GCSE English LanguageWriting
30 questions on descriptive and narrative writing. Pick your answer, then tap to see if you were right and why. Every question comes from the Show Working English Language bank, and every line quoted from a book is checked word for word against a public-domain copy.
Descriptive and narrative writing is the creative task: a description, a story or a true account. These questions cover the craft behind it, such as narrative voice, tense, showing rather than telling, symbols and shaping a single moment.
01 / Quiz yourselfTry it, then tap to check
Choose your answer before you open it. Then read why, so it sticks.
01 / Descriptive and narrative writingOur own example
Her hands shook as she opened the letter.
Answer: D She is nervous
The writer never says “she was nervous”. Shaking hands let the reader work out the feeling, which is what “show, don’t tell” means.
02 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: B He slammed the door so hard the glass rattled.
Only the slammed door shows anger through an action. The others simply name the feeling. Showing gives the reader a picture and lets them infer the emotion.
03 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“Over the wide expanse there was no sound and no movement.”
Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles
Answer: D Hearing and sight
“No sound” is about hearing and “no movement” is about what can be seen. Describing an absence of sound and motion makes the place feel empty and eerie.
04 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“The air was motionless, but when you opened your mouth there was just a faint chill, like a chill from a glass of iced water before you sip”
Katherine Mansfield, The Garden Party, and Other Stories
Answer: D The slight coldness of the air
The writer compares the air to the chill of iced water. Linking a description to a sensation we all know helps the reader feel the coldness for themselves.
05 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“Windless, warm, the sky without a cloud.”
Katherine Mansfield, The Garden Party, and Other Stories
Answer: C To give quick, vivid snapshots
A sentence without a main verb can list details like quick snapshots. In description it builds a picture fast, here a perfect, still summer day.
06 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“A fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg.”
Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
Answer: C He has escaped from prison
An iron fixed to the leg was used to chain prisoners. One well-chosen detail of appearance tells the reader who this man is without stating it.
07 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“Please, sir, I want some more.”
Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist
Answer: B He is hungry but polite
“Please” and “sir” are polite, and asking for more food shows hunger. Speech can reveal character quickly, so writers choose every word carefully.
08 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“My dear Mr. Bennet,” said his lady to him one day, “have you heard that Netherfield Park is let at last?”
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
Answer: C To break up the speech and show who speaks
Putting who is speaking partway through a line of speech tells us who is talking and gives the speech a natural rhythm. Each part of the speech sits inside its own speech marks.
09 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“I was born in Tuckahoe, near Hillsborough, and about twelve miles from Easton, in Talbot county, Maryland.”
Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
Answer: A First person
“I was born” shows the writer is telling his own story, so this is the first person. It makes the account feel personal and direct.
10 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“On an evening in the latter part of May a middle-aged man was walking homeward from Shaston to the village of Marlott”
Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d’Urbervilles
Answer: C Third person
The narrator describes “a middle-aged man” from the outside rather than saying “I”. This is third person narration, which lets the narrator move between characters.
11 / Descriptive and narrative writingOur own example
You push open the door and the cold hits you.
Answer: B Second person
“You” puts the reader inside the story as the character. Second person is rare but can make a description feel immediate and unsettling.
12 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“One fibre in the wicker arm-chair creaks, though no one sits there.”
Virginia Woolf, Jacob’s Room
Answer: B Present tense
“Creaks” and “sits” are present tense verbs. The present tense puts the reader in the moment, as if they are standing in the empty room.
13 / Descriptive and narrative writingOur own example
The house was silent. Then the phone rang.
Answer: A To make a sudden moment stand out
A short sentence after a pause hits hard, like the phone breaking the silence. Varying sentence length lets a writer control pace and create impact.
14 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: A Vary the sentence openings
Starting each sentence the same way becomes dull. Opening some with a description, a sound or an adverb, for example, keeps the writing lively.
15 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: D staggered
“Staggered” tells us how he moved: unsteadily, as if exhausted or hurt. A precise verb does the work of several weaker words.
16 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: B as cold as ice
A cliché is a phrase used so often it has lost its impact. “As cold as ice” is worn out; fresh, specific details make a description feel original.
17 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: A A symbol
A symbol is an object that stands for something bigger. The dying plant mirrors the dying marriage, so the writer can suggest it without saying it.
18 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: A A motif
A motif is an image or idea that keeps coming back. A ticking clock might remind the reader that time is running out.
19 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“The night had a sinister aspect.”
Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd
Answer: C pathetic fallacy
Giving the night a threatening, “sinister” look makes the setting reflect danger. Using weather and setting to match or hint at the mood is pathetic fallacy.
20 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“the storm came rattling over the Heights in full fury.”
Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
Answer: C rattling
“Rattling” imitates the noise the storm makes. Sound words help the reader hear a scene, not just see it.
21 / Descriptive and narrative writing
The right order:
The exposition introduces characters and setting, rising action builds tension, the climax is the turning point, falling action deals with the results, and the resolution ties things up.
22 / Descriptive and narrative writing
The right order:
Moving from wide to close, like a camera zooming in, gives a description a clear shape and leads the reader to the detail that matters.
23 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“Keep still, you little devil, or I’ll cut your throat!”
Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
Answer: C He is desperate and threatening
A threat shouted at a child shows a violent, desperate man. Writers reveal character through what people say as well as what they do.
24 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: B an unreliable narrator
An unreliable narrator may lie, misunderstand or leave things out. The reader has to read between the lines to work out what really happened.
25 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: A Years later, she watches another train leave
A cyclical ending returns to the opening image. Seeing a train leave again lets the reader compare the two moments and notice what has changed.
26 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: A Burnt toast and wet dog filled the hallway.
Burnt toast and wet dog are smells. Good description uses more than sight: sounds, smells, tastes and textures make a place feel real.
27 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“her eyes fixed, and tears slowly filled them.”
Virginia Woolf, Jacob’s Room
Answer: D Through her body’s reaction
We are never told she is sad: we see her eyes fix and fill with tears. Showing a physical reaction lets the reader feel the emotion with her.
28 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“the long, low curve of the melancholy moor.”
Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles
Answer: D Sad and gloomy
“Melancholy” means deeply sad. Giving a landscape a human feeling sets the mood of the whole scene, here a lonely, gloomy one.
29 / Descriptive and narrative writingA line from a book
“A hound it was, an enormous coal-black hound, but not such a hound as mortal eyes have ever seen.”
Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles
Answer: A To keep the terrifying creature in focus
Each repetition adds something more frightening, ending with a hound no “mortal eyes” have seen. Repetition builds the horror step by step.
30 / Descriptive and narrative writing
Answer: B Rain hammered the tin roof all night.
The strongest opening drops the reader into the scene with a precise verb and a sound. Announcing what the story is about wastes the first line.
02 / Where marks slipOne thing to watch
Squeezing a whole plot into the time. One episode, written in detail, does better than a rushed story.
03 / In the appComing to Show Working
In the app, Descriptive and narrative writing gives you ten questions at a time, picked from all 35, with the reason after every answer. English Language is built, but it isn’t on phones yet: it will arrive in an update.
Coming soon to the App StoreOur own questions, written for every board. Lines from books are from authors who died long enough ago that their words are free to quote. Show Working is independent and not affiliated with any exam board.
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