These are original Marlbridge practice questions, not past exam questions. Every unseen passage was written by Marlbridge for practice. The public-domain extracts are from Edgar Allan Poe, “The Tell-Tale Heart” (1843), and Kate Chopin, “The Story of an Hour” (1894). The marks in the rubrics are a suggested Marlbridge rubric, not an official scoring guideline. Answer every question before opening its answer.
Question 1 (multiple choice · foundation)
Read this passage written by Marlbridge.
I did not mean to stay so long at the harbour. But the tide had a way of making plans for me, and I let it.
Which statement best describes the narrator?
- (A) A third-person narrator who stands outside the story
- (B) A first-person narrator who is a character in the story
- (C) A narrator who is not present in the events
- (D) A stream-of-consciousness narrator with no punctuation
Answer and explanation
Answer: (B). “I” and “me” show a first-person narrator who is also a character in the events.
- (A) and (C) fail because the narrator says “I”.
- (D) The passage is punctuated normally and presents reflection, not a flow of thought.
Question 2 (multiple choice · core)
Read these two Marlbridge sentences about the same event.
Sentence 1: A tall man in a grey coat entered the room, hesitated, and sat. Sentence 2: Ahmed, who had not slept since Thursday and could feel every tick of the clock in his teeth, walked into the room, wondering whether he should sit at all.
Which statement best compares the narrative distance?
- (A) Sentence 1 is closer to the character’s thoughts.
- (B) Sentence 2 is closer to the character’s thoughts and feelings; Sentence 1 reports from outside.
- (C) Both are equally distant.
- (D) Sentence 1 is in the first person and Sentence 2 in the third.
Answer and explanation
Answer: (B). Sentence 2 gives Ahmed’s name, his sleeplessness, a bodily feeling and his thoughts; Sentence 1 shows only outward appearance and action.
- (A) reverses the two.
- (C) The two differ clearly in distance.
- (D) Both are in the third person.
Question 3 (multiple choice · core)
In Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” (1843) the narrator writes: “True!—nervous—very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?” Which feature of the syntax best conveys the narrator’s state?
- (A) The long, flowing sentence with no interruptions
- (B) The exclamation and dashes that break the sentence into abrupt parts
- (C) The use of the past tense only
- (D) The absence of any question
Answer and explanation
Answer: (B). “True!” followed by dashes jerks the sentence forward and suggests agitation.
- (A) The sentence is interrupted, not flowing.
- (C) The sentence mixes past and present (“had been and am”).
- (D) There is a question: “why will you say that I am mad?”
Question 4 (multiple choice · core)
Read this passage written by Marlbridge.
Four o’clock and the kettle, no, the phone first, he said he’d ring at four, is it four, the clock says ten past, he’s late, he is never late, I should have gone down to the gate, the gate is cold, the whole hall is cold, why do we never put the heating on
Which description best fits the narration?
- (A) A distant third-person summary
- (B) Stream of consciousness: thoughts presented as a continuous, associative flow
- (C) A narrator addressing the reader directly
- (D) An objective report of facts
Answer and explanation
Answer: (B). The passage has no quotation marks or narrator tags, shifts quickly between ideas and uses loose punctuation, imitating thought.
- (A) There is no summarising outside voice.
- (C) No “you” is addressed.
- (D) The passage is full of the character’s worries, not neutral report.
Question 5 (multiple choice · stretch)
In Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” (1894), the narrator writes: “She did not stop to ask if it were or were not a monstrous joy that held her.” What does this show about the narrator’s position?
- (A) The narrator can report Louise’s inner thoughts and feelings, not just her actions.
- (B) The narrator is Louise herself.
- (C) The narrator knows nothing of Louise.
- (D) The narrator is physically in the room with Louise.
Answer and explanation
Answer: (A). The narrator tells us what Louise did and did not stop to ask, which is inner experience.
- (B) The narrator speaks of “she”, so it is a third-person narrator.
- (C) The sentence shows detailed knowledge of her state.
- (D) The sentence is about inner thought; it does not place the narrator in the room.
Question 6 (short answer · core)
Read this passage written by Marlbridge.
The Annual Marrow Competition, held on the vicarage lawn, was won this year, as it has been every year since the war, by Mr Pettigrew, whom nobody could be said to like and whom nobody dared to beat.
Identify the narrator’s tone and explain how two features of the writing convey it. (4 points)
Answer and explanation
A strong answer: The tone is wry and gently ironic. The long, formal sentence, with its official-sounding “Annual Marrow Competition” and “vicarage lawn”, treats a trivial event with ceremony, and the balanced clause “whom nobody could be said to like and whom nobody dared to beat” delivers a quiet joke at the winner’s expense. The phrase “as it has been every year since the war” implies a rigged or cowed contest without saying so.
Suggested Marlbridge rubric (4 points).
| Point | Awarded for |
|---|---|
| 1 | Names an accurate tone (wry, ironic, mock-formal, amused) |
| 2 | First feature with a quotation (diction or formal tone) |
| 3 | Second feature with a quotation (syntax, such as the balanced clause) |
| 4 | Explains how the features create the attitude |
Question 7 (short answer · core)
Read these two passages written by Marlbridge about the same event: a goodbye at a station.
A. The train pulled out at nine. Mara stood on the platform in her green coat until it had gone, and then she went home.
B. Nine o’clock, and the train going, and I told myself I would not wave, and I waved, my arm up like something not mine, and the green coat I had bought for this day was stupid, stupid, and the platform was suddenly so long.
(a) Compare the narrative distance. (2 points) (b) Explain one effect of the difference. (2 points)
Answer and explanation
(a) Passage A is a distant third-person report of outward actions. Passage B is a first-person, stream-of-consciousness narration inside the character’s mind and feelings.
(b) A presents the event as a plain fact, so the sorrow is implied; B makes the reader share the character’s confusion and embarrassment at the moment of parting, so the feeling is immediate and personal.
Suggested Marlbridge rubric (4 points).
| Point | Awarded for |
|---|---|
| 1 | Identifies A as distant or external |
| 2 | Identifies B as close, internal or stream of consciousness |
| 3 | States an effect of A (restraint, understatement) |
| 4 | States an effect of B (intimacy, immediacy, intensity) |
Question 8 (short answer · stretch)
Write one paragraph (about 120 words) explaining how the narrator’s perspective is revealed in the opening sentences of Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” (1843). Quote at least two phrases.
Answer and explanation
Sample response (written by Marlbridge). Poe’s first-person narrator reveals a defensive, agitated perspective in his opening lines. He addresses “you” directly, asking “why will you say that I am mad?”, so the story begins as an argument with an imagined listener. His diction is contradictory: “dreadfully nervous” and “disease” are words of illness, yet he claims that his senses are “sharpened”, not destroyed. The exclamation “True!” and the dashes make his syntax abrupt, so that the way he speaks contradicts the calm he claims. The perspective is therefore one of a man determined to appear sane while the form of his speech suggests otherwise.
Suggested Marlbridge rubric (4 points).
| Point | Awarded for |
|---|---|
| 1 | Identifies first-person narration and direct address |
| 2 | Two accurate quotations |
| 3 | Comments on diction or syntax and links it to perspective |
| 4 | Names the tone or perspective precisely (defensive, agitated, insistent) |
How did you do?
Count your correct multiple-choice answers (out of 5) and your rubric points (out of 12). If you missed questions 1 to 5, reread “Who is telling, and from where” in the study guide. If your written scores were low, redo Question 6 listing the diction, then the syntax, then the tone. Then try the checklist.