Hi,
The following tasks are due on Monday, October 3rd.
Good luck!
Read the descriptions below. They describe
two parts of hotel: the lobby and the ballroom.
They made
their way across the room and emerged into a lobby. There was a grandiose
staircase that swept down from a mezzanine level, a fountain that would have
been spectacular had it not dried up years before, couches and coffee tables,
artwork on the walls, rugs on the floor, and a reception desk. It was a tired
homage to the glitz and glamour of a long since forgotten era.
They wound
their way through the cookers and countertops, and came out into a spectacular
ballroom. It was furnished with round tables and chairs with velvet-covered
cushions, and from the ceiling hung an impressive chandelier. Each one of the
tables was fully laid, but covered in dust, and there were cobwebs in the
corners of the room, as if the scene had been frozen in time for many years. The
room was a corpse, decaying and dead, but the person it was once was still just
about visible.
1. Now go back through the two descriptions,
underline all the adjectives you can find, then write them down in a list. The
first adjective you will find is ‘grandiose’.
2. Have a look at the following exam-style
question:
How
does the writer create a sense that the location was once magnificent, but is now neglected and run-down?
You are going to answer this question by
referring to the second description, but, before you do, read the following
answer, which is based on the first:
The
writer sets up a comparison between what the lobby used to look like and what
it looks like now by using powerful adjectives such as ‘grandiose’ and
‘spectacular’ to describe its former glory, and describes how the staircase
‘swept’ down, almost as if it was moving, which is a form of personification. He
then goes on to describe the fountain as ‘dried up’ and the whole scene as a
‘tired homage to the glitz and glamour of a long forgotten era’. This puts an
image in our mind of people in expensive clothes looking very elegant in their
opulent surroundings, but makes it quite clear that this picture no longer
applies, which is actually quite tragic. He also uses alliteration in ‘couches
and coffee tables’ to make the writing more rhythmic.
Notice how the answer mentions the use of
adjectives before going on to refer to other details, such as personification
and alliteration.
Now write your answer to the question based
on the second extract.
2. Write two new descriptions of the two
locations in your own words. Each description should be around the same length
as the two provided (around seventy words).
