Source A: The eye beyond the glass

An original contemporary non-fiction-style practice text, written for this question.

The caption needed forty words. We had space beside the aquarium window for a name, a short explanation and one memorable fact. I had written that the octopus was a curious neighbour beneath the sea, then stopped at neighbour. It sounded welcoming. It also sounded as though the animal had agreed to a relationship which existed mainly in my draft.

I went to watch it before revising. At first, there seemed to be only stone and shadow. Then a section of the shadow moved. An arm unfolded along the rock, its underside pale against the darker surface. I could see an eye, then could not see it, though I had not looked away. The animal had not disappeared. My understanding of its outline had.

A keeper stood beside me and explained what she was observing. I asked whether it recognised us. She said that we should be careful about deciding what a movement meant from one visit. I knew this was a reasonable answer. It was less convenient than the answer my caption required. A panel cannot be made lively by printing perhaps beside every verb, but certainty does not become accurate because a designer has left room for only one sentence.

The octopus moved towards the glass. For a moment, the eye seemed directly opposite mine. I felt a sudden, ridiculous wish to be interesting. I adjusted my position as though we were meeting socially and I had been caught standing badly. Then the arm reached along a seam, explored it and withdrew. Whatever had brought the animal near, my desire to be noticed was not evidence of its purpose.

I watched for another twenty minutes. Its surface changed from a rough-looking pattern to something smoother, and the body seemed less separate from the place around it than my first description allowed. I could name visible details without knowing the experience to which they belonged. That distinction was not disappointing in the way I had expected. It made the watching more demanding.

Back at the desk, I removed neighbour and wrote a caption about changing appearance and the limits of a quick glance. We would still tell visitors something memorable, but we would not assign the animal an enthusiasm for meeting them. Forty words remained a constraint. This time, it constrained what I claimed rather than what I was willing to notice.

On my next visit, the window appeared empty again. I waited. A small movement altered the rock’s edge. The animal had been there before my attention found it, and the encounter began on terms I could not write in advance.

Source B: From H is for Hawk — Helen Macdonald

Read Source B in the official Pearson anthology (printed pages 19–20).

Compare how the writers present their ideas and perspectives about the difficulty of understanding an animal through human expectations.

Support your answer with detailed examples from both texts, including brief quotations.