GCSE English Language: Analysing Literary Non-fiction

Narrator:
Literary non-fiction is writing that focuses on people, places and events in the real world. In your exam, you’ll need to successfully recognise the genre of the writing, the intended readership, as well as identify its purpose, language and structure. In this film, we look at two pieces of writing about London, taken from different sources. Discussing them are Anna James, writer and journalist, and myself, author Tim Moore.

Tim Moore:
My writing is travel writing. It’s about my experiences. The style I use could be described as literary. It’s critical with humorous elements.

Anna James:
The second example is from an article written for The Guardian by journalist Tom Dyckhoff. I’d describe his writing as reportage with a bite of sarcasm and humour.

Tim Moore:
All writers have an aim when writing a text. They want to have a specific effect on their reader, and that’s referred to as a purpose.

Tim Moore:
I guess the purpose of my writing would be primarily to entertain people, make them laugh. It’s comic writing, but also to inform, because there’s a lot of history in there, there’s lots of information that people might not know about, you might find interesting, bits of trivia. So those would be the big two.

Narrator:
In this extract, I write about Whitehall, an important road in London.

Tim Moore:
Back in Charles I’s time, there were mob riots in Whitehall. That’s quite an interesting way of, of getting across something that people wouldn’t know, and then the idea that you’re painting a very different picture of Whitehall’s life, that there was a time when they were, when it was full of, you know, rioting mobs.

Tim Moore:
A text can have more than one purpose.

Narrator:
As in the following example from the Weekend Guardian supplement, where writer Tom Dyckhoff talks about King’s Cross.

Anna James:
Before my time, there’s always Mona Lisa, the film, and reruns of The Sweeney. We can see that he’s using pop culture references that might mean something to his readership, to entertain us. Through this, we can see that the author’s purpose is both to inform and to entertain.

Tim Moore:
Whatever your purpose, it’s important to know who your audience are, and imagine them when you’re writing.

Narrator:
I would describe my audience as people who were the height of fashion in the eighties, but now they’re much older and more likely to wear comfortable clothes, and have an unfashionable haircut, but they still like a laugh, and to learn new things. Tom’s Guardian reading audience on the other hand, probably like to cycle and eat vegetarian food. They may own a cat, be upwardly mobile, and even play a musical instrument.

Tim Moore:
Writers craft their language and words to appeal to their intended audience.

Tim Moore:
At 12:30 the traffic at either end of the thoroughfare was embroiled in its usual pinball frenzy. Pinball, obviously, you know, if you have an image in your head of a pinball match, there’s, you know, lights beeping off and things crashing about and the ball going everywhere. So I’m kind of just getting across in quite a concise way, just using two words, that the traffic is very busy and it’s a very hectic scene.

Anna James:
I can just remember what it was, dim memories of jigging at its warehouse clubs in the 90s. Tom’s writing in the first person in this article, which means it’s through his eyes, it’s about what he thinks, as well as the facts.

Tim Moore:
Well my tone is generally quite critical but in a humorous way, a little bit cynical.

Narrator:
Despite recent claims that the capital’s air is now cleaner than at any time since 1585, no one would promote lungfuls of modern London as a cheek-reddening tonic.

Tim Moore:
In that sentence, I’m saying, yes, you know, London’s air might be cleaner than it was, but even so, you really wouldn’t want to be breathing it in now, much more than you might have done 400 years ago.

Anna James:
What’s going for it? Of all the remarkable transformations in supergentrified London, that of King’s Cross is the most astonishing. He’s also quite scathing in his tone, a little bit sarcastic, which we can see in phrases such as supergentrified London, which has a little bit of judgement to it.

Anna James:
I can just remember what it was, dim memories of jigging at its warehouse clubs in the 90s. References like this build a relationship and an empathy with the audience, who may have had similar experiences themselves, which means that they’re more connected to the article.

Narrator:
I understood that as well as emphasising Whitehall’s role as Empire High Street, the sheer width was also a crowd control measure.

Tim Moore:
This type of information would appeal to my readership because I mean, it’s, I’m expanding on something they probably already know. It’s more of a condensed way of getting across a much bigger image.

Tim Moore:
Ambling over to the tourist gaggle of the Downing Street gates. Yeah, I choose my language in a very deliberate way. I’m using the word ambling, because that implies that I’m doing something at a leisurely pace, I’m a sort of observer of this quite busy scene, this gaggle. If I’d used a different word, maybe I’d have been scurrying or hurrying, it would have created a very different impression.

Anna James:
The writer uses descriptive words to add detail and atmosphere to the text. The thundering traffic and choking pollution of Euston and Pentonville Roads. A writer uses descriptive language to make a reader feel that they’re really there, to be able to almost feel the sensations as if you were physically in King’s Cross, feeling the pollution choke you.

Tim Moore:
It’s not just words and language working for the writer to achieve their purpose, it’s also structure.

Narrator:
Back in Charles I’s time, there were mob riots in Whitehall, and as executive power began to concentrate here, so political malcontents periodically gathered to express their grievances.

Tim Moore:
Well, structure is how the language fits together on the page. I use paragraphs to take the reader through the journey with me. So I’m starting here, with the paragraph that starts, back in Charles I’s time, so that’s telling you that I’m about to start talking about the history of Whitehall, which I do, you know, as a 300 year potted history in that paragraph, and then I’ll move on to the next part of the story.

Anna James:
The writer uses a very short sentence at the beginning of the article which is commonly known in journalism as a lead. Fragments of a less salubrious past hold on for dear life amid the swank. And this is there to entice the reader, and keep them reading.

Narrator:
It’s certainly filthy.

Tim Moore:
Well, the shortness of the sentence, it’s very punchy, just three words, and it’s quite attention grabbing because it’s just, you know, there it is, on its own, at the start of the paragraph, it’s quite kind of stark. A hook would be something that would, you know, literally kind of draw the leader in, make them want to kind of go on to the next paragraph. The sheer width was also a crowd control measure, but you know, that needs explanation, why was it? And then the next paragraph, I talk about back in Charles I’s time there were mob riots, so it’s kind of, you know, it’s a way of drawing their attention from the end of one paragraph to the next part of the story.

Tim Moore:
So when you’re faced with a literary non-fiction text to analyse, it’s good to remember that the writer had a clear purpose in mind, and made choices about the words they used.

Anna James:
If you’re in an exam, and you’re asked to respond to a non-fiction text, make sure you read the question properly so you know exactly what’s being asked. Also make a plan, I would recommend doing the following.

Narrator:
When you’re in the exam, make a bullet point list or a mind map of all the ideas you can think of that are relevant to the question. Then link the ideas to quotations from the extract. Select the best ideas or points to use, aim for at least three or four main points, and put them in a logical order. This should lead towards a convincing conclusion.