Actual 2026 AQA A-level ENGLISH LITERATURE B 7717/1A Paper 1A Question Paper + Mark Scheme

Actual 2026 AQA A-level ENGLISH LITERATURE B 7717/1A Paper 1A Question Paper + Mark Scheme

Section A
Answer one question in this section.
Either
0 1 Othello – William Shakespeare
Read the extract below and then answer the question.
Explore the significance of this extract in relation to the tragedy of the play as a whole.
Remember to include in your answer relevant analysis of Shakespeare’s dramatic
methods.
[25 marks]
DESDEMONA
’Tis meet I should be used so, very meet.
How have I been behaved, that he might stick
The smallest opinion on my least misuse?
Enter Emilia and Iago
IAGO
What is your pleasure, madam? How is’t with you?
DESDEMONA
I cannot tell: those that do teach young babes
Do it with gentle means and easy tasks:
He might have chid me so, for, in good faith,
I am a child to chiding.
IAGO What is the matter, lady?
EMILIA
Alas, Iago, my lord hath so bewhored her,
Thrown such despite and heavy terms upon her
As true heart cannot bear.
DESDEMONA
Am I that name, Iago?
IAGO What name, fair lady?
DESDEMONA
Such as she said my lord did say I was.
EMILIA
He called her whore: a beggar in his drink
Could not have laid such terms upon his callet.
IAGO
Why did he so?
DESDEMONA
I do not know: I am sure I am none such.
IAGO
Do not weep, do not weep. Alas the day!
EMILIA
Hath she forsook so many noble matches,
Her father, and her country, all her friends,
To be called whore? Would it not make one weep?