Essay Practice Mark Scheme

Essay Practice 1–5: Mark Scheme

La casa de Bernarda Alba — Question 9 (literary essay). For teachers.

1. The ten questions and why they were chosen

How the set mirrors the real papers (counts from the Teacher Guide, Section 3):

•  Focus. Of the 16 real Bernarda Alba questions (2018–2025), 7 were on a theme, 5 on a dramatic technique and 4 on one or two named characters. This set has 4 theme, 3 technique and 3 character questions, close to the same proportions.

•  Command words. Since 2023 Pearson has used only Analiza and Evalúa. The real Bernarda Alba split is Analiza 10, Evalúa 5, Examina 1; this set has Analiza 6, Evalúa 4. As in every real paper, no practice paper has more than one Evalúa option, and Practice 2, like 2021 and 2023, has two Analiza options. Hasta qué punto appears once, inside an Evalúa question, as in 2019. The Evalúa questions use four of Pearson's wordings: hasta qué punto, si, Evalúa + noun (la importancia de…), and a two-option choice after a colon (like 2024 9(a)).

•  Genuine choice. Every pair offers two different kinds of question (theme + character, character + technique, theme + technique), so students who avoid technique questions — as the reports say most do — still have to decide rather than default.

•  New areas. Seven questions target areas that have never been the main focus of a real question: honour and reputation, religion, the ending, silence and sound, Martirio, Pepe el Romano (named only as part of 2025 9(a)) and the relationship between the sisters (bringing in Magdalena and Amelia, never used). Honour, religion, the ending, Martirio and Pepe were suggested as practice areas in the Teacher Guide (Section 4.6); the wording here is new.

•  High-frequency areas. Three questions revisit what Pearson returns to most: Bernarda (in 15 of 16 mark schemes), symbolism (2018b, 2022a, 2024b), and freedom, fear and repression (2018a, 2019a, 2018b, 2024a), with new angles so that a pre-learnt answer to a past question will not fit.

•  No question quotes the play, as in all 208 real Section B questions from 2018 to 2025.

2. General marking guidance (Pearson, MS 2018–2025)

•  All candidates must receive the same treatment. Examiners must mark the first candidate in exactly the same way as they mark the last.

•  Mark schemes should be applied positively. Candidates must be rewarded for what they have shown they can do rather than penalised for omissions.

•  Examiners should mark according to the mark scheme not according to their perception of where the grade boundaries may lie.

•  There is no ceiling on achievement. All marks on the mark scheme should be used appropriately.

•  All the marks on the mark scheme are designed to be awarded. Examiners should always award full marks if deserved, i.e. if the answer matches the mark scheme. Examiners should also be prepared to award zero marks if the candidate’s response is not worthy of credit according to the mark scheme.

•  Where some judgement is required, mark schemes will provide the principles by which marks will be awarded and exemplification may be limited.

•  When examiners are in doubt regarding the application of the mark scheme to a candidate’s response, the team leader must be consulted.

•  Crossed out work should be marked UNLESS the candidate has replaced it with an alternative response.

Sections B and C (written response to works)

There are three levels-based mark grids to be applied to each individual essay: Critical and analytical response (AO4, 20 marks); Range of grammatical structures and vocabulary (AO3, 20 marks); Accuracy of language (AO3, 10 marks). Total 50 marks per essay.

“It is recommended that, in order to give a detailed analysis of the work, students write between 300-350 words for each essay. This is sufficient for students to give relevant, justified points of view, arguments and conclusions with evidence from the work. The whole essay will be marked regardless of length.”

Step 1 – Decide on a band. Consider the answer as a whole and place it in the band whose descriptors most closely match it, using a ‘best fit’ approach: “if the response is predominantly band 5–8 with a small amount of band 9–12 material, it would be placed in band 5–8 but be awarded a mark near the top of the band because of the band 9–12 content.”

Step 2 – Decide on a mark. Award a mark towards the top or bottom of the band “depending on how students have evidenced each of the descriptor bullet points”, and modify it “based on how securely the trait descriptors are met at that band.”

The grid wording below is quoted from the 2025 mark scheme; it is identical in 2018–2025. Each grid is applied once for each essay individually.

Critical and analytical response (AO4) — 20 marks

“This mark grid assesses students’ ability to respond critically and analytically to the aspect of the literary work or film outlined in the question. To provide a critical and analytical response, students should select relevant material, present and justify points of view, develop arguments, draw conclusions based on understanding and evaluate issues, themes and cultural and social contexts.”

“Indicative content contains points that students are likely to use to construct their answer. It is possible for an answer to be constructed without mentioning some or all of these points as long as students provide alternative responses that fulfil the requirements of the question.”

Range of grammatical structures and vocabulary (AO3) — 20 marks

“This mark grid assesses students’ ability to use a range of grammatical structures and vocabulary in order to produce articulate written communication with a range of expression.”

Additional guidance (MS, abridged, Pearson's wording):

•  Articulate: “articulate communication is fluent, effective and coherent as students control/manipulate the language to say what they want to say rather than what they can say, for a number of different purposes.”

•  Terminology for literary and cinematic analysis: “vocabulary for critical analysis according to the work being studied, for example ‘plot’, ‘character’; figures of speech such as ‘metaphor’, ‘similes’”.

•  Complex language includes “conceptually challenging tenses such as the pluperfect, future perfect”; passive voice; subjunctive mood; use of relative pronouns; “using extended sentences to express abstract ideas/convey justified arguments that require a range of lexis and structures, for example conjunctions and pronouns”; “using synonyms and a variety of expressions to say things in different ways”; “all grammar and structures included in the grammar list that are specific to A Level.”

•  Straightforward language: “simple sentences with limited linking of sentences and clauses”; “high frequency grammatical structures and vocabulary.”

Accuracy of language (AO3) — 10 marks

“This mark grid assesses students’ ability to apply grammar and syntax accurately.”

Additional guidance (MS, abridged, Pearson's wording):

•  “students are not expected to produce perfect, error-free writing in order to access the top band as errors are also made by native speakers.”

•  Errors that do not hinder clarity: “errors that do not affect meaning, for example gender, adjectival agreements”; “infrequent errors that do not distract the reader from the content and which result in coherent writing.”

•  Errors that hinder clarity: errors that make writing difficult to understand immediately or force re-reading, “for example inappropriate tense formation, mismatch of subject and the possessive adjective”; “frequent errors hinder clarity as they will distract the reader from the content of the writing.”

•  Errors that prevent meaning being conveyed: “errors that mean the reader cannot understand the message”; “errors that convey the wrong message”; “errors that make it unclear who is carrying out the action, for example using the incorrect person of the verb”; “mother-tongue interference.”

3. Indicative content

“Indicative content is not exhaustive. Students should be rewarded for any valid response and may draw on a range of arguments or examples.” (MS 2025). Quotations marked (MS yyyy) are printed as they appear in that Pearson mark scheme; everything else refers to scenes or acts rather than quoting. Items to check against the class edition are listed in Section 4.

Essay Practice 1 — 9(a)

Students need to analyse how Lorca presents the theme of honour and reputation in the play. They may refer to the following in their answers:

Honour in the play is mostly about what other people will say (el qué dirán). Bernarda judges her family by its reputation in the village, and Lorca shows how this controls the women's lives and in the end matters more to her than grief.

•  Mourning is a public display of respectability. Bernarda imposes eight years of mourning because that is what her family has always done: “Así pasó en casa de mi padre y en casa de mi abuelo” (MS 2022).

•  Bernarda hides anything that could damage the family's name. What happens inside the house must not be seen outside: “Y si pasara algún día estáte segura que no traspasaría las paredes” (MS 2020). She keeps her mother, María Josefa, locked away so that the neighbours do not see her (MS 2019).

•  Honour is tied to class. Bernarda stopped Martirio marrying Enrique Humanes because his father was a labourer: “Mi sangre no se junta con la de los Humanes” (MS 2020). Protecting the family's status costs her daughters their chance of marriage.

•  Women's honour depends on their sexual conduct, and losing it is punished violently. The village's pursuit of la hija de la Librada at the end of Act II, and Bernarda's demand that “que pague la que pisotea su decencia” (MS 2020), show what happens to a woman who breaks the code. This foreshadows Adela.

•  There is a double standard. Men's behaviour does not stain their honour: La Poncia says “Los hombres necesitan estas cosas” (MS 2021, 2022, 2025), and the stories of Paca la Roseta and of Adelaida's father show men's freedom and women's blame.

•  Other characters share the code. La Poncia warns Adela because “quiero vivir en casa decente” (MS 2021, 2025); Angustias calls Adela “¡deshonra de nuestra casa!” (MS 2022).

•  At the end, Bernarda's first concern after Adela's suicide is the family's reputation: she insists that her daughter died a virgin and orders silence. Honour is put before grief and before the truth.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Analyses how Lorca presents honour (the neighbours and the funeral, reported off-stage events, the walls of the house, Bernarda's commands, the ending), not just where honour appears.

•  Links honour to class, gender and religion, and explains the double standard with evidence.

•  Reaches a judgement, e.g. that Lorca presents honour as a force that destroys the family it claims to protect, or that it is a public mask rather than a moral value.

•  Uses accurate context: rural Andalusia in the 1930s, before the Civil War.

Common pitfalls

•  Listing events that involve honour without explaining how Lorca presents the theme.

•  Writing a general essay on repression or religion that never names honour or reputation.

•  Factual slips about the Humanes episode (it concerns Martirio, not Adela: ER 2019).

•  Presenting Bernarda as Franco or the play as a portrait of the dictatorship (ER 2024, 2025).

Essay Practice 1 — 9(b)

Students need to evaluate to what extent Martirio is responsible for the tragedy at the end of the play. They may refer to the following in their answers:

Martirio's jealousy and her actions in Act III lead directly to Adela's death, but Bernarda, Adela, Pepe and the society around them also share the responsibility.

It could be said that Martirio is largely responsible because:

•  She is in love with Pepe and jealous of Adela. In Act II she takes Angustias' portrait of Pepe, which shows how far her rivalry goes.

•  She watches Adela and knows about the night meetings. She rejects her as a sister: “aunque quisiera verte como hermana no te miro ya más que como mujer” (MS 2020).

•  In Act III she confronts Adela in the yard and calls Bernarda, which exposes the affair and leads to the shooting.

•  After Bernarda fires, Martirio lets Adela believe that Pepe is dead (see the teacher check list). Adela runs out and hangs herself. Martirio's words are the immediate trigger of the suicide.

It could also be said that others are more responsible because:

•  Bernarda created the conditions: the eight years of mourning, the closed house, the violence. She also fires the gun. She prevented Martirio's own marriage to Enrique Humanes (MS 2020), so Martirio's bitterness is partly Bernarda's work.

•  Adela makes her own choices and will not give Pepe up: “Nadie podrá evitar que suceda lo que tiene que suceder” (MS 2025). She breaks Bernarda's cane: “Esto hago yo con la vara de la dominadora” (MS 2018).

•  Pepe courts Angustias for her money (“Vino por el dinero”, MS 2025) while meeting Adela at night, and escapes unharmed.

•  The honour code of the village: the fate of la hija de la Librada (end of Act II) shows what awaited Adela if the affair became known. Martirio, whose name means martyrdom, can be seen as another victim of the same system.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Distinguishes the immediate cause (Martirio's actions and words) from the underlying causes (Bernarda, society, Adela's choices) and weighs them.

•  Gives a clear answer to hasta qué punto and keeps it consistent from introduction to conclusion.

•  Selects precise moments (the portrait, the Act III confrontation, the aftermath of the shot) and explains them rather than retelling Act III.

Common pitfalls

•  Narrating the final act instead of evaluating responsibility.

•  Saying that Pepe dies (he escapes) or that Martirio kills Adela.

•  Confusing Martirio with Angustias (e.g. about who is engaged to Pepe) or with Adela (ER 2019 factual error).

•  Claiming Martirio intended Adela's death without evidence; students may argue it, but must justify it.

Essay Practice 2 — 9(a)

Students need to analyse the importance of Pepe el Romano in the play, even though he never appears on stage. They may refer to the following in their answers:

Pepe el Romano drives the plot but is never seen. Everything the audience knows about him comes through the women's words, sounds and objects. Lorca keeps the men outside the house: “Men are heard but never seen” (MS 2025).

•  He is the catalyst of the action. His engagement to Angustias sets off the rivalry between the sisters, and Angustias, Martirio and Adela all desire him.

•  He represents marriage as a financial deal. He chooses Angustias, the eldest, because she is the only rich one: “Vino por el dinero” (MS 2025); “es la única rica de la casa” (MS 2021).

•  He embodies male freedom and the double standard. He courts Angustias at the window at night and meets Adela afterwards; the sisters and La Poncia discuss what time he left (Act II). At the end he escapes on horseback while Adela dies.

•  His presence is felt through signs: the portrait Martirio takes (Act II), noises in the yard at night, and the stallion kicking the walls (Act III). Adela's desire for him is expressed through images of fire: “este fuego que tengo levantado por piernas y boca” (MS 2020).

•  Keeping him off stage is a dramatic choice. He becomes a projection of the daughters' longings rather than a real person; the audience, like the women, stays inside the house; the tension rises because the conflict is always about someone who is not there.

•  Students may argue that Pepe matters less as a person than as a symbol: the real conflict is between Bernarda's authority and her daughters' desire, and any man could have filled his place.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Addresses both parts of the question: why Pepe matters and what his absence from the stage achieves.

•  Treats his absence as a technique and analyses its effect on the audience.

•  Links Pepe to the themes of money, desire, gender roles and freedom, and reaches a judgement on his importance.

Common pitfalls

•  Writing an essay about Adela with Pepe only in the background.

•  Saying that Pepe is killed (Martirio's words mislead Adela, but he escapes).

•  Inventing scenes in which Pepe speaks or appears.

•  Ignoring the second half of the question (aunque nunca aparece en escena).

Essay Practice 2 — 9(b)

Students need to analyse the importance of the ending of the play. They may refer to the following in their answers:

The ending brings together the play's main themes: Adela's rebellion ends in death, Bernarda puts honour before grief, and the circular structure shows that nothing has changed.

•  It is the climax of Adela's rebellion. She breaks the cane (“Esto hago yo con la vara de la dominadora”, MS 2018) and, believing Pepe dead, hangs herself. Repression leads to death.

•  Circular structure: the play begins and ends with a death and with Bernarda's command “¡Silencio!” (MS 2019). The family is where it started; repression wins.

•  Bernarda's reaction: she insists that Adela died a virgin and forbids public tears. She announces more mourning: “¡Nos hundiremos todas en un mar de luto!” (MS 2018). Reputation matters more than her daughter's death.

•  The other characters: Martirio's jealousy has played its part; Pepe escapes unpunished, which completes the picture of the double standard; the remaining sisters stay shut in the house.

•  The ending is prepared throughout: each act ends with an outburst (MS 2019); the hunt for la hija de la Librada at the end of Act II and the stallion in Act III foreshadow violence and desire breaking out.

•  Effect on the audience: shock and pity, and a critique of the society Lorca describes in his subtitle, Drama de mujeres en los pueblos de España. The play closes on silence rather than a resolution, leaving the audience to judge.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Explains how and why the ending matters (structure, themes, character, effect on the audience) instead of retelling the last scene.

•  Connects the ending to earlier parts of the play (the opening, foreshadowing, each act's structure).

•  Offers a judgement on what the ending shows about Lorca's purpose.

Common pitfalls

•  Summarising the final scene.

•  Factual errors: Bernarda does not kill Adela; Pepe is not killed.

•  Reading Bernarda's final “¡Silencio!” as a comment on Franco's censorship. The play was written in 1936 and is set before the dictatorship (ER 2024, 2025).

•  Adding a new idea in the conclusion (ER 2020).

Essay Practice 3 — 9(a)

Students need to evaluate whether Bernarda is an oppressor or a victim of the society of her time. They may refer to the following in their answers:

Bernarda enforces the rules of her society on her daughters, her mother and her servants, but those rules were not invented by her, and she is also trapped by them.

It could be said that Bernarda is an oppressor because:

•  She imposes eight years of mourning and closes the house: “no ha de entrar en esta casa el viento de la calle”; “En esta casa no hay un sí ni un no. Mi vigilancia lo puede todo” (MS 2022).

•  She uses the cane as a symbol of authority and uses physical violence: she removes Angustias' powder violently (stage direction quoted in MS 2023) and hits Martirio over the portrait (MS 2020).

•  She locks up her own mother (“¡Encerradla!”, MS 2021), despises the poor (“Los pobres son como los animales”, MS 2021) and calls for the punishment of la hija de la Librada (MS 2020).

•  She prevented Martirio's marriage to Enrique Humanes (MS 2020). At the end she fires at Pepe and silences grief.

It could also be said that Bernarda is a victim because:

•  She follows the rules she inherited: “Así pasó en casa de mi padre y en casa de mi abuelo” (MS 2022). As a widow she is expected to display mourning and protect the family's honour.

•  She lives in fear of what the village says, and she knows what it does to women who break the code (la hija de la Librada, Paca la Roseta).

•  She repeats the gender rules of her society: “hilo y aguja para las hembras. Látigo y mula para el varón” (MS 2020). After her husband's death she takes on the role of head of the house (MS 2021).

•  She is isolated: her servant despises her (“¡Mandona! ¡Dominanta!”, MS 2022) and she cannot show grief even at the end.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Addresses the society of the time explicitly (class, religion, honour, gender roles in 1930s rural Andalusia) rather than only Bernarda's personality.

•  Weighs both sides and reaches a clear judgement; a strong answer may conclude that she is both, a victim who becomes the system's enforcer, and explain why.

•  Distinguishes Bernarda's own choices from the pressures on her.

Common pitfalls

•  Arguing only one side, so there is no evaluation.

•  Comparing Bernarda to Franco (ER 2024, 2025). The play is set before the Civil War.

•  Speculating about Bernarda's psychology without evidence from the play.

•  Describing everything Bernarda does in chronological order.

Essay Practice 3 — 9(b)

Students need to analyse how Lorca presents religion in the society of the time. They may refer to the following in their answers:

Religion in the play is mostly ritual, appearance and social control. Lorca contrasts the characters' religious language and customs with their lack of charity.

•  Ritual and public display: the play opens with the funeral and the mourners' prayers (Act I). The men send money for prayers for the dead: “De parte de los hombres esta bolsa de dineros para responsos” (MS 2021), which links faith to money and status.

•  Church is the only outing Bernarda allows, and it too controls women: “Las mujeres en la iglesia no deben mirar más hombre que al oficiante” (MS 2020, 2025).

•  Hypocrisy: Bernarda's piety sits alongside contempt for the poor (“Los pobres son como los animales”, MS 2021) and her call to punish la hija de la Librada (MS 2020). A poor woman and her child are turned away from the door at the start of Act I. Christian charity is absent.

•  Mourning is presented as a religious and social duty: eight years of black clothes and a closed house.

•  Religious morality governs women's sexuality: virginity and decency define a woman's worth, which is why Bernarda insists at the end that Adela died a virgin.

•  The servants' comments at the start of Act I, before the mourners arrive, show a gap between public piety and private feeling.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Analyses how Lorca presents religion (irony, contrast between words and actions, ritual on stage, what is said in private) and not only where it appears.

•  Links religion to social control, gender and honour, and to the Catholic rural society of the time.

•  Reaches a conclusion, e.g. that Lorca presents religion as social convention rather than faith.

Common pitfalls

•  Generic claims about the Catholic Church without evidence from the play.

•  Anachronism: linking the play to the Francoist Church–State alliance, which came after Lorca's death.

•  Drifting into honour or repression without linking them back to religion.

Essay Practice 4 — 9(a)

Students need to analyse how Lorca presents the relationship between the sisters. They may refer to the following in their answers:

The five sisters are shut in together by the mourning. Rivalry over Pepe and over money turns them against each other, and only brief moments of shared frustration hold them together.

•  Rivalry over Pepe: Angustias is engaged to him; Martirio and Adela both want him. In Act II the portrait of Pepe goes missing from Angustias' room and is found in Martirio's bed, which leads to a bitter quarrel.

•  Money divides them. Angustias, the daughter of Bernarda's first husband, is the only rich sister; the others resent her. Magdalena comments on the wedding: “¡El dinero lo puede todo!” (MS 2021).

•  Martirio and Adela move from sisters to enemies: “aunque quisiera verte como hermana no te miro ya más que como mujer” (MS 2020). Their confrontation in Act III leads to the tragedy.

•  There is some shared feeling. The sisters complain together about the mourning, the heat and their chances of marriage, and Magdalena and Amelia are often observers who try to calm quarrels. Their complicity never becomes real solidarity.

•  The house breeds suspicion: the sisters spy on each other and report to Bernarda. Bernarda's authority stops open conflict but not jealousy.

•  The names Angustias (anguish) and Martirio (martyrdom) point to the suffering that defines the sisters' lives.

•  The ending: sisterhood has failed; Bernarda forbids the surviving daughters to cry in public.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Explains the causes of the conflict (Bernarda's rule, money, the marriage market, enclosure) and how Lorca presents it (dialogue, confrontation scenes, contrasting characters).

•  Uses more than two sisters; answers that show knowledge of Magdalena and Amelia stand out, since the mark schemes rarely use them.

•  Reaches a judgement, e.g. that rivalry is the result of the system rather than of personal malice.

Common pitfalls

•  Writing about Bernarda's relationship with her daughters instead of the relationships between the sisters.

•  Mixing up the sisters (who is engaged, who takes the portrait, who is rich).

•  Retelling quarrels without analysis.

Essay Practice 4 — 9(b)

Students need to evaluate the importance of the imagery of water and heat in the play. They may refer to the following in their answers:

Pearson lists “heat” and “water, flowing or stagnant” among the symbols that highlight the play's key themes (MS 2022). Water and heat express desire, thirst for freedom and the pressure building inside the house.

It could be said that the imagery of water and heat is very important because:

•  The play takes place in summer and the characters often complain about the heat. The heat reflects desire and tension building towards an explosion. Adela describes her desire as fire: “este fuego que tengo levantado por piernas y boca” (MS 2020).

•  Heat is linked to the outside world of men: the reapers come in from the hot fields in Act II; on a hot night in Act III the stallion kicks the walls.

•  Water stands for what the women lack. Bernarda describes the village as having no river, only wells, whose water people fear may be poisoned (Act I): stagnant water as an image of the village and the house. Thirst at night becomes a pretext and an image of unsatisfied desire (Act III).

•  María Josefa wants to marry “un varón hermoso de la orilla del mar” (MS 2018): the sea, open and moving water, stands for freedom and fertility, in contrast to the closed house.

It could also be said that other symbols are more important because:

•  The house and its walls represent the main themes more directly (MS 2022); the cane was argued to be the most effective symbol in a top-band essay (ER 2022).

•  The colours (black, white, green) are visible on stage and linked to specific characters' feelings (MS 2024).

•  Water and heat create atmosphere but are less often the focus of key scenes.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Evaluates importance: compares water and heat with other symbols and reaches a judgement.

•  Explains how the imagery works dramatically (stage directions, dialogue, setting in summer) and links it to desire, repression and freedom.

•  Keeps water and heat at the centre rather than writing a general symbolism essay.

Common pitfalls

•  Listing all the symbols in the play (a pre-learnt symbolism answer: ER 2023).

•  Explaining what water and heat mean without saying how important they are.

•  Inventing quotations about water or heat.

Essay Practice 5 — 9(a)

Students need to evaluate which is stronger in Bernarda's daughters: the desire for freedom or fear. They may refer to the following in their answers:

All the daughters want a life outside the house, but most of them obey out of fear. Adela is the exception, and even her story can be read in both ways.

It could be said that the desire for freedom is stronger because:

•  Adela: “este luto me ha cogido en la peor época de mi vida para pasarlo” (MS 2018); “¡Mañana me pondré mi vestido verde y me echaré a pasear por la calle! ¡Yo quiero salir!” (MS 2024). She meets Pepe at night and breaks Bernarda's cane (MS 2018).

•  Angustias puts on powder on the day of the funeral and sees marriage as escape: “Afortunadamente pronto voy a salir de este infierno” (MS 2018).

•  Martirio's desire for Pepe drives her to take the portrait and to confront Adela.

It could also be said that fear is stronger because:

•  The daughters obey Bernarda out of fear (MS 2019): they ask permission to go out (“Madre, déjeme usted salir”, MS 2021) and submit to the cane and to her violence.

•  They fear the village. The fate of la hija de la Librada (end of Act II) shows what happens to a woman who breaks the rules.

•  Magdalena and Amelia resign themselves to the mourning. Martirio ends up on the side of authority when she calls Bernarda.

•  Even Adela's suicide can be read as fear of a life without Pepe (MS 2019), or as a final act of freedom.

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Deals with several daughters individually and compares them, rather than generalising.

•  Answers the question directly (one or the other, or a justified position that they coexist) and explains the judgement in the conclusion.

•  Uses the ending as evidence for a judgement (for example: desire is stronger in Adela, but fear and repression win in the end).

Common pitfalls

•  A pre-learnt freedom essay with nothing on fear (ER 2023 warns against pre-learnt paragraphs).

•  Writing about Bernarda's fear or María Josefa without linking it to the daughters.

•  Writing only about Adela.

Essay Practice 5 — 9(b)

Students need to analyse how Lorca uses silence and sounds in the play. They may refer to the following in their answers:

Silence is Bernarda's weapon; sounds from outside bring into the house the world of men, work, desire and violence that the walls try to keep out.

•  Bernarda's “¡Silencio!” opens and closes her part in the play (MS 2019). Silence stands for the suppression of truth, grief and desire; at the end she orders silence about Adela's death.

•  The sound of the funeral bells in the opening stage directions creates an atmosphere of death and mourning before Bernarda appears.

•  Off-stage sounds bring the outside world into the closed house: the reapers' song in Act II (men, the fields, freedom, desire); the village's shouts against la hija de la Librada at the end of Act II (“¡Matadla! ¡Matadla!”, MS 2023); the stallion kicking the walls and the noises in the yard at night in Act III; the gunshot at the climax.

•  María Josefa's songs, including her song to the lamb in Act III, break the silence with poetry and say what the daughters cannot say.

•  Whispering, gossip and listening at doors: Bernarda watches and listens (“Mi vigilancia lo puede todo”, MS 2022), and La Poncia and the sisters report what they overhear.

•  Lorca's stage directions specify sounds and silences (MS 2023 on the importance of stage directions).

What a top-band answer (AO4 17–20) would do

•  Covers both silence and sounds and analyses their dramatic effect: tension, the contrast between inside and outside, silence as repression and sound as desire and life.

•  Links the use of sound and silence to structure (opening and ending) and to the main themes.

•  Uses accurate terminology (acotación, fuera de escena, estructura circular, ambiente, presagio).

Common pitfalls

•  Reducing the essay to Bernarda saying “¡Silencio!”.

•  Ignoring sounds, or describing them without their effect.

•  Inventing stage directions or quotations.

4. Check against the class edition

The indicative content uses only well-established events of the play. The points below are referred to in the indicative content and should be checked against the edition used in class before students rely on them.

•  1(b), 2(a), 2(b): in Act III, after Bernarda fires at Pepe, Martirio's words (in many editions “Se acabó Pepe el Romano”) lead Adela to believe he is dead; Pepe in fact escapes on horseback. Check the exact wording and who says what in the class edition before students quote it.

•  1(a), 2(b), 3(b): Bernarda's final speech (Adela died a virgin; she is to be dressed as a maiden; no one is to cry in public; “¡Silencio!”). The indicative content refers to it without quoting beyond “¡Silencio!”; check the exact lines.

•  2(a), 4(a): in Act II the sisters and La Poncia disagree about what time Pepe left Angustias' window, which reveals his later meetings with Adela. Check the times in the class edition.

•  4(a): the portrait of Pepe is taken from Angustias and found in Martirio's bed (Act II). The mark scheme for 2020 confirms that Martirio took it and was punished; check where it is found.

•  4(b): Bernarda's description (Act I) of the village as a place with wells and no river, where people fear the water may be poisoned; and the characters getting up at night to drink water (Act III). Both are referred to, not quoted; check the scenes.

•  5(b): the funeral bells in the opening stage directions, the reapers' song (Act II) and María Josefa's song to the lamb (Act III). Check the stage directions in the class edition; editions differ in how much of them they print.

•  3(b): the poor woman and her child sent away from the door, and the servants' comments about the funeral and about Bernarda, both at the start of Act I before the mourners arrive. Check who speaks in the class edition.

•  All quotations marked (MS yyyy) are printed exactly as in the Pearson mark schemes. Pearson's own text contains slips (MS 2021 and MS 2023 call Pepe “Paco”); check each quotation against the class edition before students learn it.