Can anyone reassure me/ds about this? He sat his unseen paper today and, having discussed it with his friends and then looked it up online, it seems he has interpreted the poem completely differently from everyone else and from the accepted interpretation online. Totally differently - themes and everything.
He is very able - predicted A star and did a practice paper this week and was given full marks. I say this to point out it will have been well-written and structured and he says he addressed the assessment objectives as normal, but what if his interpretation is just wrong?
The mark scheme says it's ok as long as 'valid', but what does that mean? I have just read the poem (did this A level years ago) and I don't agree with ds but can see where he got his ideas from. I think he's over-thought it rather than simply misunderstood.
Any ideas about how this might affect his mark would be much appreciated!