Coming of age

• Themes in coming-of-age stories


  • Coming of age
  • Teenagers finding their identity
  • Discovering purpose in life
  • Accepting oneself and others
  • Life-changing moments
  • Confronting fears
  • Taking responsibility for actions
  • Coming to terms with the unfairness of the world
• Bildungsroman


  Novel focusing on the character's personal development and moral education
• Accepting others and forgiveness

  Facing fears and complex relationships

  Standing up for oneself and dealing with injustice

  Moving away as a life-changing moment

  Realizing gender expectations and gaining independence

  Dealing with cultural conflict and finding identity

  • Themes: life and death, community, identity, coming of age, family, good and evil
• Coming of age


  The development from child to adult that everybody, young or old, experiences
• Coming of age theme


  • How a teenager finds their own identity
• Aspects of coming of age in the literature studied

  • Characters discovering their purpose in life
  • Learning to accept themselves and others
  • Experiencing life-changing moments
  • Confronting their fears
  • Taking responsibility for their actions
  • Coming to terms with the unfair nature of the world
• Bildungsroman

  A novel that deals with the formative years of the main character, and in particular, with the character's personal development and moral education
• Gothic fiction


  A popular 19th century genre that explored the darker side of human nature and the theme of the supernatural
• Gothic fiction conventions


  • Strange places
  • Scientific Progression
  • Doppelganger (someone's double)
  • The Uncanny (something strangely familiar)
  • Characters in moral or ethical turmoil (huge confusion/doubt)
• Influential gothic writers


  • Mary Shelley
  • Bram Stoker
  • Edgar Allan Poe
  • The Bronte Sisters
• Concrete noun


  A noun we can see, hear, touch, smell or taste e.g. table
• Abstract noun


  A noun which we cannot experience with any of the 5 senses e.g. happiness, tension
• Proper noun


  A noun which is the name or title of something and is capitalised e.g. Bolton, Turton School
• Collective noun


  A singular word used to group together a plural e.g. a group, a herd, a class
• Dynamic verb


  A verb that we can see/hear being completed – a deliberate action e.g. I kick, I speak
• Stative verb


  A verb that we cannot see being completed e.g. I think, I believe
• Imperative verb


  A commanding verb e.g. Do this work, sit down, let's go
• Modal verb


  A verb expressing possibility or probability e.g. will, should, could, can, must
• Subject


  The part of a sentence or clause that does the action
• Past tense


  Used to describe things that have already happened and usually have an -ed ending e.g. I walked to school yesterday
• Present tense


  Used to describe things that are happening now
• Future tense


  Describes things that have yet to happen and usually uses 'will' e.g. I will go tomorrow
• Neil Gaiman is a modern writer who is influenced by gothic authors including Mary Shelley and Edgar Allan Poe
• The Graveyard Book


  • A coming of age story of Nobody 'Bod' Owens who is adopted and raised by the supernatural occupants of a graveyard after his family is brutally murdered
• Themes in The Graveyard Book


  • Life and Death
  • Community
  • Identity
  • Coming of Age
  • Family
  • Good and Evil
• Characters in The Graveyard Book


  • Nobody 'Bod' Owens
  • Scarlett Amber Perkins
  • Silas
  • Jack Frost
  • The Sleer
  • Miss Lupescu
• Great Expectations - Pip learns to accept others and forgive people. He shows maturity in facing his fears and learning to deal with complex relationships.
• Jane Eyre - Jane learns to stand up for herself and to deal with injustice - she is changing from child to adult and learning to deal with relationship problems. Moving away from Mrs Reed is a life-changing moment for her, and part of her coming of age.
• Little Women - Jo is realising what it is to be a woman growing up in a male society with all the expectations of her gender, and the difficulties of gaining female independence in a 19th century society geared towards men.
• White Teeth - Magid is realising what it is to be a Bangladeshi son of immigrants, living in London. As he comes of age, he is dealing with the conflict between following his parents' wishes, and finding his own identity.