AQA A-Level English Language and Literature Past Papers & Mark Schemes

AQA A-Level English Language and Literature (specification code 7707) occupies distinctive territory between two disciplines: it asks students to read texts both as a literary critic (attentive to narrative voice, imagery, structure, characterisation) and as a linguist (attentive to register, syntax, phonological patterning, pragmatic implication). The most capable students in this subject don't separate these approaches — they use them simultaneously. Paper 1: Telling Stories (3 hours, 75 marks, 40%) centres on narrative across different textual forms. Section A provides an unseen prose extract for close language and literary analysis, with questions asking how the writer constructs meaning through specific linguistic and literary choices. Sections B and C draw on set texts studied during the course — typically one prose text and one play or poetry collection — with questions requiring comparative analysis that integrates both linguistic and literary frameworks. Paper 2: Exploring Conflict (2.5 hours, 75 marks, 40%) examines how conflict — social, interpersonal, ideological — is represented in texts. It includes both unseen spoken data (a transcript of dialogue or interview) and written texts for analysis, alongside questions connecting to set texts. Analysing how conflict is constructed through pronoun choices, interruptions, semantic fields of aggression, or syntactic subordination are all relevant approaches in this paper. The NEA writing portfolio (20%) requires two pieces: an original creative piece with a critical commentary explaining the linguistic and literary choices the writer made. The commentary is not a description of the story — it is an analysis of craft. Students who can articulate why they chose a particular narrative perspective, or how a specific grammatical structure creates a particular effect, produce the strongest commentaries. This qualification rewards genuine readers and writers who are also analytical — students who find both close textual analysis and creative writing engaging, and who can explain what language choices achieve.