VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 77.5%: He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he lay in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscience to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 80%: He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he lie in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscience to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 72.5%: He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had lain there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he laid in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscience to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 65%: He had laid there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had laid there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he laid in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscious to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: "How did you change?"
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 65%: He had laid there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided…
He had laid there in the medium stone grey intensive care unit
Deep dark stains lined the bed like misguided angels. Throbbing intensified, the body coiled ready to spring forwards to fly like an arrow of God. There he laid in all his glory; someone who had purpose, someone who had style, someone who was happy. I could see through my visor-like eyes the mirror to the perfect alternate version of myself. No one was around but my own conscious to guide me through the pain. My life was fading, something I couldn’t control. Was life ever going to change?
6 months later…
Getting out of bed was the hardest part of the day, disenfranchised by the lack lustre purgatory of not improving. Twice a day, I wrote to myself during the summer; year 12 was looming, I wrote my dreams into a timeless capsule under my bed in the aged monopoly set that smelled of cat piss.
I was told year 12 was suffering…
The start of a brand-new day, the same normal people I called my peers were distant background noise to me. I was silently suffering like a prey animal, but much like the prey animal I had learned to conceal hardships. Bogged down, brought down, beaten. The days went by in a gruellingly slow fashion, like paint drying against the seams, growing grass against the footpath, SACs accumulated like dull dust.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: There are no heroes in Oedipus the King,…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 80%: Sophocles also explores the role of divinity in determining morality, with the institution confining both the gods…
Sophocles also explores the role of divinity in determining morality, with the institution confining both the gods and man to a state of moral duality. The gods are presented as both ‘champion[s]’ of man and mechanisms of damage, explored by Sophocles through the parados. The chorus is ‘racked with terror’ due to the divine plague, and ‘worship[s] [Apollo] in dread’, with desperately pleading to understand ‘[Apollo’s] price’. The portrayal of the gods as mechanisms of terror is expressed through recurring thanatological language; the chorus’ descriptions of ‘deaths on deaths’ presenting the extent of divine suffering inflicted upon the city. Sophocles simultaneously depicts the gods as a source of absolution. Apollo is described as the ‘child of golden Hope’ and ‘lord of the light’, Athena as possessing a ‘radiant…kindness’, and Dionysus with ‘eyes ablaze with glory’. His contrast of deathly language in the chorus’ questioning of ‘what will [Apollo] bring to birth’ imbues a duality within the gods as both man’s ‘death’ and their salvation. Oedipus’ ultimate acceptance of his actions as having been ‘brought to light by the gods’ places moral culpability on himself and endorses the
VCE · Creative Response
Creative Response: “You were looking for the key for…
VCE Creative Response essay scoring 87.5%: Changing Direction “You were looking for the key for years. But the door was always open!”- vce eng exam 2025…
Changing Direction
“You were looking for the key for years. But the door was always open!”- vce eng exam 2025
The room smelled like antiseptic and mangoes.
A woman sat beside my bed, enclosing my hand within both of hers. Her face seemed familiar, though familiarity had become a cruel sensation: the certainty of knowing without the comfort of remembering.
“Dad?” she whispered. “Do you know who I am?”
Behind her stood a man and two children, waiting for an answer I could not give. I smiled because they appeared to need me to.
“I’m sorry.”
The woman lowered her head. As she pressed my hand against her cheek, my gaze settled on the faded name beneath my hospital bracelet.
Alina.
My fingers found the small metal key hanging from my neck.
“Alina,” I said.
The woman looked up. “Who is Alina?”
The sweetness of mangoes grew stronger, pushing the antiseptic from the room, and suddenly my hands were young again.
“Wrong.” Alina tapped the centre of my palm.
“I copied exactly what you wrote.”
“You wrote it backwards.”
“Urdu itself is backwards.”
She gasped as though I had insulted God, then threw a mango seed at my head. We were seventeen, when borders belonged in schoolbooks and death belonged to old people, so we spent entire afternoons beneath the mango tree without believing an afternoon could ever be our last.
Taking my hand again, she traced the Urdu letters of her name across my Punjabi palm.
“Again,” she ordered.
I copied the movement carefully: Aa-lii-n-a.
Mango juice travelled along her wrist as I watched.
“Are you learning?”
“Very carefully.”
“Besharam.”
Shameless.
Although she rolled her hazel-green eyes, a smile escaped from the corner of her mouth. I wanted to tell her that I loved the way she said that word, but there would always be tomorrow.
That afternoon, an eclipse darkened the village. Birds disappeared into the trees, and the cattle became restless as the world held its breath.
“Are you scared?” I asked.
“No,” she replied too quickly.
When sunlight finally returned through the leaves, Alina smiled as though she had summoned it herself.
“See? It always comes back.”
The following morning, the shouting began.
Smoke pressed through our windows, stinging my eyes, while my mother threw clothes into our metal trunk. My father repeated that we would return within a week, although his shaking hands folded the same kurta three times.
They packed enough clothing for seven days. I ran to Alina.
Dragging my bicycle by its broken chain, I pushed past families moving in every direction, their possessions clutched against them as if a bundle of clothing could hold a life together. Someone called for me to stop, but smoke had swallowed the road behind me.
Alina’s front door stood open.
I would later forget the precise sound of her laugh and whether her dupatta had been green or blue, but I never forgot that doorway shifting in the hot wind.
“Alina!”
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: ‘The actions of Oedipus are irrelevant; he…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 72.5%: Sophocles’ Oedipus the King explores the idea of fate and whether people have control over their own future.…
Sophocles’ Oedipus the King explores the idea of fate and whether people have control over their own future. Oedipus is shown as a victim of fate because his future has already been decided by the gods before he is able to control it. The actions of other characters also unknowingly help the prophecy come true. However, Oedipus is not completely controlled by fate because his own pride, anger and decisions also contribute to his downfall. Therefore, Oedipus is a victim of fate, but his actions are still important in causing his downfall.
Paragraph 1 — Fate
As a king in 5th century Athens, Oedipus is subject to a future determined by those of higher power. Within the play, the Theban citizens widely accept that “Great laws tower above us,” showing that the gods have more power than humans. The word “tower” suggests that these laws are above humans and cannot be controlled or changed by them. This shows that even though Oedipus is the king of Thebes, he is still below the power of the gods and their decisions. The prophecy about Oedipus’ life also establishes that his future has already been decided before he can control it. Oedipus acknowledges that “Apollo told [him]” it is “[his] fate” that he “must make love with [his] own mother” and “shed [his] father’s blood with [his] own hands.” The phrase “my fate” shows that Oedipus understands that his future is controlled by a higher power. The use of “must” also suggests that there is no other choice for Oedipus and that the events are unavoidable. This makes Oedipus a victim of fate because the prophecy was already determined before he even knew who his real parents were. Therefore, his actions cannot change the final outcome because the gods have already decided his future.
Paragraph 2 — Other people's actions
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: There are no heroes in Oedipus the King,…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 80%: Sophocles critiques the notion of the benevolent dictator, examining their moral complexity and challenging their…
Sophocles critiques the notion of the benevolent dictator, examining their moral complexity and challenging their heroic status. Laius, Oedipus and Creon all cultivate a persona of ‘first of men’, however each is deeply corrupted by their power. In trying to neutralise his ‘wildest fear’ of dethronement, he ‘fastened his [son’s] ankles [and] had a henchman fling him away’ to die. In labelling Laius’ attempted filicide a ‘[destruction]’, Sophocles politicises ruler’s actions; an attempt to remove an adversary to maintain dominance. Oedipus’ power ensures the cultivation of a reputation of a man who will ‘do anything’ for Thebes, while simultaneously being consumed by hubris. The gradual unravelling of Oedipus’ internal nature, from the ‘land’s avenger’ to a man who believes he ‘must rule’ at any cost, imbues moral complexity within the benevolent dictator, with Sophocles expressing the dual nature of hero and villain within the leader. This duality is represented through the ‘double doors [which] dominate the facade’. Outside the doors, Oedipus projects a
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: There are no heroes in Oedipus the King,…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 77.5%: Sophocles critiques the notion of the benevolent dictator, examining their moral complexity and challenging their…
Sophocles critiques the notion of the benevolent dictator, examining their moral complexity and challenging their heroic status. Laius, Oedipus and Creon all cultivate a persona of ‘first of men’, however each is deeply corrupted by their power. In trying to neutralise his ‘wildest fear’ of dethronement, he ‘fastened his [son’s] ankles [and] had a henchman fling him away’ to die. In labelling Laius’ attempted filicide a ‘[destruction]’, Sophocles imbues a political nature to the ruler’s actions; an attempt to remove an adversary to maintain dominance. Oedipus’ power ensures the cultivation of a reputation of a man who will ‘do anything’ for Thebes, while simultaneously being consumed by hubris. The gradual unravelling of Oedipus’ internal nature, from the ‘land’s avenger’ to a man who believes he ‘must rule’ at any cost, imbues moral complexity within the benevolent dictator, with Sophocles expressing the dual nature of hero and villain within the leader. This duality is represented through the ‘double doors [which] dominate the facade’. Outside the doors, Oedipus projects a heroic image,
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: There are no heroes in Oedipus the King,…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 77.5%: Sophocles critiques the notion of the benevolent dictator, examining their moral complexity and challenging their…
Sophocles critiques the notion of the benevolent dictator, examining their moral complexity and challenging their heroic status. Laius, Oedipus and Creon all cultivate a persona of ‘first of men’, however each is deeply corrupted by their power. In trying to neutralise his’ ‘wildest fear’ of dethronement through patricide, he ‘fastened his [son’s] ankles [and] had a henchman fling him away’ to die. In labelling Laius’ attempted filicide a ‘[destruction]’, Sophocles imbues a political nature to the ruler’s actions; an attempt to remove an adversary to maintain dominance. Oedipus’ power ensures the cultivation of a reputation of a man who will ‘do anything’ for Thebes, while simultaneously being consumed by hubris. The gradual unravelling of Oedipus’ internal nature, from the ‘land’s avenger’ to a man who believes he ‘must rule’ at any cost, imbues moral complexity within the benevolent dictator, with Sophocles expressing the dual nature of hero and villain within the leader. This duality is represented through the ‘double doors [which] dominate the facade’. Outside the doors, Oedipus projects a heroic
VCE · Language Analysis
Language Analysis: Analyse the piece "online age…
VCE Language Analysis essay scoring 75%: In the wake of the Australian government's implementation of Age Restricted Material Codes in order to better…
In the wake of the Australian government's implementation of Age Restricted Material Codes in order to better protect children from online harm, e-Safety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant published her opinion piece “Online Age Restrictions Are Common Sense”. Published on the 13th of March 2026 on the e-Safety website, the piece employs a pragmatic tone that shifts into accusatory. Alongside the text is a visual of a young child engrossed in their device, complementing Grant's overall contention that the online world is currently inadequately protecting children and that the new Australian Age Restrictions are necessary to the safety of youth. Grant utilises her role as e-Safety Commissioner to convey her arguments as knowledgeable and sensible, appealing to parents of minors to understand the dangers faced by their children if not for the implementation of online safeguards.
Grant initially opens with the conveyance of the material present online severity and the threat it poses to children. She employs hyperbolic and fear evoking language such as “high impact” when referring to violent media, and “extreme” when describing pornography. This encourages readers to understand the brutality of material that is “freely accessible” online to “impressionable young minds”, positioning them to feel concerned and frightened for the safety of youth, particularly readers with young children. Following with this, Grant utilises honest and blunt language when making reference to grave topics such as “self harm, suicide and disordered eating content”. Her usage of direct terms, rather than euphemisms, further evokes fear within parents using the shock value generated by the mention of dire, usually taboo subjects. Grant's listing of several types of harmful content present online, placed on its own lines for emphasis, elicits horror with its reinforcing of the danger children face. Her use of emotive language and honesty work in conjunction to compel parents into understanding the necessity of online restrictions, by targeting their innate desire to protect their children.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: i. In The Memory Police, interpersonal…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 95%: In Yoko Ogawa’s The Memory Police, interpersonal connections emerge as a crucial form of resistance, but not as a…
In Yoko Ogawa’s The Memory Police, interpersonal connections emerge as a crucial form of resistance, but not as a simple or triumphant answer to authoritarian control. In a world where collective political opposition has been hollowed out by systematic erasure, bonds of care, memory and collaboration become some of the only remaining spaces where individual humanity can be asserted. Yet Ogawa also underscores the fragility, limitations and potential distortions of these relationships, suggesting that while they may be the strongest resistance available, they are also precarious, ethically complex and ultimately unable to overturn the regime’s power. Overall, the novel invites readers to recognise interpersonal connection as a powerful, if deeply constrained, mode of resisting obliteration.
Ogawa first presents small, everyday acts of care as a quietly defiant resistance to the regime’s enforced forgetting, implying that in the absence of overt political agency, intimate bonds become the only viable space for dissent. The narrator’s decision to hide R in the “secret room” transforms an ordinary domestic setting into a clandestine refuge, a spatial symbol of resistance carved out of an otherwise surveilled home. The “ladder” and cramped attic emphasise how precarious and makeshift this sanctuary is, yet Ogawa uses this imagery to show that compassion can still generate pockets of safety within totalitarian control. When the narrator and the old man secretly “smuggled food and books” to R, the listing of these mundane details highlights that their resistance operates through routine acts of maintenance rather than dramatic rebellion. Authorially, Ogawa encourages readers to value the ethical weight of these quiet, continuous gestures, framing them as acts of moral refusal in a climate of passivity. Similarly, the narrator and R’s collaborative work on the manuscript, as they sit “side by side, turning the pages together”, functions as a metatextual image of connection sustaining imagination. The tactile verbs “turning” and “together” underscore that their relationship is what keeps narrative, creativity and memory alive despite the disappearances. Through these scenes, Ogawa suggests that interpersonal bonds resist not by overthrowing the Memory Police, but by preserving interior life and human complexity, implying that in conditions of extreme oppression, the strongest available resistance is simply to go on caring, remembering and creating with another person.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: "The blight on the village never came from…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 100%: Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle is fundamentally a cautionary tale about ostracism because…
Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle is fundamentally a cautionary tale about ostracism because exclusion does not merely separate individuals from society; it reshapes the identities, fears and behaviours of both the rejected and those who reject them. The language of “blight” and “belonged” is therefore deeply ironic: the village imagines corruption as something external to itself and belonging as something it alone has the authority to define. The Blackwood sisters' retreat into ritualised domestic enclosure initially appears to protect them from a community whose cruelty depends on having an Other to persecute; yet the very rituals that shelter Constance and Merricat also reveal minds already colonised by that persecution. Ultimately, Jackson's most unsettling warning is that ostracism becomes self-perpetuating: the village's exclusion of the Blackwoods produces the withdrawal, paranoia and folklore that then seem to justify their continued exclusion.
At its most immediate level, Jackson exposes the danger of ostracism by showing how collective exclusion converts prejudice into ordinary communal behaviour. Merricat's opening self-introduction, "I like my sister Constance, and Richard Plantagenet, and Amanita phalloides, the death-cup mushroom," fuses affection and poison within a single grammatical list. Jackson signals from the first page a consciousness for whom danger and intimacy are not opposites but companions, a fusion the house's isolation exists precisely to protect. The villagers' taunt, "Merricat, said Constance, would you like a cup of tea," conscripts persecution into the metre of a nursery rhyme, so that cruelty is rehearsed as communal entertainment rather than experienced as transgression. Jackson's choice of childish verse form exposes how thoroughly the village's hostility has been normalised, made cheerful and participatory rather than shameful. Their treatment of Merricat during her weekly shopping trips reinforces this collective surveillance: her admission that "I was afraid of going past the houses where they might be watching" transforms the village itself into a space of observation, where even unseen eyes exert disciplinary power over her movement. Uncle Julian compounds this exposure from within the house itself by compulsively narrating the poisoning as though drafting "his book." His repeated insistence that he must "get it exactly right" reveals a household equally obsessed with controlling a narrative the village has already claimed for its own gossip. Against this doubled surveillance, the Blackwood house offers an alternative order entirely of the sisters' making. Constance's domestic rituals are materialised in the cellar's "deeply colored rows of jellies and pickles and bottled vegetables and fruit," which Merricat imagines standing "forever, a poem by the Blackwood women." The lyrical transformation of preserved food into a "poem" elevates domestic routine into an enduring system of order and continuity, allowing Constance to exercise control within a world that has otherwise rendered her powerless. Jackson therefore presents ostracism as dangerous not simply because it excludes, but because it drives its targets into increasingly enclosed forms of existence.
VCE · Language Analysis
Language Analysis: prompt about handwriting
VCE Language Analysis essay scoring 85%: The expansion of a technology driven world has eliminated the need for foundational skills that were once a…
The expansion of a technology driven world has eliminated the need for foundational skills that were once a need in society but now are often seen as a ‘forgotten skill’. Handwriting has created an arising debate on whether it is needed in the modern world. The author, Shonda Graham, an education consultant, is worried that her teachers don’t value handwriting as much as she would like. Shonda argues that writing is a multipurpose skill, which develops your handwriting, comprehension, spelling, and reading. Shonda uses a presentation to reach out to a broader community of teachers, attempting to improve the audience's literacy and writing instruction. Shonda, rather than being dismissive of all technology, expresses her disappointment on how they are being used, downplaying multiple vital skills that would be used if it wasn’t for computers taking over.
Through Shanda’s presentation, she outweighs how valued handwriting can be, ultimately expressing how underappreciated the rule can be for teachers and their younger students. Some might say, ‘what is the point of handwriting’, but Shanda dismisses this idea and shows the true value of what handwriting can bring, expressing her worry of how underappreciated the tool has become arguing that ‘handwriting is a gateway to better learning and understanding, and is an important teaching tool.’ Shanda then backs this up with contextual evidence, explaining that preschoolers actually learn letters when handwriting, attempting to get across to her audience about how important handwriting can be to create a functional learning path for infants and younger children. She also advocates for meaningful and creative practices rather than strict and harsh, ‘mindless’ drills, pushing parents and teachers to bring out the imagination in their children and students.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: "I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 72.5%: Essay: Charlotte Brontë’s period, coming of age novel, Jane Eyre, follows the life of the eponymous protagonist…
Essay:
Charlotte Brontë’s period, coming of age novel, Jane Eyre, follows the life of the eponymous protagonist as she navigates the complexities of life as an educated female orphan in Victorian England. Told from a semi-autobiographical perspective, the text examines the various themes of love, class, and religion amongst others, all through an, although somewhat antiquated by contemporary standards, trailblazing proto-feminist lens. Brontë contends, through the phases of the protagonist Jane’s life, passion’s ultimate usurpation of independence as the primary concern in the mind of individuals as they age. Initially, dependence is the primary focus of the novel, with passion being presented as something to be sacrificed to secure better treatment as a dependent. However, as the text progresses, passion begins to supplant independence as the supreme priority to be striven for. Ultimately, by the end of the novel, passion, primarily through love, begins to, on a subconscious level, take primacy over independence and seep further into one’s thought process. Therefore, it is clear that, through the example of Jane, Brontë argues that the desire for independence is ultimately supplanted by passion throughout life.
Brontë presents childhood as being primarily focused on the limits of one’s independence, resistance and how passion must be a secondary concern at this phase of life. Particularly in Jane’s case, as she is both a child and an orphan, her early phase of life at Gateshead is framed in this way. From the outset, Jane’s life is characterised in these terms, with John Reed, son of Jane’s guardian Aunt Reed, directly calling her “a dependent [who] ought to beg”. Through this blunt and arrogant taunt, Brontë illustrates how significant one’s dependency status, and the duty of dependents to be submissive, is in Victorian society; she seeks to prompt reflection in her contemporary reader, exposing that this perspective is so deeply ingrained it is even foundational to children’s conception and categorisation of others. Jane is subsequently instructed by Bessie, a fellow dependent, to “try to be useful and pleasant” in order to secure her “home here”. Bessie also warns that if Jane becomes “passionate and rude, [Aunt Reed] will send [Jane] away. Here, Brontë elucidates the power dynamics of being a dependent i.e. when one’s access to housing is under another’s control, one cannot afford to be “passionate”, lest one lose access to that housing; this makes it clear that the issue of independence is far more important at this time than passion. Finally, when conversing with fellow student and dependent Helen Burns, who promotes a forgiving attitude toward one’s superior, at the Lowood institution, Jane declares that she “must resist those who punish [her] unjustly”. This final resolve from Jane represents the culmination of Brontë’s perspective, and what she wants her Victorian readership to consider, that the consistent reinforcement of submission in the face of injustice as the duty of the dependent will work only to create resentment within them. Furthermore, this also emphasises the magnitude of independence as the primary concern at this phase of life. Ultimately, it is clearly evident that Brontë presents the earliest part of life as primarily concerned with dependence and resistance over passion.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: 2. Isolation & insignificance 4. Nature's…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 85%: Samantha Harvay’s award winning space pastoral novel ‘Orbital’ follows a crew of six astronauts aboard a space…
Samantha Harvay’s award winning space pastoral novel ‘Orbital’ follows a crew of six astronauts aboard a space station and explores humanity's impact on the natural environment. Through ‘Orbital’ Harvey illustrates how mankind's endeavour to progress has resulted in an unacceptable cost to the environment but has also provided opportunity to benefit. Harvey accentuates this through demonstrating how human endeavor has resulted in the degradation of the natural environment and mankind's actions are ironic when considering its survival., Contrastingly, she also explores how mankind's progression has allowed for marvel of achievements.
Human endeavor has resulted in the destruction of the natural environment. Harvey explores how through humanity's insatiable desire for evolvement, the natural environment has suffered greatly, resulting in climate change and an increase in natural disasters. Harvey supports this through the “super-typhoon”. She employs this symbol/motif to underscore how as a result of human actions, nature's power is a force humans cannot defend themselves against. Further more, Harvey describes the typhoon as a “charging force”, Harvey uses personification to describe nature as a being itself, showing how mankind's treatment of the earth has caused it to retaliate, and all humanity can do is wait as it doomily approaches. This supports Harvey's views and values as it shows how humanity must take more caution and have more care towards the earth as it is the key to their survival. By employing this, Harvey shows how man’s endeavour for advancement has resulted in the devastation of the one thing on which it relies.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: 2. Isolation & insignificance 4. Nature's…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 85%: Samantha Harvay’s award winning space pastoral novel ‘Orbital’ follows a crew of six astronauts aboard a space…
Samantha Harvay’s award winning space pastoral novel ‘Orbital’ follows a crew of six astronauts aboard a space station and explores humanity's impact on the natural environment. Through ‘Orbital’ Harvey illustrates how mankind's endeavour to progress has resulted in an unacceptable cost to the environment but has also provided opportunity to benefit. Harvey accentuates this through demonstrating how human endeavor has resulted in the degradation of the natural environment and mankind's actions are ironic when considering its survival., Contrastingly, she also explores how mankind's progression has allowed for marvel of achievements.
Human endeavor has resulted in the destruction of the natural environment. Harvey explores how through humanity's insatiable desire for evolvement, the natural environment has suffered greatly, resulting in climate change and an increase in natural disasters. Harvey supports this through the “super-typhoon”. She employs this symbol/motif to underscore how as a result of human actions, nature's power is a force humans cannot defend themselves against. Further more, Harvey describes the typhoon as a “charging force”, Harvey uses personification to describe nature as a being itself, showing how mankind's treatment of the earth has caused it to retaliate, and all humanity can do is wait as it doomily approaches. This supports Harvey's views and values as it shows how humanity must take more caution and have more care towards the earth as it is the key to their survival. By employing this, Harvey shows how man’s endeavour for advancement has resulted in the devastation of the one thing on which it relies.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: “I know what it feels to be beaten. To…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 87.5%: In the Western film High Ground, director Stephen Maxwell Johnson explores the violent tensions between…
In the Western film High Ground, director Stephen Maxwell Johnson explores the violent tensions between Indigenous Australians and British colonisers in the aftermath of the Gan Gan massacre. Whilst Johnson reveals how the past can simultaneously motivate and constrain individuals; he acknowledges that trauma can cultivate growth when it is confronted rather than feared. Johnson explores how the past can influence people to seek justice yet also perpetuate a cycle of self-destruction. He emphasises how personal history can strengthen loyalty, but blind allegiance prevents the acceptance of differing perspectives. Ultimately, Johnson suggests that confronting past mistakes allow individuals to reconcile and learn from trauma.
Johnson thoroughly explores how the residual trauma of the past can motivate individuals to seek justice, yet when consumed by anger, it becomes a barrier to healing and perpetuates a cycle of self-destruction. Trauma is used as a driving force to push individuals to keep living. This is most prominently seen in Gulwirri and Gutjuk’s conversation where she explains that she knows “what it feels like to be beaten,” to feel “like nothing” ad that you have to keep fighting as “your anger is all you have.” The fire positioned between the two in scene also serves as a symbol for the raging fury which drives Gulwirri’s actions. Through this Johnson underscores how her actions and desire for justice are all incentivised by her wrath due to her anguish of the past. By accentuating that this is all she has, he recognised that anger can overwhelm and consume all aspects of individual agency putting forth the notion that her motivation will perpetuate destruction of self if left to fester. This is further reinforced through the tragic progression of Baywarra’s character. When describing him Elder Darrpa exclaims that he “could’ve been” the Mob’s “greatest teacher” but he lost all that to his “anger.” Whilst his anger is highlighted as his driving force, Johnson displays how it also consumed him and prevented Baywarra from reaching his potential. This inhibited him from truly healing from the massacre of the past eventually culminating in his death as a direct result of the fury which consumed his being. Johnson characterises Baywarra as a fiery character portraying parallels between him and fire throughout the film. This symbolism reinforces Johnson’s ideology that anger perpetuates self-destruction, as after Baywarra attacks a mission a long shot portrays his silhouette being consumed by a raging, out of control fire, foreshadowing his eventual demise due to his own uncontrollable wrath. Johnson scrutinizes this destructive mindset to emphasize to his audience, that no good can come from senseless violence and it will only result in excessive harm and death.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: In the Memory Police, silence acts both as…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 77.5%: In Yoko Ogawa’s dystopian allegory The Memory Police, silence functions as a complex, dual-faceted force that…
In Yoko Ogawa’s dystopian allegory The Memory Police, silence functions as a complex, dual-faceted force that governs the lives of the island’s inhabitants. On one hand, Ogawa demonstrates how the authoritarian state enforces a suffocating, compulsory quiet to strip citizens of their memory and identity. On the other hand, silence operates as a quiet sanctuary of resistance, through the preservation of memory in secret. Ultimately, Ogawa suggests that while silent, internal preservation allows individuals to retain their humanity in the face of tyranny, a population entirely deprived of its voice is inevitably condemned to complete erasure.
Ogawa expresses how silence is a key enforcer of totalitarianism in the novel. The Memory Police's disappearances leave their victims feeling as if "an important bond" is "being cut", leaving them in an atmosphere of pervasive dread, where they cannot publicly outcry, but instead are left motionless. When hats disappear, the islanders gather at the river and stand "all in a group... staring at the river in silence", thus representing how oppressed individuals are forced into silence as a manifestation of shock and passive acquiescence. As the Memory Police's forced disappearances escalate from hats and rose petals to calendars and novels, the environment itself turns cold and muted. Ogawa reinforces this psychological deadening through the motif of continuous snow. Following the disappearance of calendars, an unyielding winter settles over the island, smothering the landscape. The narrator observes that "there was no sign whatsoever that the snow would disappear," mirroring how the muffling snow physically covers the earth just as totalitarian oppression deadens the citizens' emotional capacity. By transforming catastrophic loss into an ordinary, unremarked routine, the regime uses silence to ensure that "no one ever complains," effectively turning public quietude into complicity with state tyranny, where individuals' voice is completely absent.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: The greatest obstacles in Rainbow’s End…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 87.5%: Historical injustices have continually marginalised Indigenous populations, forcing them to endure dispossession…
Historical injustices have continually marginalised Indigenous populations, forcing them to endure dispossession and oppression. Within the 2007 play ‘Rainbow’s End,’ Jane Harrison’s illustration of the journeys of three generations of Indigenous women investigates the seemingly invisible and physical consequences of discrimination in 1950s Australia, and evaluates how meaningful events can expand one’s intrinsic psyche and manifest into external rebellion. Harrison celebrates the multifaceted aspects of the Indigenous identity, and simultaneously condemns institutions that aim to suppress Indigenous voices.
Harrison explores how Indigenous Australians are faced with significant internal conflict after physical acts of injustice and segregation. From the onset of the play, the characterisation of the Dear women immediately establishes them as resilient and hardworking despite their lack of adequate housing, as they are first introduced while [rebuilding after a flood]. The motif of the flood both literally and physically represents the insufficient housing left to Indigenous people, but also symbolically represents the unseen cycle of Indigenous trauma and injustice. Harrison’s implementation of the [humpy] on the river additionally speaks to the harsh poverty-ridden environment that the Dear women are forced to live in, further commenting on the severe negligence of western institutions and government policies. Furthermore, Dolly’s [resigned] [sigh] after Gladys and Nan use her magazines after the flood hints at how First Nations communities have familiarised themselves with the constant physical injustices imposed upon them. In addition to this resigned acceptance of injustice, Harrison depicts the historical context of social segregation within the play, demonstrated through the symbol of “hessian” that acts as a physical barrier between Gladys, who [dream(s)] of meeting the Queen, and the constructed hierarchical superiority of white society. Harrison utilises the physical barricade that hides the Flats from the Queen’s sight to denigratingly comment on how Indigenous people have been pushed into the background of their own stories, forcing non-Indigenous audiences to bear witness to the intrinsic repercussions of “shame” and social segregation. Moreover, Gladys’ dejected mood after being restricted from seeing the Queen exemplifies her initial compliance and subservience to white authorities, thus accentuating the internal conflict and tension between her Indigenous identity and her obsequious idolisation of figures of power. Therefore, Harrison strategically and deliberately adopts motifs and symbols that physically represent injustice to examine the multidimensional internal worlds of Indigenous communities.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: In Oedipus the King, all who deserve it…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 77.5%: The tragedy of Oedipus is all consuming, destroying both the innocent and the guilty. In his tragedy, Oedipus the…
The tragedy of Oedipus is all consuming, destroying both the innocent and the guilty. In his tragedy, Oedipus the King, Sophocles contends that punishment is omnipresent, with no consideration of justifiability. While cardinal sins and acts of wrath suffer unwavering retribution, the suffering caused by rebellion against morally questionable divine institutions and association with moral transgressors ensure that consequences for actions are not confined within justice.
In Oedipus the King, Sophocles contends that just punishment is attainable through retribution for cardinal sins and acts of wrath. Base transgressions are met with unwavering consequence, with Sophocles utilising agricultural imagery to illustrate their morally degenerated nature. Through depicting Oedipus as the physical ‘corruption of the land’, Sophocles compares the moral transgressions of the ruler to a blight on the fundamental sustenance of Thebes, suggesting the profundity of Oedipus’ moral depravity. Jocasta’s depiction as a ‘mother earth that cropped two crops at once’ reinforces the idea of transgressing the established agricultural order, and it is through this lens that Sophocles justifies their ultimate downfall. Additionally, Sophocles contends that severe and destructive acts of wrath are unable to escape their appropriate punishment. Oedipus’ wrath manifests in the unfounded accusation of Tiresias’ and Creon’s ‘witch-hunt’ against the king, and his attempts at making the shepherd ‘talk with pain’. Sophocles highlights the destructive nature of these acts, through Creon’s fears of the ‘damage [he’d] face from such an accusation’ and the shepherd’s pleas to not ‘torture an old man’. Sophocles suggests that eventual punishment for Oedipus’ wrath is deserved; Oedipus’ allegations of Creon’s ‘treachery’ mirror Creon’s contemptuous response to Oedipus’ plea to ‘touch [his] hand’ with drawing back, Sophocles framing the latter as an appropriate reaction. Furthermore, the intrinsic relationship between justice and punishment is explored by Sophocles through the motif of light and dark, with the ‘burst[ing] to light’ of the truth of Oedipus’ transgressions coinciding with Oedipus’ subjection to the ‘horror of darkness’. The contrast between the brightness of revelation and the darkness of punishment is utilised by Sophocles to contend their symbiotic, and therefore appropriate, nature in condemning Oedipus to his downfall. Ultimately, Sophocles contends that just penalties are attainable for the commitment of cardinal sins and destructive acts of wrath.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: "All the characters in sunset boulevard…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 97.5%: In Billy Wilder’s film noir masterpiece Sunset Boulevard, the architecture of human confinement is rendered not…
In Billy Wilder’s film noir masterpiece Sunset Boulevard, the architecture of human confinement is rendered not through steel bars, but through the insidious decay of the human spirit. Central to the film’s tragic core is a profound psychological reality: entrapment in Sunset Boulevard is rarely a cage imposed entirely from the outside. While the predatory studio system constructs a treacherous landscape of commodification, the film demonstrates that external forces merely construct the arena; it is the individuals who walk into the cell and turn the key. Through stark chiaroscuro lighting, restrictive framing, and Franz Waxman’s intrusive musical score, Wilder explores how moral compromise, psychological denial, and systemic manipulation intersect to create inescapable prisons of self-sabotage.
The trajectory of Joe Gillis serves as a central study in voluntary subjugation. Driven by a desperate need to escape financial ruin and B-movie hackwork, Joe enters the decaying mansion at 10086 Sunset Boulevard as an opportunistic refugee fleeing economic failure. In his opening voiceover, Joe acknowledges his self-imposed trap: "A neglected house gets an unhappy look. This one had it in spades. It was like that old woman in Great Expectations—that Miss Havisham in her rotting wedding dress..." By referencing Dickens, Joe explicitly identifies the estate as a monument to decay and psychological arrest. Yet, despite recognizing the toxic, Gothic nature of the environment, Joe weighs the "rotting" mansion against his grim economic reality and chooses gilded servitude over a thirty-five-dollar-a-week copy desk in Ohio. Wilder visually and aurally reinforces Joe's surrender of agency. Cinematographer John F. Seitz repeatedly frames Joe behind vertical and horizontal lines, such as the shadows cast by Venetian blinds, turning his bedroom into a cell. High camera angles look down on Joe within the cavernous architecture, rendering him small and consumed by the estate. Aurally, Waxman tracks this downfall by clashing Joe’s modern, syncopated 1950s bebop jazz motif with Norma’s oppressive orchestrations. As Joe becomes increasingly confined, his light jazz theme is swallowed by the heavy, lush strings of Norma’s tango, visually and musically confirming that his ambition has reduced him to a helpless captive.
VCE · Text Response
Text Response: In Oedipus the King, all who deserve it…
VCE Text Response essay scoring 80%: In Oedipus the King, Sophocles contends that just punishment is attainable through retribution for cardinal sins…
In Oedipus the King, Sophocles contends that just punishment is attainable through retribution for cardinal sins and acts of wrath. Base transgressions are met with unwavering consequence, with Sophocles utilising agricultural imagery to illustrate their morally degenerated nature. Through depicting Oedipus as the physical ‘corruption of the land’, Sophocles compares the moral transgressions of the ruler to a blight on the fundamental sustenance of Thebes, suggesting the profundity of Oedipus’ moral depravity. Jocasta’s depiction as a ‘mother earth that cropped two crops at once’ reinforces the idea of transgressing the established agricultural order, and it is through this lens that Sophocles justifies their ultimate downfall. Additionally, Sophocles contends that severe and destructive acts of wrath are unable to escape their appropriate punishment. Oedipus’ wrath manifests in the unfounded accusation of Tiresias’ and Creon’s