Not so sweet sorrow as board gets Shakespeare wrong in exam

 An exam board has apologised after pupils taking a GCSE English literature paper were faced with an error in a question about Romeo And Juliet.

Some 14,000 candidates may have been affected by the error, which confused the two warring families in the tragedy about two young lovers.

Candidates were asked: “How does Shakespeare present the ways in which Tybalt’s hatred of the Capulets influences the outcome of the play?”

But Tybalt is Juliet’s cousin and therefore a Capulet, so the question should have referred to his hatred of the Montagues.

One pupil Joe, 16, said he found the experience “stressful”, adding: “As we left the hall, there were arguments about what it should have been and a handful of people were in tears.”

In a statement, a spokesman for the OCR exam board, which set the paper, said: “We apologise and will put things right when the exam is marked and graded so no student need worry about being disadvantaged.

“We are investigating as a matter of urgency how this got through our assurance processes.”

England’s exams regulator Ofqual said: “Incidents of this nature are unacceptable.”