2015

1. What is the subtitle of Shakespeare’s Sonnet-18?
   Ans: Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day.
2. Name the figure of speech used in the line “Ten thousand saw I at a glance”.
   Ans: The name of the figure of speech in quoted line is hyperbole. It is an exaggerated expression of the speaker’s feeling at the sight of the dancing daffodils.
3. What is Fern Hill?
   Ans: Fern Hill was the name of farm of the poet’s aunt Ann Jones. On this farm Thomas passed many of his school holidays in his childhood.
4. Whom does Gray compare the dead villagers with?
   Ans: Gray compares the village people to undiscovered gems in caves in the ocean and to undiscovered flowers in the desert.
5. Define an Oxymoron with an example.
   Ans: An oxymoron is a figure of speech in which two contradictory words are placed side by side for a striking effect. For example: “I fear and hope, I burn and freeze in ice”.
6. “Thus I entered, and thus I go!” – Who is the speaker?
   Ans: The patriot is the speaker of the speech “Thus I entered, and thus I go!”.
7. What is the message of the poem “To Daffodils”?
   Ans: The message of the poem is the short life span of human beings and all living things and beings.
8. What is the rhyme scheme of the sonnet “On His Blindness”?
   Ans: The rhyme scheme of the sonnet is abba abba cde cde.
9. Where was Walt Whitman born?
   Ans: Walt Whitman was born in West Hills of Long Island, then rural countryside.
10. Who was Achilles?
    Ans: Achilles was the greatest of the Greek heroes who fought in the battle of Troy.
11. What is the theme of the poem “Home Burial”?
    Ans: The theme of the poem Home Burial is – how grief over the death of a child should be expressed.
12. Who was Maud Gonne?
    Ans: Maud Gonne was an Irish patriot, actress, feminist, and revolutionary who played an important role in the freedom of Ireland. She was also the beloved of the poet.

2016

1. What does Shakespeare mean by “eye of heaven”?
   Ans: The eye of heaven means the sun shines with too much heat.
2. What is the tone of the poem “To Daffodils”?
   Ans: We find in this poem a sad and melancholic tone related to the idea that beauty as well as life does not last forever.
3. “I will drink life to the lees” — What figure of speech is used here?
   Ans: The figure in the quoted line is called metonymy because the words “drink” and “less” refer to a bottle of wine with which they are associated.
4. What is “Shamble’s Gate”?
   Ans: The Shamble’s Gate is a place where public execution is done. It is also a place where animals are slaughtered.
5. To which literary age does E.B. Browning belong?
   Ans: E.B Browning belongs to the Victorian age.
6. What type of poem is “Because I Could Not Stop for Death”?
   Ans: “Because I Could Not Stop for Death” is a spiritual lyric.
7. What does Yeats mean by ‘intellectual hatred’?
   Ans: Poet here means the worst kind of hatred by the phrase “Intellectual Hatred”.
8. What is the color of the pike?
   Ans: The pike is of deep green and golden color.
9. What kind of freedom does Tagore want for his countrymen?
   Ans: Tagore wants for his countrymen heaven of freedom that flourishes in an ideal state.
10. What is onomatopoeia?
    Ans: Onomatopoeia is a figure of speech in which the sound of words reflects their sense.
11. What is the theme of the poem “Home Burial”?
    Ans: The theme of the poem Home Burial is – how grief over the death of a child should be expressed.
12. What is an Ode?
    Ans: An Ode is a long lyric poem, serious in a subject, elevated in style, and elaborate in its stanzaic structure.

2017

1. Who serves God best according to Milton?
   Ans: According to Milton, He who bears His mild yoke serves Him best.
2. Why does D.H Lawrence’s heart weep to remember the old Sunday evenings at Home?
   Ans: The poet weeps from the practical ground of his sticking to present as a man. He is vanquished by his past memories shared warmly with his mother. So he weeps realizing his weakness and his over-intimacy with his mother that deters the development of his normal life.
3. How did the poet Kaiser Haq pass his days after his sister’s death?
   Ans: The post passed his days after his sister’s death by devoting of the mystic Swami Lilananda.
4. What did Whitman do when he lived in Brooklyn?
   Ans: When the poet lived in Brooklyn, he walked around Manhattan, and bathed in the East River, which he couldn’t do today because it’s much too polluted.
5. Who are the riders of the carriage in “Because I Couldn’t Stop for Death”?
   Ans: The carriage of death held three persons – Death, the poet herself, and immortality.
6. “The paths of glory lead but to the grave.” — What figure of speech is used here?
   Ans: This kind of statement is called epigram. Apparently, there is a contradiction in this statement because the paths of glory do not lead one to success but to the grave. However, the truth beneath the contradiction is that whatever may be one’s achievement on earth, one’s life ends in the grave. There is also alliteration in the repetition of “g” in “glory” and “grave”.
7. What is the bliss of solitude according to Wordsworth?
   Ans: When the poet is in loneliness, the beautiful scene of the daffodils appears before his mind’s eye. The poet calls it the bliss of solitude.
8. Why are Autumn and the Sun called close bosom friends?
   Ans: Autumn and the Sun are called close bosom friends because they cooperate with each other to bring about the ripeness of the fruits.
9. How does E.B. Browning convey the idea of the immortality of her love?
   Ans: She conveys the idea of the immortality of her love by asserting that she would love her husband better after death.
10. What does the phrase “good morrow” mean?
    Ans: The phrase “good morrow” means good morning.
11. What is the subtitle of Shakespeare’s Sonnet-18?
    Ans: Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?
12. What is an allusion?
    Ans: Allusion is a brief and indirect reference to a person, place, thing or idea of historical, cultural, literary or political significance.

2018

1. What is the Greek name of Ulysses?
   Ans: The Greek name of Ulysses is ‘Odysseus’.
2. What does the word, ‘Curfew’ mean?
   Ans: In the poem “the curfew” means the bell rung at churches after sunset.
3. Which book of Tagore is the poem, ‘Where the mind is without fear’?
   Ans: The poem is taken from the English version of Tagore’s celebrated work ‘Gitanjali-35’ which was published in 1909 and won the Nobel Prize for literature in the year 1913.
4. What does Herrick mean by “short spring”?
   Ans: By “short spring”, Herrick means the short duration of the youth of a human being.
5. What is a dramatic monologue?
   Ans: Dramatic monologue is a kind of poem in which a single character reveals a dramatic situation.
6. What does Shelly mean by the line, ‘If winter comes, can spring be far behind’?
   Ans: He means that his expected regeneration of the new world will take place very soon.
7. What does Dylan Thomas glorify in ‘Fern Hill’?
   Ans: Dylan Thomas glorifies childhood in Fern Hill.
8. What was the name of Yeats daughter?
   Ans: The poet’s daughter’s name is Annie Yeats.
9. What is the cause of conflict between husband and wife in the poem ‘Home Burial!?
   Ans: The difference of attitude towards the death of their child is the cause of conflict between husband and wife.
10. “Killers from the egg” — what do you understand by this line?
    Ans: Here it is meant that the pike has a destructive instinct in them from the very time the mother fish lays its eggs.
11. How did the speaker’s sister of the poem, ‘Learning Grief’ die?
    Ans: In the poem ‘Learning Grief’, the speaker’s sister died from winter pneumonia
12. “Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest.”— Identify the figure of speech.
    Ans: Here is a synecdoche because an individual has been used for a class. A class of talented poets has been suggested by Milton. It is also a case of allusion.

2019

1. What is meant by ‘eternal lines’ in the poem “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day”?
   Ans: The ‘eternal lines’ refer to the lines of this sonnet.
2. How do the daffodils look like?
   Ans: Daffodils are bright and fragrant flowers that bloom in the spring. Daffodils leaves are long and flat and the blossoms – six petals and a trumpet in the middle are bright yellow or white.
   or
   The daffodils look like innumerable/countless stars shining in the sky.
3. What does the expression ‘Thou breath of Autumn’s being’ mean?
   Ans: Here ‘thou’ is the west wind which is described here as the omnipresent spirit of autumn.
4. What does W.B. Yeats pray for his daughter?
   Ans: The poet prays for his daughter to be married to a man belonging to an aristocratic family.
5. How does the poem “Ulysses” end?
   Ans: The poem “Ulysses” ends with the famous exhortation of Ulysses to his comrade to “strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”
6. What does ‘ferry’ symbolize in the poem “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry”?
   Ans: It symbolizes continual movement, backward and forward, a universal motion in space and time.
7. With what does Herrick compare human life?
   Ans: Here the poet compares human life with the life of Daffodils.
8. What is a rhetoric question?
   Ans: A rhetorical question is a question asked in order to create a dramatic effect or to make a point rather than to get an answer.
9. What is an Ode?
   Ans: An ode is a long lyric poem, serious in an object, elevated in style, and elaborate in its stanzaic structure.
10. ‘The path of glory leads but to grave’ – What is meant here?
    Ans: Here it is meant that it does not matter if we are rich or poor, we all will die. No one is able to escape death.
11. What is a hemisphere?
    Ans: A hemisphere is half of the celestial sphere as divided into two halves by the horizon.
12. Why shall God repay the patriot?
    Ans: God shall repay the patriot as people have not recognized his services in this life, it is a good reason that he will be rewarded by God in Heaven.