narrative perspective to reveal the psychological deterioration of a marriage.
- Evaluate how the 1950s suburban setting functions as both a backdrop and a catalyst for relationship changes.
- Compare the presentation of failed ambition and marital conflict in this prose text with a chosen paired text for the NEA.
5e. Literature post-1900 (Non-exam assessment component) suggested texts - RELATIONSHIPS AND CHANGE exam tips
Marking Points
- Analyse Shapcott's use of biological and medical imagery to articulate the experience of physical mutation and illness.
- Evaluate how the collection's tone subverts traditional elegiac expectations by embracing wonder and curiosity in the face of mortality.
- Explore the theme of interconnectedness, specifically how changes in the human body are mirrored by changes in the natural environment.
- Examine the use of fluid poetic forms, such as enjambment and free verse, to reflect the thematic focus on instability and continuous transformation.
- Evaluate Albee's use of dramatic form and structure, particularly the three-act progression from 'Fun and Games' to 'The Exorcism'.
- Analyse the presentation of George and Martha's relationship as a microcosm for the failure of the post-war American Dream.
- Explore the significance of the imaginary child as a dramatic device representing the illusions necessary to sustain a failing marriage.
- Compare the older, disillusioned couple (George and Martha) with the younger, superficially perfect couple (Nick and Honey) to highlight generational shifts.
- Analyse Yates's use of shifting focalisation to expose the emotional distance and miscommunication between Frank and April.
- Evaluate the symbolic function of the suburban setting (the Revolutionary Hill Estates) in representing the entrapment of the modern marriage.
- Explore how the characters' desire for 'change' (the Paris plan) acts as a catalyst for the ultimate destruction of their relationship.
- Assess the presentation of 1950s masculinity and femininity, and how these rigid constructs contribute to the Wheelers' marital breakdown.
Examiner Tips
- 💡When writing your NEA, pair this collection with a text that also explores physical or psychological transformation to build a robust comparative argument.
- 💡Focus closely on Shapcott's verbs and active imagery, which drive the sense of constant motion and cellular activity within the poems.
- 💡Ensure you link the specific structural features of individual poems, such as stanza length and line breaks, directly to the overarching theme of mutability.
- 💡Focus closely on Albee's detailed stage directions to explore how power dynamics shift physically and psychologically between the characters.
- 💡Use the theme of 'truth versus illusion' as a central framework for comparing this play with your chosen paired NEA text.
- 💡Select brief, high-impact quotations of dialogue to demonstrate Albee's use of linguistic violence and wit.
- 💡Contrast the Wheelers' internal monologues with their spoken dialogue to highlight the theme of marital alienation and performativity.
- 💡Use the character of John Givings as a structural device to explore the uncomfortable truths about the Wheelers' relationship that other characters ignore.
- 💡When comparing texts for the NEA, focus on how Yates uses the motif of the 'unfulfilled dream' to drive relationship changes.
Common Mistakes
- Error: Reading the collection exclusively as a biographical diary of cancer treatment. Correction: Analyse the poems as crafted literary artefacts that use personal illness as a springboard to explore broader philosophical themes of change.
- Error: Overlooking the significance of the title's allusion to Edmund Spenser's 'Mutabilitie Cantos'. Correction: Acknowledge the literary heritage of the theme of change and how Shapcott modernises this Renaissance concept.
- Error: Assuming the tone is uniformly melancholic due to the subject matter. Correction: Identify and analyse the moments of joy, surrealism, and intellectual curiosity that permeate the collection.
- Treating the play as a prose text rather than a drama; correction: always analyse the text through its theatrical elements, such as stage directions, dialogue pacing, and staging.
- Viewing George and Martha's relationship as purely hateful; correction: acknowledge the underlying codependency and the complex, game-playing nature of their bond which sustains them.
- Ignoring the 1962 historical context; correction: integrate contextual factors like the Cold War, 1960s gender roles, and the critique of the American Dream into the analysis of the relationships.
- Focusing solely on the plot without analysing the prose style; correction: examine Yates's specific narrative choices, such as free indirect discourse and ironic tone.
- Viewing April as the sole victim of the marriage; correction: explore the mutual complicity and self-delusion of both Frank and April in their relationship's failure.
- Treating the 1961 publication date and 1955 setting interchangeably; correction: distinguish between the post-war 1950s setting of the novel and the early 1960s context of its publication when evaluating societal critiques.