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TOK ENDGAME:
TOK ESSAY virtuosity

REFLECTIONS ON THE VERY BEST TOK ESSAYS

Every TOK Examiner knows that in each examination session there are brilliant students from around the world whose essays are a provocative delight from beginning to end. These essays (with, perhaps, some minimal editing) are “almost fit for publication.” 

At this level, there is some sense that “all bets are off.”  The written criteria are at least partially transcended.  There is a kind of free-spirited audacity in the selection of examples and deliberate playfulness in pushing the logical implications in novel directions. The reader is taken along for the ride, with twists and turns and the to-and-fro of multiple perspective and counterclaim. At the uppermost levels there is nothing less than virtuosity. Well-chosen, non-cliched, varied, artfully worked through examples can actually astonish! Like a great short story the details can be savored and remain with the reader.