Compare two texts with different genres
Key notes:-
📚 Authors sometimes revisit or reinterpret the same topics, themes and stories as other authors.
📚 The way that authors present ideas often depends on the genre, or text type, they use. Some genres may help to inform, explain or persuade readers. Other genres may help to entertain readers or show a more personal perspective. Reading texts with different genres can help readers understand different perspectives or gain a more in-depth understanding of a topic.
📚 When you compare texts about the same topic, think about how authors in different genres build on, challenge or reveal new viewpoints about that topic.
Learn with an example
📖 Read the following text from a myth. This excerpt is about warriors’ afterlife in Valhalla.
To arrive in Valhalla, the fallen warriors had to cross a large, noisy river. Once there, Odin welcomed them heartily. He had straw strewn on the benches in the hall to make them comfortable; he had all the goblets polished. . . .
And what a fine routine met these warriors there in Valhalla. Every night they feasted on overflowing platters of pork from the beast Saehrimnir, roasted in the cauldron Eldhrimnir by the soot-covered cook Andhrimnir. . . . Every day they battled together, and those who fell in these heavenly battles simply rose again at the end of the day and marched through the 540 doors of the hall to join the feast anew, since everything regenerated of its own accord.
From Donna Jo Napoli, Treasury of Norse Mythology: Stories of Intrigue, Trickery, Love, and Revenge. Copyright 2015 by Donna Jo Napoli
📖 Based on this excerpt, what can you conclude about warriors’ afterlife in Valhalla?
- Valhalla was a warrior’s paradise.
- Warriors feared crossing the river to Valhalla.
- Based on this myth, you can conclude that Valhalla was a warrior’s paradise. The text in bold below helps support this idea.
- To arrive in Valhalla, the fallen warriors had to cross a large, noisy river. Once there, Odin welcomed them heartily. He had straw strewn on the benches in the hall to make them comfortable; he had all the goblets polished. . . .
- And what a fine routine met these warriors there in Valhalla. Every night they feasted on overflowing platters of pork from the beast Saehrimnir, roasted in the cauldron Eldhrimnir by the soot-covered cook Andhrimnir. . . . Every day they battled together, and those who fell in these heavenly battles simply rose again at the end of the day and marched through the 540 doors of the hall to join the feast anew, since everything regenerated of its own accord.
📖 Read the following text from a memoir. This excerpt is about Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s 1931 flight to China.
As I walked out of the building two women ran up to me.
‘Oh, Mrs Lindbergh,’ said one, ‘the women of America are so anxious to know about your clothes.’
‘And I’, said the other, ‘want to write a little article about your housekeeping in the ship. Where do you put the lunch boxes?’
I felt depressed, as I generally do when women reporters ask me conventionally feminine questions. I feel as they must feel when they are given those questions to ask. I feel slightly insulted. Over in the corner my husband is being asked vital masculine questions, clean-cut steely technicalities or broad abstractions. But I am asked about clothes and lunch boxes.
From Anne Morrow Lindbergh, North to the Orient. Copyright 1935 by Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Based on this excerpt, what can you conclude about Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s 1931 flight to China?
- Lindbergh was disappointed in the questions reporters asked her.
- Lindbergh was unable to answer the questions reporters asked her.
- Based on this memoir, you can conclude that Lindbergh was disappointed in the questions reporters asked her. The text in bold below helps support this idea.
- As I walked out of the building two women ran up to me.
- ‘Oh, Mrs Lindbergh,’ said one, ‘the women of America are so anxious to know about your clothes.’
- ‘And I’, said the other, ‘want to write a little article about your housekeeping in the ship. Where do you put the lunch boxes?’
- I felt depressed, as I generally do when women reporters ask me conventionally feminine questions. I feel as they must feel when they are given those questions to ask. I feel slightly insulted. Over in the corner my husband is being asked vital masculine questions, clean-cut steely technicalities or broad abstractions. But I am asked about clothes and lunch boxes.
Let’s practice!
Read the following text from a fairy tale. This excerpt is about Pinocchio.
‘I think I’ll call him Pinocchio.’
After choosing the name for his marionette, Geppetto set seriously to work. Fancy his surprise when he noticed that these eyes moved and then stared fixedly at him. Geppetto, seeing this, felt insulted and said in a grieved tone, ‘Ugly wooden eyes, why do you stare so?’
There was no answer.
After the eyes, Geppetto made the nose, which began to stretch. Poor Geppetto kept cutting it and cutting it, but the more he cut, the longer grew that impertinent nose. In despair he let it alone.
Next he made the mouth. No sooner was it finished than it began to laugh and poke fun at him.
‘Stop laughing!’ said Geppetto angrily, but he might as well have spoken to the wall.
Adapted from Carlo Collodi, The Adventures of Pinocchio. Trans. Carol Della Chiesa