Shipwreck story.

Review of essay

Rating: 3 star(s)

Response to the question

The answer here is a response to a Writing to Describe task, whereby candidate must describe an experience or devise a short creative piece under examination conditions. The story here is of a shipwreck and the candidate has chosen to document the life of a shipwrecked man trying to build a secondary boat from the remains of his last in order to escape the island he has landed on. There is a consistent awareness of the piece, with plenty of internal thoughts conveyed to the reader, though I would challenge the authenticity of the character and his thoughts - they seem very disjointed and inconsistent within themselves. When creating a character, it is always good to understand their mindset and how they might approach something like a shipwreck - would an "experienced sailor" really be scared of a shark if they're on the land? It is imperative the characters are maintained and they do not "slip out of character", as it were, as this shows a lack of planning and care for the consistency of the narrative.

Level of analysis

The Level of Description here is good, but a lot of it is an explanation about what has happened/will happen to the shipwrecked man. Quite unfortunately, there is not much description though where there is description, is very good. I like the use of metaphors and similes, and the use of emotive language ("Today I realized what a ship wreck really is and how it feels to be locked in"). I would perhaps like to see a more convincing story though, and also where the candidate attempts to bring reality to the character (the comments about suicide aren't really necessary, and the candidate should seek other ways of applying sailor characteristics to their character, perhaps with field-specific language like certain knot names and naval lexis). In doing this the candidate would create a more rounded character and the description will come easier, as the lines between the candidate imagination and the (necessary) restriction that the character would present would be clearer.

Quality of writing

The Quality of Written Communication (QWC) is quite poor. It is sad to see such an exciting plot hampered by poor QWC. There are many, many grammatical inconsistencies such as "anyways I always believed in facing problems without any fear" and "A few years back, a ship lead by me, carrying over a 100 passengers rammed into an ice block". Also, there is a misuse of language like "dyeing" instead of "dying". This must be addressed and I can only stress how important it is that candidates read and re-read their answers as they write them, to ensure clarity in conveying what they wish to say.