GCSE English Comprehension The White Horse Paper ONE: Eduqas Model Answer/Response. (English Tuition Bolton)

Comprehension Possible Response.

Remember that human beings practise secrecy and deception frequently,  whether to protect themselves or to deceive others. Think of the human character as resembling an iceberg, with so much more obscured beneath the apparent personality than can be perceived on the surface. 

Therefore, any extract made available for examination will make demands on students in terms of what is inferred. 

Look out for the hints and moments of change in a text when we start to revise our opinions or become doubtful about our original interpretation. 

That is why you must always read the entire text before embarking on the answers. Please never try dividing your comprehension into discrete sections and then answering them as you go along.  You will miss so much, not least IRONY! 

Answers.

Q1) The narrator has moved to the country.

Her only companion is a horse.

She was not used to horses.

She fed the horse chapatis. 

She was proud of her husband then.

She didn’t have much in common with her neighbours.

She didn’t wear a sari.

She talked to the horse whilst she hung out the washing. 

She was born and bred in England. 

Q2) The writer uses the wife as a first-person narrator to create the impression that the husband inspires awe and is possibly controlling and even intimidating.’ He didn’t like disturbance.’ This sense of emotional distance and the awkwardness  with communication are reinforced by her reference to his ‘older‘ age and to his probably ‘deeper thoughts.’  This diffidence is revised when the narrator reminds herself that ‘ He was kind’ and that he was ‘always buying me gadgets… a microwave’ which is ironically less a ‘kind’ gift than a self-serving, practical one which could insinuate that the husband regards his wife as yet another commodity that is useful to him, though evidently unworthy of being  ‘worshipped’ like  the ‘silicon chip.’ The repeated self-talk of  ‘I told myself’ ironically creates the impression that she needs to convince herself of how lucky she is because she feels the reverse?  This we further doubt when the narrator naively states even euphemistically, ‘my husband worked late’ which destroys any impression of his capacity for loving intimacy with his wife or even loyalty or trustworthiness? 

Q3) The narrator’s  vulnerability is communicated vividly when she recounts  a simple trip ‘ into Swindon to buy shoes’ which precipitated her ‘tears’ when a small boy is reprimanded over his desire for ‘blue trainers.’ This reaction is unusually emotional and is not easy to understand unless it might be a reflection of her own misery and sense of hopelessness, particularly when she is also without children and may desperately want them. The narrator’s feelings of desolation are further magnified by the disappearance of her friend and confidante the horse described bluntly yet devastatingly, ‘ the horse was gone’ and then brutally symbolised by the appearance of the destructive ‘bulldozers’ which destroy the emotional sanctuary of the ‘field‘ reflecting the escalation of her mental distress. When she admits ‘ I should have got out more’ we recognise her loneliness makes her blame herself for her chronic lack of confidence culminating in her admission ‘ I was getting worse’ and then the desperate list of ‘forgotten’ things suggesting her sense of being overwhelmed. The palpable paranoia of the question, ‘ was everybody looking at me?‘ Shows her mental degeneration and her relationship with the ever absent husband, who always  ‘ seemed to be doing something else’  reveals indirectly the real origin of her near mental collapse. The euphemistically named’ new product’ is evidently worthy of far more attention and affection than the neglected wife ever receives and this is destroying her. 

Q4) A dramatic change is announced by the use of the word ‘ Then’ which indicates a temporal shift. This change is explained as a new behaviour that is ‘out of character’ and therefore alerts us to a transformation. This change is explicitly linked to the entrance of a fresh character in the narrator’s world, the ‘taxi driver’ who is called ‘Eric’ who reverses the isolation of the narrator’s situation by disclosing the ‘ loss of his wife’ which makes the narrator feel more empowered as she sympathetically recognises his ‘lonely’ state and they seem to trust each other’s companionship enough to embark on a road trip to ‘somewhere else.‘ This relationship does somewhat unsettle both the reader and the wife as the journey to the ‘beauty spot’ is long and induces ‘worry about the money’ on the wife’s part as well as her vulnerability in the car with someone she hardly knows, journeying to an unknown ‘hill’. However, the dramatic tension that involves the possible threat of the taxi driver is revealed as a clever misdirection on the writer’s part placing the attention on inside the cab when the revelation is outside on the car-park! Significantly, the sight of the chalk ‘white horse’ destination appears strangely miraculous and brings together the original horse with the ancient horse, culminating in the impending revelation of the vision of ‘ the glint of Ranjit’s car’ which feels sinister and life-changing too. This vision dispels the fears  around the taxi driver and makes the reader feel that some truth is about to be recognised in this ancient place with its mysterious perspective on ‘three counties.’ 

The suspense now shifts onto the shocked disbelief of the wife as she initially assumes she is ‘mistaken’ about the car and its passengers and then sees them ‘ close up’ and asks to go ‘home’ in an exciting finale where the narrator feels ‘clear’ of her delusions about her husband and that she ‘wasn’t mad at all.’  This revelation is a relief to the narrator and to the reader and we feel that the ending of the story ‘No wonder I found myself talking to horses’ ironically plays with the idea of the horse being both a sign of her acute isolation,  as well as being the source /site of a  symmetrical and liberating revelation that she is fully justified in escaping her callous, lying, sexually unfaithful husband. 

Q5) I definitely think that the writer explicitly changes our view of Ranjit as the story develops as he is initially described by the narrator in terms of gratitude and awestruck respect so he is ‘kind’ as well as generous both with ‘money’ and ‘gadgets.’   However even at this early stage the reader notices the implicit suggestions that the narrator’s isolation emanates from her husband’s dislike of ‘disturbance’ which could imply that he has a dominating, suffocating effect on his wife and suppresses her to a position of silence around him. This lack of communication and intimacy is made clear in the opening sentence where the unhappy narrator mentions ‘my only companion was a horse.’ Surely it is significant that her husband is not referred to as a companion or even as a friend? It feels as if the writer has used the first-person narrator’s viewpoint to veil the reality of his selfishness and duplicity, reflecting her sense of disempowerment within the marriage as well as her desperate faith in his apparent dedication to work. 

The escalating anxiety of the narrator is compounded by her estrangement from her ever preoccupied, apparently diligent, ‘ working late’ husband whose emotional unavailability ironically linked to his ‘new product’ precipitates her desperate friendship with the taxi driver.  Interestingly we are misdirected by the writer through the narrator to regard the strange journey to the white horse as possibly threatening because of her distance away from ‘home.’ Yet this journey is suddenly recognised as a rite of passage, a near pilgrimage to the truth as the writer brings the ‘sunlight’ of scrutiny onto the duplicitous Ranjit whose ‘ new product’ is merely a sordid affair,  maintained through endless lies inflicted upon the susceptible wife. We finish the story relieved that the victimised wife now no longer feels’ mad’ and that she can regain her mental health and confidence far away from his patronising sterile ‘gadgets’ which secretly revealed his callous character from the beginning.