Cambridge AS & A Level Literature in English 9695/22 is the May/June 2026 Paper 2 (Prose and Unseen), variant 2, an AS Level component. It lasts 2 hours, is worth 50 marks and you answer two questions: one on a prose set text from Section A and one unseen from Section B, 25 marks each. The set-text choice is between an (a) essay and a (b) passage for your novel or stories; the unseen choice, a poem or a drama extract, is open to everyone. This guide covers every option and explains the two grids the mark scheme uses. The paper and its mark scheme are free on the Tutopiya Learning Portal.

For an overview of all four 9695 papers from this series, see A Level Literature in English 9695 May/June 2026 past papers: what came up and how it was marked.

9695/22 at a glance

Rubric: answer two questions in total, one from Section A and one from Section B. All questions are worth equal marks.

Question	Text	Option	Focus	Marks
1	Desai: The Inheritance of Loss	(a) essay / (b) passage	Biju and his importance / the cook and his family (Chapter 2)	25
2	Stories of Ourselves, Volume 1	(a) essay / (b) passage	Realisation or discovery in two stories / Wallace’s schooldays in The Door in the Wall	25
3	Waugh: A Handful of Dust	(a) essay / (b) passage	Mrs Beaver and her role / Princess Abdul Akbar	25
4	Whitehead: The Underground Railroad	(a) essay / (b) passage	Cora as a symbol of hard-won freedom / Ridgeway’s past	25
5	Unseen poem: Daughter	Section B	Presentation of the daughter	25
6	Unseen drama extract	Section B	Presentation of the characters	25
	Total (one Section A and one Section B answer)			50

Question-by-question walkthrough

How every question is marked

The mark scheme gives no question-specific content. It uses two level grids, and the examiner must apply the right one: Table A for Section A (prose) and Table B for Section B (unseen).

• Same bands on both tables. Level 6 “perceptive and assured” (22–25), Level 5 “confident and thorough” (18–21), Level 4 “sound and competent” (14–17), Level 3 “straightforward and partial” (10–13), Level 2 “basic and limited” (6–9) and Level 1 “generalised and restricted” (1–5). The answer is placed by best fit, then given a mark within the level.
• Four equally weighted objectives. AO1 knowledge and understanding, AO2 analysis of how the writer’s choices shape meaning, AO3 informed personal response and AO4 a relevant, structured, supported argument.
• The one difference: context versus text type. In Table A, AO1 includes appreciation of context relevant to the question. In Table B, that strand becomes awareness of the text type (poetry, prose or drama), rising from basic, through clear and confident, to an “assured” awareness that informs the reading “perceptively” throughout.
• Narrative and paraphrase hold answers down. Level 3 allows occasional reliance on summary or paraphrase; Level 2 has “some reliance” on it. For an unseen, paraphrasing the poem line by line is the commonest form of this.
• Your own reading is credited. Examiners are told not to penalise you for leaving out a particular focus and to meet candidates on their chosen ground, provided it is relevant.

Section A: Prose

Question 1: The Inheritance of Loss (Kiran Desai)

• 1(a), Biju: discuss how Desai presents Biju and consider his importance in the novel. The second half of the task matters: say what his story contributes to the novel’s structure and concerns, not only what happens to him.
• 1(b), the cook and his family (Chapter 2): the passage opens with the policemen’s respect vanishing when they reach the cook’s hut, buried in nightshade, and ends with the cook telling everyone in the market about his son’s letter. Comment closely on how Desai presents the cook and his family, including the narrative voice and tone.

Question 2: Stories of Ourselves, Volume 1

• 2(a), realisation or discovery: a critical comment says the stories often focus on a character’s significant realisation or discovery. In its light, discuss how the writers of two stories present such moments. Choose stories where the moment is clearly shaped by the writing, and compare how each writer handles it.
• 2(b), The Door in the Wall (H G Wells): Wallace tells the narrator how, as a schoolboy, he let slip his secret about the enchanted garden to a boy called Hopkins. Bigger boys surround him, half teasing; one praises the story as the best lie he has heard, and Carnaby calls him a liar and twists his arm until he promises to lead them to the green door. He cannot find it, then or ever after, and cries himself to sleep, not for Carnaby but for the lost garden. He slacks for two terms until the narrator beating him in mathematics brings him back to work. The question is about Wallace’s schooldays: the first-person retelling to an old schoolfellow, the remembered names, the mix of flattery and shame, and the gap between the garden and school life all repay close comment.

Question 3: A Handful of Dust (Evelyn Waugh)

• 3(a), Mrs Beaver: discuss how Waugh characterises Mrs Beaver and the role she plays in the novel. Link her to the plot and to the novel’s satire rather than writing a character sketch.
• 3(b), Princess Abdul Akbar: a passage from Hard Cheese on Tony, Part 3, opening with the Princess being announced. It ends with her saying her life sometimes seems a frightful nightmare, among such lovely old English things and kind people, until she remembers her scars. Comment closely on how Waugh presents her, with attention to dialogue, tone and irony.

Question 4: The Underground Railroad (Colson Whitehead)

• 4(a), Cora: with a comment calling Cora the symbol of freedom, hard-won, in mind, discuss Whitehead’s characterisation of her. You can agree, qualify or push back, as long as the discussion stays on how she is characterised.
• 4(b), Ridgeway’s past: the passage begins with young Ridgeway watching his father work iron and moves towards his work on patrol. Comment closely on how Whitehead presents his past and what it suggests about the man he becomes.

Section B: Unseen

Question 5: Daughter (poem)

A fourteen-line poem in which a parent describes a daughter so quiet she hardly seems there. She speaks only at bedtime, to ask whether her brother is asleep. The parent plaits her hair into two “adder snakes” to guard her; by morning she has combed them into mermaid waves, her bed a rock in the sea and her legs a coiled fishtail, and when the parent tries to speak she dives and swims away. The task is the presentation of the daughter, through language, imagery and poetic methods. The shift from snakes to mermaid, the contrast with the untameable brother, the sea imagery and the ending’s movement away are all central. Table B rewards treating it as a poem: comment on its lineation, sound and form, not only its meaning.

Question 6: Drama extract

A man asks Mary Louise, who is drying her hair outdoors, whether she lives there, and then guesses that she is a writer, that she came to New York to write and that nothing has sold. She admits it and describes a love story whose hero refuses to make love to her heroine, however hard she tries to bring him to life. He suggests the heroine may be the problem; she defends her. Asked about home, she explains that she taught school and saved five hundred dollars, which other girls spend on Europe, to come to New York. The task is the presentation of the characters, through language, dialogue and dramatic methods. Look at the comedy of his guesses and her retorts, who controls the conversation, what her account of her stalled lovers might suggest on stage, and how an audience would read the pair.

Where the marks are on 9695/22

Part	What you write	Grid	Marks
Section A: Prose	One (a) essay or (b) passage answer on one prose text	Table A	25
Section B: Unseen	One answer on the poem or the drama extract	Table B	25
	Total		50

• Half the paper is unprepared. The unseen counts for as much as your set text, so practise close reading under time.
• Context is credited only in Section A. In Section B the same strand rewards awareness of the text type instead.
• Two essays quoted a comment. Questions 2(a) and 4(a) give you a view to work with; AO3 rewards an informed, independent response to it.

How to self-mark 9695/22 with the mark scheme

1. Use the right table. Table A for your prose answer, Table B for your unseen.
2. Place each answer in a level by best fit. Weigh all four objectives together, then decide whether it sits low, middle or high in the band.
3. For the prose answer, check the second half of the task. Did you consider Biju’s importance, Mrs Beaver’s role, or two stories rather than one?
4. For the unseen, test your text-type awareness. For the poem, count your comments on form, line and sound. For the drama extract, count your comments on dialogue, pacing and how the scene would play to an audience.
5. Mark paraphrase. Underline every sentence that restates the passage without analysis; more than an occasional one holds an answer at Level 3 or below.
6. Write one target. Note what would move each answer up one level, using the adjectives in the next level up.

Sit 9695/22 as a timed mock

The paper allows 2 hours for two equal answers.

Block	Marks	Time
Read both unseens and your set-text options; choose	–	8 minutes
Plan the prose answer	–	7 minutes
Write the prose answer	25	43 minutes
Annotate and plan the unseen	–	10 minutes
Write the unseen answer	25	43 minutes
Check both answers against the question’s key words	–	9 minutes

Other May/June 2026 9695 papers

• 9695 Paper 12 (Drama and Poetry)
• 9695 Paper 32 (Shakespeare and Drama)
• 9695 Paper 42 (Pre- and Post-1900 Poetry and Prose)

Practise and download

• Download 9695/22 and its mark scheme on the Learning Portal →
• All 9695 May/June 2026 papers: overview and marking patterns
• Try a free A Level Literature in English quiz

Need help with a 9695 topic? Book a free trial lesson with an A Level Literature in English tutor →

Frequently asked questions

What is the rubric for 9695 Paper 22 May/June 2026? +

Answer two questions: one prose set-text question from Section A and one unseen from Section B. Each is worth 25 marks, so the paper is out of 50 and lasts 2 hours.

Which prose texts were on 9695/22 in 2026? +

Kiran Desai's The Inheritance of Loss, Stories of Ourselves, Volume 1, Evelyn Waugh's A Handful of Dust and Colson Whitehead's The Underground Railroad. Each had an (a) essay and a (b) passage question.

What was the 9695/22 unseen in May/June 2026? +

You chose between Question 5, a short poem called Daughter in which a parent describes a quiet daughter through images of snakes, the sea and a fishtail, and Question 6, a drama extract in which a man correctly guesses that Mary Louise is a struggling writer in New York.

Is the unseen marked differently on 9695/22? +

Yes. The prose answer is marked on Table A and the unseen on Table B. Both have six levels out of 25, but Table B replaces context with awareness of the text type, so it rewards reading a poem as a poem and a drama extract as drama.

Which 9695/22 essays quoted a critical comment? +

Two. Question 2(a) asked you to discuss moments of realisation or discovery in two stories in the light of a comment, and Question 4(a) asked you to discuss Cora with a comment about her as a symbol of hard-won freedom in mind.

Where can I download 9695/22 May/June 2026 and its mark scheme? +

Both are free to download and print on the Tutopiya Learning Portal, on the Cambridge AS & A Level Literature in English 9695 past papers page.

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