The First Broadcast

Text 1: On Air, by Iwan Mercer

An original novel extract.

The red light above the microphone was dark, but Arun kept looking at it. It seemed to be storing up its brightness for him. Beyond the glass, Mara raised one hand, all five fingers spread. The studio smelled of warm dust and coffee, and every breath scraped the back of his throat.

One finger folded. Then another. The seconds did not pass; they dropped. Arun’s script lay square with the edge of the desk. He had underlined the opening sentence three times, but now the ink appeared to swarm across the paper. The script was perfectly still. Beneath it, his heart kicked out a broken rhythm.

The last finger disappeared, and the red light snapped on. ‘Good evening.’ His voice returned through the headphones as someone else’s: careful, thin, too high. First paragraph. Second paragraph. Page turn. Two sheets, not one. The paper crackled into his headphones, huge and dry. His eyes jumped to the top, the middle, the bottom. Nothing. Then Mara tapped the glass and shaped the missing word with her mouth. Arun found the line. Above the microphone, the red light was still burning, but it no longer looked like a warning.

How does Iwan Mercer use language and structure to show Arun’s nerves during his first live broadcast?

You should use relevant subject terminology to support your answer.