Analyse structure — how a text is organised

Question 4 (8 marks)

Explain how the writer uses structure to shape the reader's experience in the following extract.

It begins with light — a fragment of sun through curtains, dust motes in the air, the familiar sound of a radio from somewhere downstairs. Then, memory floods back, and with it the weight of what has happened. She lies still. She does not want to face it yet.

[Twenty years earlier]

The first morning of summer. She had run barefoot across the wet grass, laughing, calling to her sister.

Mark scheme (AO2, 8 marks):

• Opening in the present: sensory detail creates immediate, intimate scene; reader placed in "now" before the problem is named (1–2 marks)
• "Then, memory floods back" — transition from perception to consciousness; structural shift signals the turn from sensory to emotional (1–2 marks)
• Flashback: "[Twenty years earlier]" — time shift marker used deliberately; contrast between the weight of the present and the joy of the past (1–2 marks)
• Juxtaposition of present heaviness ("weight of what has happened," "does not want to face it") vs past lightness ("laughing," "ran barefoot") — structure creates emotional contrast; reader feels the loss through comparison (2 marks)
• The incomplete present (she "lies still") vs the active past (she "had run") — structure reflects the paralysis grief creates (1 mark)