Literary Analysis: Corruption and Courage in Vice and Virtue

Beyond getting the words right

Translating the set text accurately is one half of this component. The other half asks a different question: **why did the author write it that way?** That is not a vaguer question, it is a more precise one. It expects you to **name a technique**, say **what it does to the reader**, and connect that to **what the author was trying to achieve**. ⚠️ **The Latin printed in this module is illustration, not your set text.** The prescribed passages rotate every two years and are in your own printed edition. The short examples here are built from vocabulary you have already met, to show a technique clearly. **Work from your own text for the real thing.** One idea makes the whole technique list make sense, and it is on the fifth card: Cicero is **arguing**, and Livy is **commemorating**.

The techniques by name

Learn these as names you can use, not as a list to recite. Each one is a thing an author does on purpose.

Match each technique to what it does

Name the technique

An illustration built from words you know: **venit, invenit, portavit** - "he came, he found, he carried". Which two techniques are at work here?

• Tricolon and asyndeton: three parallel verbs, with the connecting words left out
• Anaphora, because words are repeated
• Historic present, because the action feels immediate
• None; it is just three verbs

Arguing and commemorating

The two set authors want different things from you, and every technique follows from that. This is the card to remember.

Find the technique

An English rendering of a passage in Cicero's manner. Tap the TWO places where he is doing something to the jury rather than simply reporting.

• A fleet was provided at the expense of the cities of Sicily.
• And who was placed in command of it? Whom did our governor choose?
• The ships lay empty in the harbour while the money went elsewhere.
• A governor is sent to protect a province; this one sold its defence
• . The Sicilians had paid for their own defencelessness.

How Cicero builds Verres

Select the TWO things Cicero does to blacken Verres that a strong answer would name.

• He measures Verres against what a Roman governor is supposed to be, so the jury judges him by a standard they already accept
• He makes the appointment of Cleomenes an outrage in itself, before any consequence is described, because an unqualified associate was given a Roman fleet
• He presents the evidence neutrally and leaves the jury to decide
• He praises Verres's administrative ability before criticising it

Technique, effect, purpose

Most lost marks on this component come from stopping too early. An analysis point has **three parts**, and the third is the one people leave out. 1. **Technique**: name it, and quote the Latin it applies to 2. **Effect**: say what it does to the reader or listener 3. **Purpose**: say why the author wanted that effect HERE ❌ "Cicero uses a tricolon, which makes it more effective." That is part one and half of part two, and it says nothing. ✅ "The tricolon closes the sentence off as though nothing more can be said, which suits a prosecutor who wants the jury to feel the case is already decided." **The third part is where the marks are**, and it is also the part that needs you to know whether the author is arguing or commemorating.

Build an analysis sentence

Assemble a point with all three parts: technique, effect, and why the author wanted it here.

Style in a paragraph

Three parallel items in a row form a _____, and leaving out the connecting words between them is _____. Repeating the same word at the start of successive phrases is _____. A question put to an audience who are meant to answer it silently is a _____ question. Telling a past event in the present tense is the _____, and Livy reaches for it at the moments he wants the reader to experience rather than merely learn about.

A worked analysis

**"How does Livy make the reader admire Scaevola and Cloelia? (10 marks)"** "Livy builds both figures by controlling **what the reader experiences and when**. Ordinary action is compressed into participles and ablative absolutes, which moves the narrative quickly to the moment that matters; at that moment he shifts into the historic present, so the confrontation appears to happen as we read rather than being reported to us. **He then lets the characters speak.** Direct speech is held back for the climax, so when Scaevola finally declares himself the words land as a decision rather than as narration. A reader who has been given the scene in the present tense hears it spoken. **The onlooker supplies the verdict.** Livy does not tell us that Scaevola is brave; he shows Porsenna's reaction, and we take our judgement from an enemy who has no reason to flatter him. The same move works for Cloelia, whom Porsenna honours after her escape. It is worth noticing that Livy gives Cloelia a courage narrative of a kind usually reserved for men, and has the enemy king recognise it. That is a deliberate construction, and it makes her an exemplum in the same way Scaevola is. **All of this follows from what Livy is for.** He is writing history as a set of models to imitate, so his techniques are the ones that produce admiration rather than agreement." **Notice: every point names a technique, says what it does, and ties it to Livy's purpose.** None of them stops at "this is effective".

Plan a literature answer

Put these planning steps in the order that produces an answer like the one you have just read.

• Decide first what the author is trying to achieve: a verdict, or admiration
• Go through the passage marking every technique you can name
• Keep only the ones you can connect to that purpose, and drop the rest
• For each one you keep, note the Latin you will quote, keeping it short
• Write each point as technique, then effect, then why the author wanted it here

An analysis question

The paper asks how Cicero makes his audience dislike Verres. Work through how to answer.

• You spot six techniques in the passage. Do you write about all six?
• You write "Cicero uses emotive language, which is very effective." What is missing?
• You want to quote. How much Latin do you take?

Your turn: analyse your text

Take a short passage from your own printed set text and analyse how the author achieves his effect.

• Say whether the author is arguing or commemorating, and how you can tell
• Name two techniques in the passage and quote the Latin each applies to, keeping every quotation short
• For each one, say what it does to the reader or listener
• For each one, connect that effect to what the author was trying to achieve in this passage