Complete Guide: H1 Leaving Cert English 2026

 

The 2026 guide is for students who plan to graduate in 2026. If you are graduating in 2025, please use the Complete Guide: H1 Leaving Cert English Guide 2025.

Leaving Cert English 2026 notes, sample essays, text analysis, examiners’ advice, video – it’s all in there. Free from AI
Contents:

Essentials
Paper I

Section I
Section II
Quotations in essays
Speech/Talk/The Language of Persuasion
Article / Opinion piece / Discursive Essay / Language of argument
Report/The language of information
Personal essay
Letter
– Letter to the Editor
– Personal letter
Descriptive essay
Short story

Paper II

Macbeth

General guidance
Link words
Cultural Context
General Vision and Viewpoint
Literary Genre
Individual texts: introduction
Novel/Memoir
Pride and Prejudice
All the Light We Cannot See
Rebecca
Lessons in Chemistry
Small Things Like These
Notes from a Coma
Hamnet
Where the Crawdads Sing
Elena Knows
Drama
A Raisin in the Sun
Sive
Colder than Here
Macbeth
Film
The Shawshank Redemption
Mustang
Barbie
Knives Out
The Grand Budapest Hotel
Diego Maradona
On the Waterfront
The Banshees of Inisherin

Unseen poetry

General guidance
Sample answer

Prescribed poetry

General guidance

Elizabeth Bishop

Introduction
Detailed analysis of each poem individually
The Fish
The Bight
At the Fishhouses
The Prodigal
Questions of Travel
The Armadillo
Sestina
First Death in Nova Scotia
Filling Station
In the Waiting Room
Sample essay: “Bishop’s carefully judged use of language aids the reader to uncover the intensity of feeling in her poetry.” To what extent do you agree or disagree with the above statement? Support your answer with reference to the poetry of Elizabeth Bishop on your course.

John Donne

Introduction
Detailed analysis of each poem individually
The Sunne Rising
Song: Go, and catch a falling star
The Anniversarie
Song: Sweetest love, I do not goe
The Dreame (Deare love, for nothing less than thee...)
A Valediction Forbidding Mourning
The Flea
Batter my heart
At the round earth’s imagined corners
Thou hast made me
Sample essay: “John Donne uses startling imagery and wit in his exploration of relationships.” Give your response to the poetry of John Donne in the light of this statement. Support your points with the aid of suitable reference to the poems you have studied.

T.S. Eliot

Introduction
Detailed analysis of each poem individually
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
Preludes
Aunt Helen
A Game of Chess
Journey of the Magi
III, Usk
IV, Rannoch, near Glencoe
East Coker
Sample essay: “The poetry of T.S. Eliot often presents us with troubled characters in a disturbing world.” Write a response to this statement with reference to both the style and the subject matter of Eliot’s poetry. Support your points with suitable reference to the poems on your course

Seamus Heaney

Introduction
Detailed analysis of each poem individually
The Forge
Bogland
The Tollund Man
Mossbawn: Two Poems in Dedication (1) Sunlight
A Constable Calls
The Skunk
The Harvest Bow
The Underground
Postscript
A Call
Tate’s Avenue
The Pitchfork
Lightenings VIII. (The annals say…)
Sample essay: “Heaney’s poetry explores ordinary life and people through language that is anything but ordinary.” Support your points with reference to the poetry on your course.

Paula Meehan

Introduction
Detailed analysis of each poem individually
Buying Winkles
The Pattern
The Statue of Virgin Mary at Granard Speaks
Cora, Auntie
The Exact Moment I Became a Poet
My Father Perceived as a Vision of St. Francis
Prayer for the Children of Longing
Death of a Field
Them Ducks Died for Ireland
Sample essay: “Meehan’s poetry communicates powerful feelings through thought-provoking images and symbols.” Write your response to this statement with reference to the poems by Paula Meehan on your course.

Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin

Introduction
Detailed analysis of each poem individually
Lucina Schynning in Silence of the Nicht The Second Voyage
Deaths and Engines
Street
Fireman’s Lift
All for You
Following
Kilcash
Translation
The Bend in the Road
On Lacking the Killer Instinct
To Niall Woods and Xenya Ostrovskaia, married in Dublin on 9 September 2009
Sample essay: “Ní Chuilleanáin’s demanding subject matter and formidable style can prove challenging.” Discuss this statement, supporting your answer with reference to the poetry of Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin on your course.

Tracy K. Smith

Introduction
Detailed analysis of each poem individually
Joy (Elegy One)
Dominion Over the Beasts of the Earth
The Searchers
Letter to a Photojournalist Going In
The Universe is a House Party
Museum of Obsolescence
Don’t you wonder, sometimes?
It’s Not
The Universe as a Primal Scream
The Greatest Personal Privation
I am 60 odd years of age
Ghazal
Sample essay: “Tracy K. Smith’s demanding subject matter and formidable style can prove challenging.” Discuss this statement, supporting your answer with reference to the poetry of Tracy K. Smith on your course.

W.B. Yeats

Introduction
Detailed analysis of each poem individually
The Wild Swans at Coole
The Lake Isle of Innisfree
Sailing to Byzantium
September 1913
An Irish Airman Foresees His Death
Easter 1916
Stare’s Nest by My Window
The Second Coming
In Memory of Eva Gore-Booth and Con Markiewicz
Swift’s Epitaph
An Acre of Grass
from Under Ben Bulben: V and VI
Politics
Sample essay: “Yeats uses evocative language to create poetry that includes both personal reflection and public commentary.” Discuss this statement, supporting your answer with reference to both the themes and language found in the poetry of W. B. Yeats on your course.

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