What the exam asks
In Paper 2 (25 marks, closed book), you answer one of four general literary questions by comparing and/or contrasting Purple Hibiscus with another literary work studied in the course. Criterion B1 (5 marks) rewards how deeply you analyse and evaluate Adichie’s authorial choices—not plot summary or historical context—while Criterion B2 (5 marks) rewards how far your comparison sharpens our reading of both works. Detailed, accurate references to parts and scenes earn top marks in Criterion A (5 marks); memorised quotations are not required.
In the individual oral (40 marks), you examine how a transnational global issue is presented in one extract of up to 40 lines from Purple Hibiscus and in the wider novel, alongside a non-literary body of work.
Core ideas
Matching the novel to Paper 2 question types
Every Paper 2 question asks how two works present or use a literary feature. Always anchor your answer in Adichie’s broader authorial choices (Criterion B1):
| General Paper 2 question type | Scenes and details to reference | Core authorial choice (Criterion B1) |
|---|---|---|
| A parent and a child | Papa with Jaja and Kambili (the “love sip”, the boiling water on her feet, the missal thrown on Palm Sunday); Papa and Papa-Nnukwu; Aunty Ifeoma and Amaka | The written schedule as a text within the text; the two contrasting houses; a violent father seen exclusively through a daughter who worships him |
| A character changed by events | Kambili moving from silence to speech and song across the two Nsukka visits; Jaja moving from silence to defiance and prison | Retrospective first-person narration combined with the flash-forward opening in Part 1 that shows the rupture before its causes |
| Speaking out / what is left unsaid | Jaja’s refusal on Palm Sunday; Kambili’s first raised voice at Nsukka and her bodily defence of Papa-Nnukwu’s painting; her stutter and euphemisms for beatings | Structural delay (making the reader wait for speech); clipped syntax, ellipses and a narrator who records physical trauma without naming it as abuse |
| Power held and resisted / justice | Papa’s household rules versus his pro-democracy newspaper, the Standard; Ade Coker’s assassination; the bribed guards in Jaja’s prison in Part 4 | Dramatic irony: Papa’s two contradictory faces presented through what young Kambili observes but never explicitly judges |
| Place, or a shift in time / place | The high-walled Enugu compound versus the cramped, noisy Nsukka flat and garden; the country home in Abba; the four-part time shift | Spatial juxtaposition (two houses as the novel’s structural spine) and non-linear framing (Part 1 in medias res, Part 2 flashback, Part 4 present) |
| The title, or a recurring motif | The purple hibiscus in Aunty Ifeoma’s garden brought to Enugu by Jaja; Mama’s ceramic ballet-dancer figurines; the missal; the rain and harmattan | Symbolic evolution: objects that shift meaning as the household fractures, complicating what the title initially promises |