Coetzee, Shriver, Murakami

Crispin Maenpaa has been awarded a Commendation for his Transition Year Extended Essay (click here) on three very different novels with the common theme of Parenthood :

"The three books I chose for my extended essay are the disturbing and eye-opening novel We Need to Talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver, the award-winning novel Disgrace by J.M.Coetzee and the intriguing and surreal novel Kafka on the Shore, by Haruki Murakami. We Need to Talk about Kevin is about the dangerous distance that can exist between a mother and a daughter and it discusses the ultimate taboo - can a mother hate her son?"

Another extended essay

Another commendation this year for her Transition Year extended essay went to Rebecca Feeney-Barry for this piece on Suffering in literature, which analyses Jennifer Johnston's How Many Miles to Babylon, Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol and Iain M.Banks's Consider Phlebas.

Extended Essays

The Transition Year Extended Essay projects this term produced an impressive level of literary analysis. Click here for Joseph Millar's essay on war fiction, analysing Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front, Pat Barker's Regeneration, and Iain Lawrence's Lord of the Nutcracker Men. A second outstanding essay is by Celeste Guinness (here), on Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, Alan Paton's Cry the Beloved Country, and Anne Frank's Diary. Both Joseph's and Celeste's essays have received Commendations.