DD applying English at Cambridge 2018 any advice?

[Hollybollybingbong]

DD would like to study English at Uni and will apply in 2018. She has her heart set on Cambridge. I have been the voice of reason about the difficulty of getting there even as an excellent student and she has told me that she visualises what she wants to help her achieve it, she knows it will be hard but needs to think positively (I've received this as 'Shut up mum!'). I completely respect that. Please could anyone offer advice as to the best way to make her personal statement shine amongst all personal statements for English. She is studying English, History, Law and taking Computer science a year early in August. She has written a 60,000 word book and is discussing it with authors and sending it to publishers (so it's currently still a personal project.)
DS applied this year and was quite relaxed about where he ended up, he wasn't phased or surprised not to get an interview. I'm already more stressed about DD.

It's probably worth reading the King's College Reading lists to see the type of books that Cambridge recommends reading and see if any appeal. Make sure she can critically analyse books she has read and easily expand on anything she will have written her personal statement! Making sure she knows the literary theory of the books and really understands- or can at least interpret confidently- what the author is trying to put across in terms of social, historical, political, philosophical aspects.
Also, if she has to submit in any examples of written work to the college, make sure these are of very high standard, and ensure she spends extra time on these essays so that they're written to the best of her abilities! I'm still strongly convinced the strength of my essays that I sent in played a huge part in me obtaining an offer, with 2 of my interviewers specifically commenting on the strength of them.
Good luck to her!

It feels like the personal statement will be mostly (approx 75%) her critique of the additional reading she has done as proof of her love and understanding of the subject with a little aside for work experience, productions viewed, essay competitions, writing her book and the appeal of the structure of the course

Does she need to include work experience? I don't see how it's relevant. Structure of the course stuff sounds good, as does the lit stuff.

Making sure she knows the literary theory of the books and really understands- or can at least interpret confidently- what the author is trying to put across in terms of social, historical, political, philosophical aspects.

It's all a bit of a minefield really. Because I think English A-level works in a particular way.

In Jane Eyre, what Charlotte Bronte means is X, Y and Z and I can prove this by means of quotations A, B and C.

The trouble is that this is a sort of lie - albeit the kind of lie that teachers find convenient.

It is entirely possible that authors wrote stuff without trying to put across any particular theory. Or if they were influenced by a theory, they were also unconsciously shooting themselves in the foot, with one bit of their mind subverting another bit of their mind. So that a single novel might be simultaneously conservative but also radical. Influenced by Gothic traditions and fairytales, but also a work of social realism.

So while the applications process is (relatively) simple, literature itself is - unfortunately - quite complicated.

But gradually opening oneself to its fascinating complications is a good thing, I think.

Yes, you said that much better than me - I posted too fast.

I think it is really, really hard for A Level students. They are very much encouraged to see literature as a means of communicating moral (philosophical, religious, political ...) ideas, too. And so you start talking about what 'the reader' thinks and feels and understands, not about what you think or feel, or about what different people across time and space might feel and think. And ideally, you draw out a moral conclusion.

So perhaps they read the Wife of Bath, and they learn it is about women's place in society, and they write that the reader learns that women can speak out against male-dominated culture. And this is the point of the text.

I think some students think they are being tricked if they're asked to find contradictions in a text they read, or if they're asked to second-guess their initial responses.

I think if students are only interested (or primarily interested) in moral, philosophical or political messages, they should be studying the relevant subjects. Or at least studying English Lit at a university where not such a strong focus on close reading.

Don't be too hard on A Level teachers here: we're not quite as crap as this thread might suggest! The assessment objectives require different readings of texts to be considered, and to look at the way critical views of texts have changed over time. So when I teach The Wife of Bath, for instance, we discuss feminist and anti-feminist readings, we discuss the use of satire - and who is being satirised, the complexity of the narrative voice and so on. And we would absolutely be expected to encourage students to look for contradictions in texts of the kind Elinor is suggesting.

Oh, no! I wasn't trying to have a go at teachers at all.

I dislike the way the A Level syllabus is written, but I'm not criticising people for teaching it.

I think it's really unfair on students that there is this substantial difference between A Level and undergrad, which so many of them don't seem prepared for. And when I talk to teachers, they find it annoying too - which I should have said in my post, to make clear I'm not having a go at teachers.

I agree it's good to look at the way readings of texts have changed, to discuss (eg) feminist readings. But I was more getting at the way that students seem so often to think they must hide behind 'the reader' and what 'the reader' thinks the text 'tells us' or 'shows us'.

Yes, I think it's exam syllabuses that I dislike too. And the constraints imposed by the need to teach to them.

I definitely found - nearly forty years back - a huge gap between the way I'd been taught at school, and the way in which I was being asked to read and write when doing an English degree. (And not a lot of help given in terms of how to bridge that gap.

So when my daughter did English A-level I couldn't help feeling appalled. And also glad when she didn't apply to do an English degree.

That makes me sad, though I understand why. I think English degrees are great. But what the fuck this government (and recent governments) think they're doing with teaching of English, I do not understand.

I really, really hate spending time saying to bright, excited students 'look, you have been taught this, but now I have to ask you not to do it, and here's why'. It just makes me feel cruel. Ok, some of them love it and are delighted with the idea of questioning all their previous assumptions - and we're supposed to believe those are the students who really matter - but I hate seeing the ones who have worked so hard, feeling lost.

Dd is a second year English student at Cambridge. Her personal statement focused on her wider reading. I don't think breadth of reading is what they are looking for, more depth - something to show that the student has developed a specific interest of their own and delved deeper. Dd focused on Victorian realism and struck lucky in her interview as this was a specialism of one of her interviewers. I think she should mention her own writing in her personal statement but not spend too long on it as it is her reading and analytical skills which will be more relevant. I don't think dd has ever read a Booker prize winner! Good luck to your dd, op.

Perhaps the breadth of reading has some importance in the sense that you do have to read a lot, when doing a Cambridge Humanities degree. (So you have to read quickly, and also think deeply.) And find a way of connecting with authors who might leave you stone cold.

An awful lot of my university reading left me stone cold, in retrospect. I just wasn't old enough. Very little life experience. I am not sure why we inflict all this on the young, when they would benefit more - emotionally, intellectually - if they did it later..

Which is entirely beside the point.

Yes, ElinorRigby you are right. The pace of work is very fast and dd is quite a slow reader so good to build up that stamina.

My DD is a first year English student at Oxford and I'd second what MrsBartlet said about depth of reading being more important than breadth (although if you're interested in studying English you'll be reading a lot anyway).

Essay competitions are a good way of breaking free from the constraints of the syllabus too; DD entered a Cambridge competition and won second prize (although I'm not sure how impressed Oxford would have been by that!)

I'd also suggest that nearer the time she does as many ELAT past papers as she can as I think Cambridge are now using it in their selection process. It's also a good way of practising close reading as this will almost certainly form part of the interview process.

LRD/Elinor out of interest do you think the PreU is any better than A Level in preparation for undergrad?

Cross-posted! Yes, good point about breadth/speed being good preparation for the sheer amount of stuff they have to get through in a very short time!

cherry - I don't know enough about PreU, sorry. I couldn't swear to it I've had students who took it, though perhaps I have and have been unfairly attributing their issues to A Level or vice versa.

Thank you again everyone. DD isn't shy of looking away from the 'taught' critiques of literature and is confident enough in her own opinion to be true to herself when analysing text. I'm reading this as a good thing and not something to reign in!
We agree about the teaching of English in schools, (curriculum, NOT teachers) in fact, it's fair to say that the way English Language is taught is what has made DD decide so firmly to study Literature only. The Language curriculum seems to put a straight jacket on creativity.
DD has a piles of books in her room, all very varied (the Oxfam bookshop being a regular haunt), she will soon have a new pile and she will decide, as she always has, which take her interest.
This thread has been very useful in providing a smorgasbord of ideas that she will consider when creating her personal statement.
I'm glad the King's college reading list has been mentioned, I knew I'd seen one somewhere but couldn't find it when I started looking for DD.
I'm finding the difference between Comp Sci and English personal statements are, unsurprisingly, huge!

YY, absolutely a great thing not something to rein in.

It's funny how many people don't think that lit crit is a creative discipline. In a way of course it isn't, and you can't just be creative, but I think being a creative thinker is really important.

I think it's really unfair on students that there is this substantial difference between A Level and undergrad, which so many of them don't seem prepared for. And when I talk to teachers, they find it annoying too

Yes, yes, indeed.

Things for your DD to think past: the emphasis on the "right" answer. My undergrads are always on about this, and it drives me crazy. It comes from the ridiculousness of targets and league tables for schools at A Levels, and teachers teaching to the test. It cripples bright undergrads.

But I know that teachers are questioned and undermined if they don't get the results - or rather if their pupils don't get the "right" results. The crumbing of a world-class education system, unfortunately.

So your DD should be ready to entertain uncertainty, complexity, and blurred areas - grey areas of critical opinion, and to strike the words "right" or "correct" words out of her critical vocabulary. She should eschew the very typical A level exam/essay writing technique of collecting "quotes" THEY'RE QUOTATIONS from various critics and then patching them together into what they think is an essay. It's not.

Reading, and understanding that her point of view is important - "situating oneself" - in relation to the ways a text can be interpreted, and the ways it can make meaning.

Understanding that "point of view" is not subjective, but that objectivity is not possible; that an interpretation is valid if it is argued for, with valid, analytical, independent evidence, drawn from close reading and analysis of primary texts, combined with an understanding of context.

With Eagleton, she'll get a kind of soft Marxisim, which is very readable, and very engaged with the power of texts not just to represent the world from which they emerge, but also to construct and structure the reader's world-view. That is, fictions not just mirrors of their world, but active world-makers.

Peter Barry's book is a great text book, and cover a number of different theoretical approaches.

I really, really hate spending time saying to bright, excited students 'look, you have been taught this, but now I have to ask you not to do it, and here's why'

Yes, I have a couple of lectures where I have to start with "You need to put out of your mind what you were taught in this module in your A Level. It's mostly inaccurate and insufficient."

And I have students who tell me they've studied Bertolt Brecht, but are really amazed and surprised to do a bit of reading to come back & tell me "Gosh Prof. Off, he was a Communist!" Their school curriculum had managed to omit this fact ....

I remember hating helping my daughter with her A-level coursework.

It was all contrasting what Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Caryl Churchill 'said' about feminism. And what ee cummings was 'saying' about American politics.

There was nothing about genre. So I felt that my daughter hadn't been encouraged to think about the nature of dramatic and poetic form - how writers can play with it - the way a mood might be created within a novella or short story. She ended up with an A* - but I felt all she really learned was how to answer exam questions.

I'm glad those days are over. Fortunately it didn't destroy her enjoyment of reading. She went away on a long trip and took 'The Woman in White' with her, at my recommendation. And we ended up having a good conversation about it.

Well it may be simplistic but I did English at Oxford so I got in!

I read a lot of Jeanette winterson in preparation for my interview. I remember discussing the narrative perspective in Written on the Body, as the narrator is never defined as he or she and the interviewers asked me if I thought the narrator was male or female. I remember discussing how that was left deliberately ambiguous in order to challenge the reader etc. So maybe reading texts with differing/unusual narrative perspectives might be useful.

Yes, but IME people do not always get in for the reasons they think they got in.

(And, though it might seem a minor point, the OP's not talking about Oxford. She's talking about Cambridge, which has a very, very different degree and outlook from Oxford, in English Lit.)

Does it work like this?

1. You have to have good exam results.
2. There is an element of context. If you are from a privileged background have been to an independent school with small classes, the judgement about the goodness of those results will be slightly different than if you are from a deprived area have been to a struggling state school.
3. You have to read outside the exam syllabus, and have both enthusiasm and a good understanding of what you have read.
4. You have to have understood and followed the admissions procedures
5. If interviewed, you have a) to be able to back up what you have said about yourself in your application and b) to think on your feet. So it's helpful if you can talk as well as read, even if interviewers understand that some people are shy and will try to help them to overcome nerves.
6. The large number of good candidates mean that not everyone who can 'do' 1-5 will be offered a place. However anyone who can 'do' 1-5 is clearly an able person, who is going to get a lot of university life wherever they go.