me123 Lit is more competitive than English, but don't let that stop you. Lit isn't only for the students that are good at English (but if you are, that's a bonus) and it's a very good subject. In lit, you study texts in greater detail than English, you zoom in to each text look at their thematic and socio-historical ideas and how this influences meaning.
Here's a subject overview on my school's lit page:
"VCE Literature focuses on the complex meanings derived from texts, the contexts in which they are produced and read, the relationships between various texts and the experiences the reader brings to the texts. The student investigates how language and other literary techniques convey these complex meanings. Through close reading and analysis, VCE Literature enables students to examine the historical, social and cultural contexts in which the texts are created, and allows students to critically and creatively explore the purposes and views and values presented by the creators and their impact on the reader. It also allows students to consider how different literary criticisms from a range of author may inform and influence one’s reading of a text."
I don't know what it's like to do both English and lit, but I've spoken to classmates that are doing both, and the workload is fine. In my school, we aren't given too much to do outside of class, so the workload is manageable, however if you want to do really well, you would need to extend yourself. I'd talk to the head of English/lit teacher at your school about the workload as it may be different to my school.
When considering lit, I'd ask yourself these questions:
How are you finding English?
Are you scoring relatively high?
Are you finding that you're looking for more than what is studied in English?
Are you naturally inclined toward English?
If you naturally inclined like me, you'll enjoy lit and will do quite well (of course hard work beats talent when talent doesn't work hard). But being naturally inclined will certainly help you.
Lit also scales up by 1-2 which will benefit your ATAR much more than comm service (depending on how well you do that is).
One thing I like about lit (which can also be applied to English in some ways) is that there's much more flexibility with interpretations (as long as you give plausible explanations and evidence) and there's a lot more independence.
The Year 12 exam is also 2 hours, whereas the English exam is 3 hours.
A lot of my friends and others at my school regret not doing lit, so if you're interested in doing it, I'd highly encourage that you pick it up. A lot of people are misinformed about lit, thinking that's it's harder than English, but in reality, it isn't much more difficult, it just targets highly-analytical skills. That's why I always encourage anyone interested in lit to try it out.
Don't hesitate to ask me anything else, I'd be happy to answer any questions.
