Atmosphere and setting - PEE and useful phrases
As well as having lots of ideas, you need to explain them clearly. An effective way of doing this is to PEE. PEE stands for:
Point
Evidence (a quotation)
Explanation
Read through the following extract. How does the writer create an atmosphere of cold and loneliness?
Dark spruce forest frowned on either side the frozen waterway. The trees had been stripped by a recent wind of their white covering of frost, and they seemed to lean towards each other, black and ominous, in the fading light. A vast silence reigned over the land. The land itself was a desolation, lifeless, without movement, so lone and cold that the spirit of it was not even that of sadness. There was a hint in it of laughter, but of a laughter more terrible than any sadness - a laughter that was mirthless as the smile of the sphinx, a laughter cold as the frost and partaking of the grimness of infallibility. It was the masterful and incommunicable wisdom of eternity laughing at the futility of life and the effort of life. It was the Wild, the savage, frozen-hearted Northland Wild.
'White Fang' - Jack London
If you are going to use quotations from the extract in your answer, remember to set them out properly. Here are some points to remember:
Use quotation marks.
Quote accurately.
Quotes of three words or less can be used in the sentence you're writing - for example ...when the writer talks about the "futility of life" he means...
Longer quotations need to be included on a line of their own and with a space before it (known as an indent) - for example ...the writer describes the landscape as a "desolation, lifeless, without movement, so lone and cold" he creates a picture that...
Short, well-chosen quotations are better than long, vague ones.
Also remember that certain words and phrases are especially helpful when you're explaining an idea in detail. They can be particularly helpful if you are commenting on implicit meaning. The following wordbank shows you some of those phrases, and you might be able to add some more:
this implies
this suggests
which gives the impression that
possibly
perhaps
this indicates that
this shows
obviously
Some other words and phrases that may be useful are those that help move your argument on. These are called connectives. Here are some examples:
however
therefore
in contrast
because
but
and
furthermore
also
then
at first
later
as well as
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