Just curious does anyone know if writing fairly short essays can achieve 9-10 marks, considering that they tick off most of the criteria, i.e. in section A, the essay remains solely focused and unpacks all elements of the prompt, writes fluently and expressively with great use of evidence, and continually explores how the text was constructed in relationship to the prompt so that the text composer can put forth their ideas and values?
Thanks in advance
I suppose as many people have pointed out, it depends on how short you mean by short.
The problem with short essays are:
1) there's no way to "unpack all elements" in a short essay of anything less than 800 words; what differentiates a 9/10 are very small nuances that lie at the 'fringes' of the topic that you are being given. 9/10 essays don't just answer the question, they try to make additional connections to the topic by discussing things like historical context, author motivations, beliefs, messages, motifs, symbolism, imagery, narrative structure and a whole host of other literary techniques which students at a 6/7/8 are not able to confidently engage in.
2) Ultimately, your examiner's perception of the quality of your essay will inevitably, to some degree, be framed in reference to other essays they've corrected. What this means is that a student that writes 18 pages worth of good writing during the exam will receive a higher score than a student who writes 9 pages worth of writing of an equivalent standard to the student mentioned above.
3) There seems to be a moderate correlation between the length of an essay and the score that the student receives. I don't think that is because 'long' essays are better, but it's more of a recognition that a student who knows their texts inside out, will be likely to receive a better score, and it just so happens that these types of students who are familiar with their texts choose to write long essays to capture everything they want to cover in relation to the assigned topic.
However, in saying this, it's not always about quantity. Unless you can write long essays that are very good and have done so under timed conditions before, you shouldn't attempt to write a lot on exam day just for the sake of it. Remember that all of your essays in each section are worth the same amount of marks. If you write too much and run out of time, you rob yourself of the chance of gaining easy marks that could have been gained had you managed to complete all three essays.