Exemplar Q2 Question and A grade response

Q - Look in detail at this extract.
How does the writer use language here to describe the room? 
You could include the writer’s choice of: 
• words and phrases • language features and techniques • sentence forms

 Crooks’ bunk was a long box filled with straw, on which his blankets were flung. On the wall by the window there were pegs on which hung broken harness in process of being mended; strips of new leather; and under the window itself a little bench for leather-working tools, curved knives and needles and balls of linen thread, and a small hand riveter. On pegs were also pieces of harness, a split collar with the horsehair stuffing sticking out, a broken hame, and a trace chain with its leather covering split. Crooks had his apple box over his bunk, and in it a range of medicine bottles, both for himself and for the horses. There were cans of saddle soap and a drippy can of tar with its paint brush sticking over the edge. And scattered about the floor were a number of personal possessions; for, being alone, Crooks could leave his things about, and being a stable buck and a cripple, he was more permanent than the other men, and he had accumulated more possessions than he could carry on his back.

Answer:

The narrator demonstrates the lack of warmth and comfort in the room through the phrase “long box filled with straw”. Firstly the long box has connotations of a coffin and therefore death, thus suggesting that the room is devoid of humanity and life/warmth. Secondly by highlighting the noun “straw” this likens Crooks’ sleeping area to an animals sleeping quarter’s thus describing the room to be unfit for humans.

The narrator also uses repetition as references to animals are repeated throughout the extract, thus furthering the description of the room as unfit for humans and, furthermore inhumane (the ‘inhumane’ aspect of the room is also present in the bed being described in such a manner as to connote a coffin).

The narrator’s includes a long sentence which contains a list, and each item on the list contains an object that is broken or in need of repair, indeed the harness is specifically described as “broken”. This listing of problematic items furthers the description of the room as not being fit for purpose and appropriate or comfortable. The list being contained in a long sentence could suggest that the lack of warmth and comfort has been prolonged.