AQA GCSE English Literature · 3.1.2

Other 19th-century novels

Revision questions with answers for 3.1.2 Other 19th-century novels in AQA GCSE English Literature (spec 8702). Practise with flashcards, a topic quiz, a random quiz across the course, 5 crosswords, or read every question and answer below.

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Question 1
Great Expectations: who is Pip and how is the novel narrated?
Answer:
An orphan who grows up in the Kent marshes and tells his story as an older man. The first-person retrospective narrator can judge his younger self, so the novel reflects on guilt and snobbery.
Question 2
Great Expectations: what happens when Pip meets Magwitch on the marshes?
Answer:
The escaped convict threatens Pip and demands food and a file. Pip's fear and guilt, and his later kindness, shape the plot and his sense of right and wrong.
Question 3
Great Expectations: who is Miss Havisham and what does she represent?
Answer:
A rich woman jilted on her wedding day who stopped the clocks and still wears her wedding dress. She represents decay, bitterness and the destructive power of revenge.
Question 4
Great Expectations: why does Miss Havisham bring up Estella as she does?
Answer:
She trains Estella to break men's hearts as revenge for her own betrayal. It shows how bitterness can harm the next generation, and Estella is left unable to love.
Question 5
Great Expectations: how does Pip change when he receives 'great expectations'?
Answer:
He moves to London, becomes a snob and is ashamed of Joe and his humble background. His ambition to be a gentleman shows the corrupting effect of wealth and social class.
Question 6
Great Expectations: who is Pip's secret benefactor and why does it matter?
Answer:
Magwitch, the convict, not Miss Havisham as Pip assumed. The revelation challenges Pip's snobbery and forces him to question what makes a true gentleman.
Question 7
Great Expectations: how is Joe Gargery presented?
Answer:
As a kind, loyal, uneducated blacksmith who shows a deep moral goodness. He contrasts with the cold, false 'gentlemen' of London.
Question 8
Great Expectations: what is the importance of Satis House?
Answer:
Miss Havisham's decaying mansion is a symbol of the past, with stopped clocks and rotting wedding cake. The name 'Satis' means 'enough', which is ironic for a place of unsatisfied desire.
Question 9
Great Expectations: how does the novel end?
Answer:
In the published ending, Pip and Estella meet at the ruins of Satis House and he says 'I saw no shadow of another parting from her'. Dickens changed the original, bleaker ending on a friend's advice.
Question 10
Great Expectations: what are the key themes?
Answer:
Social class and ambition, guilt and conscience, love and rejection, and what it means to be a gentleman. Dickens argues that moral worth matters more than wealth.
Question 11
Jane Eyre: how is Jane's childhood at Gateshead presented?
Answer:
As cruel and lonely: she is bullied by her cousin John and punished by her aunt Mrs Reed, and locked in the red room. It shows the injustice of her status as a poor orphan.
Question 12
Jane Eyre: what is Lowood School like?
Answer:
A charity school run by Mr Brocklehurst, with cold, hunger and harsh punishments. Jane's friend Helen Burns dies there, and the school shows religious hypocrisy and the mistreatment of poor girls.
Question 13
Jane Eyre: who is Mr Rochester?
Answer:
The master of Thornfield Hall, moody, passionate and secretive. Jane is drawn to him because they speak as equals, but he hides his marriage to Bertha Mason.
Question 14
Jane Eyre: who is Bertha Mason and what does she represent?
Answer:
Rochester's first wife, who is locked in the attic after mental illness. She is a Gothic 'madwoman' and symbolises the repression of women's anger, and the novel's colonial background.
Question 15
Jane Eyre: why does Jane leave Thornfield?
Answer:
On her wedding day she learns Rochester is already married. She refuses to be his mistress and keeps her moral independence, despite her love for him.
Question 16
Jane Eyre: what is the role of St John Rivers?
Answer:
A cold, zealous clergyman who proposes that she marry him and become a missionary. He represents duty and religion without love, contrasting with Rochester's passion.
Question 17
Jane Eyre: what does 'I am no bird; and no net ensnares me' show?
Answer:
Jane tells Rochester she is a free human being with her own will. It sums up her independence and equality.
Question 18
Jane Eyre: how does the novel end?
Answer:
Thornfield has burned down, Bertha is dead, and Rochester is blind and maimed. Jane returns and says, 'Reader, I married him', as an independent woman with her own money.
Question 19
Jane Eyre: what are the key themes and techniques?
Answer:
Independence, class, gender, religion and love, told in the first person with direct address to the reader. Gothic settings, fire and ice imagery and symbolism add to the effect.
Question 20
Pride and Prejudice: what is the famous opening line and what is its effect?
Answer:
'It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.' It is ironic: it introduces the novel's focus on marriage and money and the comic voice of the narrator.
Question 21
Pride and Prejudice: why is marriage so important to the Bennet family?
Answer:
The Longbourn estate is entailed to Mr Collins, so the daughters will have little money after Mr Bennet's death. Marrying well is the best way for women to be secure.
Question 22
Pride and Prejudice: who is Mr Darcy and how is he first presented?
Answer:
A rich, proud landowner who appears haughty and insults Elizabeth at the ball. Society's first impressions of him are negative, but they turn out to be misleading.
Question 23
Pride and Prejudice: how is Elizabeth Bennet presented?
Answer:
As witty, intelligent and independent, with a strong sense of morality. Her flaw is prejudice: she misjudges Darcy and trusts Wickham.
Question 24
Pride and Prejudice: why does Elizabeth refuse Darcy's first proposal?
Answer:
She dislikes his pride and the insulting way he proposes, and she believes he has ruined Jane's happiness and wronged Wickham. It marks the point at which both begin to change.
Question 25
Pride and Prejudice: what is the role of Mr Wickham?
Answer:
A charming officer who lies to Elizabeth about Darcy, and later elopes with Lydia. He shows that appearances can deceive and that charm can hide a lack of character.
Question 26
Pride and Prejudice: what does Lydia's elopement show?
Answer:
Lydia's selfishness and the danger to a family's reputation, as scandal could ruin all the sisters. It also shows Darcy's generosity when he quietly helps to solve the problem.
Question 27
Pride and Prejudice: how does Austen use irony and satire?
Answer:
She mocks snobbery, foolish characters such as Mr Collins and Mrs Bennet, and social expectations about marriage. The narrator's tone invites the reader to laugh and to judge.
Question 28
Pride and Prejudice: what are the key themes?
Answer:
Pride and prejudice, marriage and money, class and reputation, and love versus social expectation. Austen shows how characters must overcome their flaws to find happiness.
Question 29
Frankenstein: who is Robert Walton and why does Shelley use a frame narrative?
Answer:
An Arctic explorer who writes letters to his sister and records Victor's story. The nested narratives (Walton, Victor, the creature) create layers of perspective and a sense of truth and warning.
Question 30
Frankenstein: why does Victor create the creature?
Answer:
He is driven by ambition and curiosity to discover the secret of life. Once he succeeds, he is horrified and abandons it, which shows his failure of responsibility.
Question 31
Frankenstein: how does the creature learn about the world?
Answer:
By secretly watching the De Lacey family and reading books such as Paradise Lost. He becomes eloquent and sensitive, which shows he is made monstrous by rejection, not by nature.
Question 32
Frankenstein: why does the creature turn to violence?
Answer:
He is rejected by everyone, including his creator, and becomes bitter and vengeful. He kills William, causes Justine's death and, later, kills Elizabeth and Clerval.
Question 33
Frankenstein: what does the creature demand from Victor?
Answer:
A female companion who will share his loneliness. Victor first agrees, then destroys the half-finished female because he fears the consequences.
Question 34
Frankenstein: what is the Romantic context of the novel?
Answer:
Romanticism valued nature, emotion and the sublime, and warned of the dangers of unchecked reason and science. The novel shows nature as powerful and consoling, and condemns Victor's unnatural creation.
Question 35
Frankenstein: what is the subtitle and why is it significant?
Answer:
'The Modern Prometheus'. Prometheus stole fire from the gods and was punished, so Victor is a figure who defies natural limits and suffers for it.
Question 36
Frankenstein: how does the novel end?
Answer:
Victor dies on Walton's ship after chasing the creature, and the creature tells Walton he will end his life in the Arctic. It leaves the reader with sympathy for both and an unresolved moral question.
Question 37
Frankenstein: what are the key themes?
Answer:
Ambition and the dangers of science, responsibility, isolation and rejection, nature versus nurture and the Gothic. Shelley asks who the true monster is.
Question 38
Frankenstein: how did Mary Shelley come to write the novel?
Answer:
In 1816, at Lake Geneva, she took part in a ghost-story challenge with Percy Shelley and Lord Byron, and developed the idea after a waking dream. It was published anonymously in 1818.
Question 39
The Sign of Four: who are Holmes and Watson?
Answer:
Holmes is the brilliant consulting detective who uses deduction. Watson is his friend and the narrator, who admires Holmes and falls in love with Mary Morstan.
Question 40
The Sign of Four: what is the case Mary Morstan brings to Holmes?
Answer:
Her father disappeared years ago and she now receives a pearl each year and a letter inviting her to meet a stranger. It leads to Thaddeus Sholto and the story of the Agra treasure.
Question 41
The Sign of Four: what is the Agra treasure?
Answer:
A hoard of jewels hidden during the Indian Rebellion of 1857. It leads to a pact between four men (the 'sign of four') and to the crimes that drive the plot.
Question 42
The Sign of Four: who is Jonathan Small?
Answer:
The one-legged villain who was one of the four, imprisoned in the Andaman Islands, and returns for the treasure. He tells his story at the end and is presented as a morally complex figure.
Question 43
The Sign of Four: who is Tonga?
Answer:
Small's Andaman Islander companion, who uses poisoned darts. He is presented through Victorian racial stereotypes, which shows imperial attitudes.
Question 44
The Sign of Four: how does Doyle present Holmes's method?
Answer:
Holmes explains that observation and logic can solve the case: 'When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth'. This shows the Victorian belief in science and reason.
Question 45
The Sign of Four: how does the novel present Holmes's drug use?
Answer:
It begins with Holmes injecting cocaine to escape boredom, which Watson disapproves of. It shows Holmes's addictive, restless side and tension between reason and appetite.
Question 46
The Sign of Four: what is the role of Athelney Jones?
Answer:
A Scotland Yard detective who is confident but wrong, and arrests the wrong people. He contrasts with Holmes's skill and shows the weakness of official policing.
Question 47
The Sign of Four: how is the British Empire presented?
Answer:
The story involves the Indian Rebellion, Andaman prisoners and stolen treasure, which shows Britain's imperial reach and anxieties. It also hints at guilt over how the Empire was gained.
Question 48
The Sign of Four: how does the novel end?
Answer:
Small throws the treasure into the Thames, and Watson proposes to Mary, while Holmes returns to his cocaine. The ending mixes romance with Holmes's solitude.
Question 49
Jane Eyre: how does Brontë use fire and ice imagery?
Answer:
Fire stands for passion, anger and danger (Rochester, Bertha, the burning of Thornfield), while cold and ice suggest harshness and emotional deprivation (Gateshead, Lowood, St John). Jane has to find a balance between the two.
Question 50
Pride and Prejudice: how do Elizabeth and Darcy change?
Answer:
Darcy learns humility and treats others with more respect, while Elizabeth learns to question her first impressions. Both overcome their flaws, which makes their marriage a match of equals.

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Other 19th-century novels

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