Paper 1 revision: grammar concepts

QUESTION 1: Comprehension

“Discuss” implies that an opinion must be expressed with supporting evidence. Candidates must be taught to provide evidence for their opinions.

QUESTION 2: Summarising

• The use of “approximately 90 words” is a clear indication of a reasonable limit. Using too many words incurred penalties.

• When told to use their own words, candidates must heed that instruction.

• Writing a summary in point form means expressing one idea, fact, thought, etc. per point in 10- 12 words.

• A connected prose summary consists of only one paragraph.

QUESTIONS 3 AND 4 Advertising and other media

• Answers were generally of a poor quality as candidates ignored instructions to confine their comments and evidence to specifics. Again, providing specific evidence is essential to earning marks. A simple “Yes” and “No” is not acceptable.

• Candidates were required to offer interpretations of certain figures of speech like pun, euphemism, irony, etc.

• Appropriate evidence about specific facial  expressions of cartoon figures earned marks

while generalised comments did not. For example: “The raised eyebrows of the man

indicate his confusion while the wide eyes of the woman suggest her alarm.”

QUESTION 5: Editing, using language correctly

• Candidates should be reminded that sound editing is based on a thorough working

knowledge of the rules of English grammar and punctuation.

• Very few candidates could see the need for correct punctuation.

• We urge teachers to teach correct punctuation of direct speech, use of the apostrophe

and concord.

• Common spelling errors: yous (plural form of you), there (for "their").

Students, The English Handbook and Study Guide^TM covers every aspect of the English Language you will need from Senior Primary to Matric.

Here follows a list of grammar concepts which you may be asked to identify, analyse/explain, or correct when deliberate mistakes have been made to test your knowledge.

1.                  active and passive voice

2.                  adjective

3.                  adverb

4.                  auxiliary verb

5.                  concord

6.                  conjunction

7.                  direct speech

8.                  indirect speech

9.                  modal verb

10.              noun

11.              object

12.              predicate

13.              pronoun

14.              subject

15.              verbs (all nine tenses)

16.              apostrophe use (contraction and possessive)

17.              preposition

18.              punctuation marks (all)

19.              phrase vs. clause

syno-, anto-, homonyms, and homophones

To a small boy who died at Diepkloof Reformatory

Reformatory in the title - A reformatory is a residential school for young offenders.

In the opening stanza the speaker addresses the dead boy. He says that the small boy had had no idea that his little crime would get the attention of a large number of institutions and professionals, nor did he know that they would benefit from it (their jobs depend on crimes like this).

In the next stanza, he looks through the small boy’s documents, starting with his birth certificate.

In stanza three he studies the boy’s death certificate and says that death released him from suffering.

In the final stanza he finds the document that sent the boy to the reformatory. He says that millions of people are complicit (involved) in the boy’s crime. He believes the boy will go straight to heaven because God does not need to punish him in order to protect society.

Q&A

1.      Line 24: Why is "Death" spelt with an uppercase "D"?

The capitalized D transform death into a proper noun. In addition, death is given a gender, ‘he’, automatically implying it is human.

2.      Lines 40-41: How are millions of people complicit (involved) in the boy’s crime – whatever it is?

The boy was probably led to criminal behavior because of his circumstances – perhaps poor and hungry or he got involved with other criminal boys. The circumstances he says were created by the millions of people who created this world before him. By creating a world in which this small boy turned to crime, those people are partially responsible for the crime.

3.      The poet deliberately juxtaposes (put side by side) the word "commit" and "committal". There is a deep irony in this. Explain what it is.

It is ironic since the committal is the legal document sending the small boy to the reformatory; and here the principal is tasked with ‘commit’ the child to his grave.

Abandoned Bundle analysis

The morning mist and chimney smoke of White City Jabavu flowed thick yellow as pus oozing from a gigantic sore.

'White City Jabavu is a part of Soweto, a township lying to the south-west of Johannesburg. The poet then uses a simile to compare the morning mist and chimney smoke to 'pus oozing from a gigantic sore'. The township is compared to a sore, a place that is very unhealthy and horrible to look at. It is heavily polluted, with rubbish heaps everywhere.

It smothered our little houses like fish caught in a net.

The next stanza consists of only two lines. It starts with the use of personification. It (the smog) smothers the houses. The houses are smothered in the unhealthy mist and smoke. Then a simile follows: The poet says that the houses; and therefore the inhabitants of the houses, are like fish caught in a net. They can't go anywhere. They are forced to live in filthy circumstances, and they have nowhere to go.

Scavenging dogs draped in red bandanas of blood fought fiercely for a squirming bundle. The third stanza introduces the scene: dogs are fighting for a squirming bundle. The dogs are described as scavenging; they are searching, hunting for food. Then a metaphor is used to describe what the dogs look like. The dogs in this case look like they are wearing red bandanas, in other words; their heads are covered in blood.

I threw a brick they bared fangs flicked velvet tongues of scarlet and scurried away, scurry leaving a mutilated corpse-an infant dumped on a rubbish heap-'Oh! Baby in the Manger sleep well on human dung.' The speaker throws a brick, so that the dogs run away. Another metaphor is used to describe the dogs: 'flicked velvet tongues of scarlet'. The colour red is used again, when their tongues are described as scarlet. It could refer to either the real colour of their tongues or the blood on their tongues coming from the bundle. Their tongues look like velvet; which is a soft and smooth material. They leave behind a mutilated corpse of a baby. The baby is now described as a corpse: and is therefore dead.

Then an exclamation follows: 'Oh!' This is the first indication of what emotions the speaker might experience. It can be an outcry of despair or sadness. The baby is then described as 'Baby in the Manger', which refers to Jesus. The baby is therefore innocent. It died a horrible death, like Jesus did, without committing any sin. The next line introduces a tone of bitterness. It contains a paradox. The speaker tells the baby to sleep well. This is the baby's last resting place, but it is not a soft mattress, but human dung. How can anyone sleep well on human excrement? The fate of the baby is horrifying. It shouldn't have happened.

Its mother had melted into the rays of the rising sun, her face glittering with innocence, her heart as pure as untrampled dew

The last stanza describes the mother. The word melted is used to indicate that she disappeared. Like snow melts and therefore disappears in the sun she also disappeared. Her face glitters in the sun. When something glitters it is usually beautiful. She is described as innocent. A new day is beginning for the mother. She will continue with her life, while her baby has just died a horrible death.

Mothers who have babies in these particular circumstances often don't have an income or means to look after the babies. Maybe the mother didn't have anywhere to take her baby to and she didn't have money to look after him. So she dumped the baby on the rubbish heap, because she didn’t know what else to do with him. The last stanza reinforces the sense of innocence. A simile is used to compare her heart to 'untrampled dew'. Dew drops that haven't been stepped on make perfect round spheres, and that is how the mother is described: pure and perfect. She can continue with her life as if nothing happened, as if she didn't commit a horrible sin.

Vrooyen/Temp

a young man's thoughts before jun the 16th

a young man’s thoughts before june the 16^th

Once again, in this short poem, your success lies in paying careful attention the context/setting of the poem, but you also have to know the new and unfamiliar vocabulary.

The setting: The poet places himself in the shoes of one of the teenagers who participated in the Soweto uprising of June 16, 1976. He sees himself the day before the event, foreseeing the tragedy that is due to erupt.

The vocabulary:

winds – takes a twisting route

aches – hurts with a dull pain

belch – burp noisily

strum – sweep the fingers

brow – person’s forehead

drenched – soaked through

Here are the mistakes you failed to see:

1.1       Describe the structure of this poem (not what it is about) and say whether you think it is   effective.                                                                                                                     [2]

free verse/no punctuation/stream of consciousness poetry/ It is suitable because it clearly describes the anxious, disordered thoughts of a teenager who does not know what the next day will bring./

1.2       What is implied about the persona in the lines, “i take with me only the sweet/memories of my      youth”?                                                                                                                        [1]

The persona has a sense that they are leaving their youth behind – it is now just a memory./

1.3.1    What is the tone of “a broad belch of beer”, line 7?

1.3.2    It makes the line:                                                                                                         [1]

A.    sordid         B.     celebratory         C.   unruly  

B. celebratory

1.3.3    Explain your answer to 4.3.2 by referring to the alliteration.                                     [2]

The alliteration of “a broad belch of beer” evokes the picture and sound of happy young people enjoying an evening together/ in a carefree manner./                                                                

1.4       Then, for the first time, from lines 8 – 12, the persona mentions adults and what their response will be “tomorrow”. In the context of the poem, explain why the adults should sing and play a “sad song”.                                                                                              [2]

“tomorrow” is June 16^th, the day of the Soweto Uprising,/ when the brutal murders of teenaged protesters caused their parents and adults in their community to go into mourning./

1.5       Do you find the last line a fitting ending to the poem?   Explain your answer.         [2]

It is fitting for several reasons – the red sunset speaks of blood and the end of something, so foreshadows the day ahead// the blood of innocent children was shed and “drenched” helps us feel that horror// OR the persona speaks of “my sunset” being ‘drenched”, changing what is normally beautiful, a sunset, life, into something grotesque// OR it is a young person’s response to an indescribable horror – it must be expressed strongly.// …

1.6       Comment on the rich imagery used in the last line.                                                    [3]

Sunset is often the metaphor for the end of life - death. Here, however, it is not a gentle death but one which is ‘drenched with red’. Notice the harshness of the word ‘drenched’. The life of the young people has been ripped apart by police bullets, and their blood flows freely, drenching the sunset (and streets) with red.

Futility by Wilfred Owen

Futility by Wilfred Owen
This a beautiful war poem and by no means the difficult poem students make it out to be. In fact, there are only four new and unfamiliar words and the unusual rhyme scheme that could offer a challenge in the exam.
Those new words:

1.      Clays – a human being

2.      Cold star – earth before the process of evolution (Ice Age)

3.      Fatuous – pointlessly foolish; this also indicates the poet’s change of attitude towards thr sun.

4.      Toil – to work hard

Owen uses half-rhyme, also known as slant rhyme. This is an imperfect rhyme in which the final consonant matches but vowels sounds do not match:
Sun/sown                    once/France               snow/now/know                    
seeds/sides                  star/stir                       tall/toil/all

The poem is about a soldier (the speaker) that cannot believe that his comrade (a fellow soldier) has been killed in battle. He believes that by moving him into the sun his friend can be revived. This is because he sees the sun as a miracle worker, a healing agent. The sun, he believes has special powers to give life. The speaker is in denial and shock. He reasons that the sun has been able to prove its potency before so why can’t it resuscitate his friend now. He thinks about how his friend has just died therefore making it easier for the sun to restore him back to life. The speaker thinks about the role played by the sun in the creation of the world. The sun made things grow. This has such a tremendous feat. If the sun could do this then surely it can “wake up” one lone soldier. At the end of the poem the speaker realises how useless, pointless and hopeless the sun is and how it is not powerful enough to wake his friend. A comment is also made here about the futility of war because war causes death.

Are limbs, so dear-achieved, are sides,

Full-nerved, - still warm, - too hard to stir?

The rhetorical question is aimed not only at the Sun, the Sustainer of Life. It is also intended at the devastating concept of war in general. He was depressed and disgusted at the distressing and demoralizing consequences of the War.

Was for this that the clay grew tall? Did Man advance in Life and progressiveness to come to this? As the poet prefixes the adjective “fatuous” before sunbeams, he illustrates how the sun had lost its utility value in the face of Death. Was it for this eventual finale that the sun awoke the earthlings?

When I have fears - discussion and questions

     This poem falls into two major thought groups:

• Keats expresses his fear of dying young in the first thought unit, lines 1-12. He fears that he will not fulfill himself as a writer (lines 1-8) and that he will lose his beloved (lines 9-12).
• Keats resolves his fears by asserting the unimportance of love and fame in the concluding two and a half lines of this sonnet.

The poet's concern with time (not enough time to fulfill his poetic gift and love) is supported by the repetition of "when" at the beginning of each quatrain and by the shortening of the third quatrain. Keats attributes two qualities to love: (1) it has the ability to transform the world for the lovers ("faery power"), but of course fairies are not real, and their enchantments are an illusion and (2) love involves us with emotion rather than thought ("I feel" and "unreflecting love").

When I have Fears

Questions

1.1              Which type of sonnet is this?

1.2              Name ONE characteristic unique to this type of sonnet.

2.         Critically discuss the extend metaphor found in the first quatrain. Consider the following aspects in your answer: what two things are being compared; why this is an effective comparison and what the choice of words imply.

3.         What does Keats fear the most?

4.         Refer to the last two lines. What does Keats come to realize and accept at last?

Suggested answers

1.1              Shakespearean / Elizabethan

1.2              3 quatrains /  a rhyming end couplet / abab cdcd efef gg rhyme scheme

2.         Keats is comparing the process of writing to the harvest of grain. It is appropriate because in the same way that you glean in the grain he wants to write every last bit of poetry in his mind. Also, the words are stored in books similar to the granaries used for the harvest grain. Words like ‘rich’ and high-piled imply the abundance of his ideas.

3.         Keats is afraid of dying before he could write down the ‘harvest’ of his poems.

4.         In the end we all die and it is something we have to do alone. You cannot take fame with you when you die.    

Sonnet - When I have Fears

When I have Fears

Notes

WHEN I have fears that I may cease to be

(Scared of oblivion)

Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,

Won’t be able to get out his ideas- arrogant?

Before high piled books, in charact'ry,
Hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain;

Fears he will die before his works are published

When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,

Won’t be able to look at beauty or experience love

And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;

Won’t be able to solve the mysteries of life

And when I feel, fair creature of an hour!

(His lover)

That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love! - then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.

These last two lines are very important, because they can be interpreted in different ways. ‘Think’ represents life and ‘sink’ represents death, so they’re contrast in this last rhyming couplet emphasises the message within the poem: will Keats carry on thinking and writing or does the death idea give an impression of suicidal thoughts and depression? Is this poem negative or positive and how do the last two lines leave you feeling?

The idea of negative capability is also evident here– the last two lines create the sense of a sensory, solitary mood– separated from the landscape.

Sonnet 30 analysis

Shakespeare's "Sonnet 30" is a Shakespearean/Elizabethan sonnet, composed of three quatrains and a couplet. In the couplet, the writer tends to take a different track compared to the rest of the sonnet. The change in this one is signaled by a single word-"But."

The entire three quatrains are devoted to showing us his grief over his "fair lord." Shakespeare uses language in this sonnet to draw the reader in to the emotional pain portrayed with lines like, "I summon up" and "Then I can." These lines help draw the reader to his sad feelings about his friend balanced by the realization that he had such a friend. A courtroom motif is used in the first part with "session," "summon up," and "cancell'd." This motif is used to stress his dependence financially on his fair lord. He also uses the words "expense," "grievances," "account," "paid," and "losses" to further emphasize that fiscal relationship. The speaker realizes in the poem that the fair lord has credits on his side. In other words, the speaker can never repay all that his fair lord has given him.

ANALYSIS

sessions (1): the sitting of a court. The court imagery is continued with 'summon up' in line 2.

old woes (4): By replaying his 'old woes' over in his mind, the poet is wasting precious time that could be spent thinking more joyous thoughts. Hence 'my dear time's waste.'

love's long since cancell'd woe (7): is the sorrow the poet had once felt over the loss of his close friends; loss that has dulled over the years but now returns as he thinks of the past.

And moan...sight (8): Some scholars interpret this line to mean 'I lament the cost to me of many a lost sigh.' "'Sight' for 'sigh' was archaic by Shakespeare's time and seems only to have been used for the sake of rhyme. Sighing was considered deleterious to health; However, the ordinary word 'sight' also makes sense in this context; that is, the poet has lost many things that he has seen and loved.

All losses...end. (14): His friend is as great as the sum of all the many things the poet sought but did not find.

SONNET 30 paraphrase

SONNET 30	PARAPHRASE
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought	When in these sessions of gratifying silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,	I think of the past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,	I lament my failure to achieve all that I wanted,
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste:	And I sorrowfully remember that I wasted the best years of my life:
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow,	Then I can cry, although I am not used to crying,
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,	For dear friends now hid in death's unending night,
And weep afresh love's long since cancell'd woe,	And cry again over woes that were long since healed,
And moan the expense of many a vanish'd sight:	And lament the loss of many things that I have seen and loved:
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,	Then can I grieve over past griefs again,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er	And sadly repeat (to myself) my woes
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,	The sorrowful account of griefs already grieved for,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.	Which (the account) I repay as if I had not paid before.
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,	But if I think of you while I am in this state of sadness, dear friend,
All losses are restored and sorrows end.	All my losses are compensated for and my sorrow ends.

In Detention by Chris van Wyk

Poem:              In Detention by Chris van Wyk

Question:         Discuss the effectiveness of this poem as a striking example of satire

                        In your answer you may refer to some or all of the following:

·                     The poet’ s intention in writing this poem

·                     The obvious sarcasm

·                     The tone of the poet

·                     The structure of the poem

·                     The diction (word choice)

How to answer:

Make sure that you first plan what you are going to say in each paragraph.  Stick to one or two related devices in a paragraph.

Learners need to show an understanding that this is a satirical poem written to show the patent absurdity of the reasons given by the police under apartheid for people ‘dying’ in detention. Behind the nonsensical reasons given by the police, lies the horror and brutality of what was, in reality, murder in detention.           

Learners can refer to the sarcasm/the twisting of the reasons by the poet/how the three reasons are ‘twisted’ into a whole string of patently absurd statements. Behind the humour tough the reality that people have been killed.

The structure of the poem with each line beginning with ‘He’ and then going into an explanation reinforces the absurdity.

Topic, theme, tone, structure & diction

Whenever you study a poem, you will be called upon to analyse it. This means that you will need to know where the poet has used language techniques and how rhythm and meter is being used. You must be careful that in doing this you do not reduce the poem to individual and unrelated parts.

Topic

The first and probably easiest part of the process is to determine what the subject or topic of the poem is. This does not need to be the theme or message. It is simply to record what experience, object or feeling that the poet is writing about. This can be as simple as the poet writing about a balloon or a bicycle (objects) or a tenth birthday party or witnessing a person shoplifting (experience). Generally this topic or subject will be the springboard from which the poet develops his/her themes or the muse that inspires the poet to ponder something about life. Consider why the poet has chosen this topic.

What is it that has particularly caught the attention of the poet and inspired them to write a poem about it/based on it?

Themes and messages

The next step is to determine what the poet is trying to express. This is similar to purpose. You need to think about what the poet wants you to know more about now that you have read the poem or alternatively, how the poet wants to make you feel. Many poems don't have a message or point other than to amuse or entertain the reader. You should try not to be too concerned about whether your answer is 'correct' at this point. Keep an open mind and as you continue to analyse you may find other messages. Think about this non-exhaustive list of possible themes:

• To amuse
• The pains of growing up
• Lost dreams and hopes
• The folly of arrogance
• The nature of friendship
• The relationship between parent and child
• The nature of love
• The importance of honesty
• The importance of looking after the environment
• The nature of death
• The nature of birth
• The beauty of friendship/nature/love

Tone

In some ways tone has a similar effect on poetry as do emotion and mood. The tone of the poem will give you an idea about the composer's attitude towards the subject or topic. The tone is the tone of voice that the composer has used. A good way to understand this is to see the tone that we describe and use in English as being along the lines of:

'Don't use that tone of voice with me!'

Has anybody ever said this to you? What tone of voice were you speaking in? Possibly you had a sarcastic tone or a threatening tone. It is possible also to have a light-hearted tone or a serious tone. The important thing to remember is that the tone that is used implies a specific attitude towards topics or subjects.

 Structure

Poetry is a disciplined expression of the written word and the use of structures provide the tools of trade of poetry writing. Poetry structures have a set of rhyming patterns, metre, grammar and imagery.

Diction

Diction refers to both the choice and the order of words. It has typically been split into vocabulary and syntax. The basic question to ask about vocabulary is "Is it simple or complex?" The basic question to ask about syntax is "Is it ordinary or unusual?" Taken together, these two elements make up diction.