Father to Son by Elizabeth Jennings-Qs-Ans- Class XI English

 

     Father to Son by Elizabeth Jennings

About the Poet

Elizabeth Jennings was an English poet. She was born in Boston and was well-known for her lyric poetry 

About the Poem

The poem seems to be personal if read superfluously, but if given a deep thought it unfolds a universal theme of ‘communication gap’ between parents and their children. Here it deals with the communication gap between a son and his father. In this modern world, many fathers undergo similar mental pain as we find the father in the poem undergoing it. If the reader wants to understand the poem fully, it should be understood from the point-of-views, the father’s and that of the son.

The father who brings up his ‘son’ in the hope that he would make him his true copy both physically and mentally is mistaken completely. Such fathers are bound to receive a rude when their sons become fully different from them.

Line to line Explanation of the Poem

“I do not understand this child/
Though we have lived together now/
In the same house for years.”

Explanation: The ‘father’, in the poem, says that he does not understand ‘this child’ i.e. his son although both of them have lived for years together so far in the same house.

 “Yet have I killed /
The seed I spent or sown it where/
The land is his and none of mine? “

Explanation: The father asks himself if he has wasted the seed.

Now, the question arises as to how the seed is wasted.

A seed is wasted when it does not sprout into a plant after being sown into the soil. But here, the son has grown up and we cannot say that ‘the seed’ has been wasted.

Here, the seed means the ‘seed of relationship’ that the father sowed into the mind of his son since the days of his childhood thinking that the boy would develop the point of view towards life similar to that of him.

The son did grow up like a healthy tree, but he has a different mindset. He does not think about what his father wants from him. He did become his father’s carbon-copy physically, but mentally he has his own independent thinking towards life. This is the reason why his father says that that he has “killed the seed”.

Another question the ‘father’ asks himself is if he has sown ‘it’ (the seed) in the land that did not belong to him.

It is a known fact that if you grow a seed into s other’s land, you cannot claim the crop or the fruit until you have some mutual understanding. Here, the father means to say that he has sowed the seeds of his ideas into his son’s mind, but his ideas did not cause any fruitful effect there.

The son did not mould his own personality in the frame which his father had desired. When he grew up, he turned into a different personality. No ideas were common between them. That’s why they speak like ‘strangers’.

“We speak like strangers, there's no sign/
Of understanding in the air...”

Explanation: As both of them (the father and the son) have ‘no common thoughts’, they speak like strangers. There is no sign (hint) of mutual understanding between them.

Sometimes fathers behave like a boss. So, sons do not feel comfortable in sharing their ‘joys and sorrows with them. They feel more comfortable with their mothers. Here in the poem, the father does not make it clear as to what type of ‘understanding’ he wants to create with his son. We can guess that they had ‘clash of ideas’ towards random questions or problems of life.

“This child is built to my design/
Yet what he loves I cannot share. /
Silence surrounds us…..”

Explanation: The meaning in the above lines is very much clear. The father says that the son has a full physical resemblance with him. It may mean in terms of height, facial features and expression, complexion, etc. In spite of that, the father cannot share what he (the son) loves. Here ‘design’ means physical structure and resemblance.

When the father says that ‘what he loves I cannot share’, he means to say that his son has different likes, dislikes, tastes and so many other ideas. All this is proof of one thing that the father wanted to make his son a ‘dummy personality’ due to his selfish motives and ignorance of the knowledge about human psychology.

It can be concluded on the above discussion that the father is to be blamed for creating a problem for himself. The son has nothing to do it. Silence prevails between them due this ‘communication gap’ that has been created by the father.

“I would have/
Him prodigal, returning to/
His father's house, the home he knew, /
Rather than see him make and move/
His world….”

Explanation: ‘A prodigal ( /ˈprɒd.ɪ.ɡəl/)  son’ is the one who has left his family to do something that his family did not allow him to do, and after some time, he has returned home feeling sorry for his mistake. The father wants his ‘son’ to come back home like a prodigal son. The use of the phrase ‘His father's house’ shows that the father is authoritative and does not think that ‘the house’ belongs to his son also.

On one side, the father calls the son ‘his’, on the other side, he says that he should return to ‘his father’s house’. Rather he should have said that ‘the son should return to his house’. Thus, the father is responsible to create estrangement (rift, separation) between the son and himself.

The use of such phrases show that the father never tried to put in emotional strength in the relationship while he tried to develop it since the days of his son’s childhood.

“Rather than see him make and move/
His world.”

Explanation: The father would like that his son should come back home and he would not like to see him making his own house, making his own world where he can move of his own.

The above line “Rather than see him make and move/His world.” shows that the father does not like that his son should become independent and develop his own world where he could move freely.  If he returns home, he would forgive him. Thus, after forgiving him, he would shape (develop) a new relationship out of the sad one that was there already between them.

“I would forgive him too, /
Shaping from sorrow a new love. /
Father and son, we both must live/
On the same globe and the same land. “
Explanation: In the above stanza, the father expresses his desire that both of them (the father and the son) must live on the same globe (the earth) and the same land (here, it may mean the nation/country). His father wants him to live in his father’s house, where he can develop a new relationship out of the sad one.

“He speaks: I cannot understand
Myself, why anger grows from grief. 
We each put out an empty hand, 
Longing for something to forgive.”

Explanation: In the above lines, the father quotes the sentence spoken by his son. In the above lines ‘he’ stands for his son. The son says that he cannot understand himself and the reason as to why anger grows from grief. From the above lines, one thing is clear that the son is confused about ‘something’. A constant struggle may be going on in his mind. It may be about making a type of compromise that is made when one fails or feels helpless to proceed further with the present odd situation. It is a kind of compromise which takes place when one is defeated.

The son may have struggled hard to make his career, but may have failed in this competitive world. Now he might be thinking to come back to his father’s house. A person feels grief when he or she is helpless to improve the situation and this ‘helplessness’ further cause anger. One feels angry on oneself because one is unable to change the situation. So the son has to remain dependent on his father.

“We each put out an empty hand, /
Longing for something to forgive.”

In the above lines, ‘we’ stands for ‘the father’ and ‘the son’. The father says that both of them extend empty hand forward to shake and long (wish) to forgive each other. The question arises here as to why the adjective ‘empty’ used in front of the noun ‘hand’.

When a person shakes hands with those of another person, the hands are always empty. But if the meaning is taken at the deeper level, the hand is never empty. It has the warmth of love. But in this case, the emotion of love is missing at present. It has to take place in the new relationship that will emerge out of ‘sorrow’.

What does ‘something’ mean in the second line above ‘Longing for something to forgive’?

Here ‘something’ may stand for the ‘issue or problem’ that made both of them estranged (separated) from each other.

Thus the father in the poem hopes that a new relationship would emerge out of the dead one as the phoenix bird takes birth out of its own ashes.

In this way, the discussion on this poem ends up.

(A)  Short Answer-type Questions (About 30-40 words each)

Q1.  Explain the lines: “Yet have I killed 
The seed I spent or sown it where
The land is his and none of mine?”

Ans. the father means to say that he has sowed the seeds of his ideas into his son’s mind, but his ideas did not cause any fruitful effect there. The son did not mould his own personality in the frame which his father had desired.

Q2. Explain the lines:“This child is built to my design
Yet what he loves I cannot share. 
Silence surrounds us…..”

Ans. The meaning in the above lines is very much clear. The father says that the son has full physical resemblance with him.

 Q4. What is the reason for this kind of relationship between the son and the father in the poem?

Ans. It is communciation gap that is responsible for such a bad type of relationship between the father and the son. Sometimes fathers behave like a boss. So, sons do not feel comfortable in sharing their ‘joys and sorrows’ with them. They feel more comfortable with their mothers.

Q5. What can be estimated about the son’s state of mind from the lines, “He speaks: I cannot understand
Myself, why anger grows from grief. 
We each put out an empty hand, 
Longing for something to forgive.”

Ans. From the above lines, one thing is clear that the son is confused about ‘something’. A constant struggle may be going on in his mind. It may be about making a type of compromise that is made when one fails or feels helpless to proceed further with the present odd situation.

It is a kind of compromise which takes place when one is defeated. The son may have struggled hard to make his career, but may have failed in this competitive world. Now he might be thinking to come back his father’s house.

Q 6. Explain the lines:  “We each put out an empty hand, /Longing for something to forgive.”

Ans. In the above lines, ‘we’ stands for ‘the father’ and ‘the son’. The father says that each of them extend  his empty hand forward to shake and long to forgive each other. The question arises here as to why the adjective ‘empty’ used in front of the noun ‘hand’.

 When a person shakes hands with another person, the hands are always empty. But if the meaning is taken at the deeper level, the hand is never empty. It has warmth of love.  But in this case, the emotion of love is missing at present. It has to take place in the new relationship that will emerge out of ‘sorrow’.

(B)   Some Important Stanzas for Comprehension

 Stanza 1

“I do not understand this child
 Though we have lived together now
 In the same house for years.”

Q1. Who is “I” in the above stanza?

Ans. It is the father in the above stanza.

Q2. Why does the “I” say that he does not understand that child?

Ans. The father does not understand what the son wants.

Q3. Who is the child mentioned in the stanza?

Ans. The child is the son of the father, the narrator in this poem.

Q4. Name the poem and its poet.

Ans. The title of the poem is Father to Son  and the poet is Elizabeth Jennings 

Stanza 2

“Yet have I killed 
The seed I spent or sown it where
The land is his and none of mine? “

 “We speak like strangers, there's no sign
Of understanding in the air. ..”

“This child is built to my design
Yet what he loves I cannot share. 
Silence surrounds us…..”

Q1. For What does the ‘seed’ stand ?

Ans. It stands for the seed of ideas.

Q2. Why does the father say that he has spent the seed he had sown?

Ans. He says so because his son’s mind-set is different from his own. He expected the same ideas as he has in his mind.

Q3. Why do they behave like strangers?

Ans. No ideas were common between them. That’s why they speak like ‘strangers’.

Q4. What is the reason for this kind of relationship between the son and the father in the poem?

Ans. It is communciation gap that is responsible for such a bad type of relationship between the father and the son. Sometimes fathers behave like a boss. So, sons do not feel comfortable in sharing their ‘joys and sorrows’ with them. They feel more comfortable with their mothers.

 Q5. What is meant by the word ‘design’ in the poem?

Ans. Here ‘design’ means physical structure and resemblance.

Q6. Explain the expression: ‘what he loves I cannot share’.

Ans. When the father says that ‘what he loves I cannot share’, he means to say that his son has different likes, dislikes, tastes and so many other ideas.

Stanza 3

“I would have
Him prodigal, returning to
His father's house, the home he knew, 
Rather than see him make and move
His world….”

Q1. Who is a prodigal son?

Ans. ‘A prodigal  son’ is the one who has left his family to do something that his family did not allow him to do, and after sometime, he has returned home feeling sorry for his mistake.

Q2. What does the father want?

Ans. The father wants that the son should return to his house unconditionally.

Q3. What do the words ‘his father's house’ indicate?

Ans. The use of the words ‘his father's house’ show that the father does not want his son not to make his claim on the house. It shows father’s possessive nature also. He wantes his son to possess him like a thing.

Q4. Explain the line:  “Rather than see him make and move/His world.”

Ans. The father would like that his son should come back and he would not like to see him making his own house, making his own world where he can move of his own.

The above line “Rather than see him make and move/His world.” shows that the father does not like that his son should become independent and develop his own world of his own and where he could move freely. If he returns home, he would forgive him. Thus, after forgiving him, he would shape (develop) a new relationship out of the sad one that was there already between them.

Stanza 4

“I would forgive him too, 
Shaping from sorrow a new love. 
Father and son, we both must live
On the same globe and the same land.”

Q1. What does the father want to shape now?

Ans The father wants to shape a new relationship out of the sad one.

Q2. What thought has forced the father to develop a new relationship out of the old one?
Ans. The father reaches a conclusion that both the sone and the father must live together in the same house.

Q3. What meaning does the line ‘On the same globe and the same land’may convey?

Ans. The same globe stands for the earth and the same land means the same nation/country.

Stanza 5

“He speaks: I cannot understand
Myself, why anger grows from grief. 
We each put out an empty hand, 
Longing for something to forgive.”

Q1. Who is ‘He’ in the above lines?

Ans. “he” is the son in the above lines.

Q2. Who cannot understand and what?

Ans. The son cannot understand why anger grows in him from grief.

Q3.  What do each of them long?

Ans. Each of them long for something to forgive each other.

Q4. What could be something in the above lines?

Ans. It could be the past behavior that they showed towards each other.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Childhood by Markus Natten- Qs-Ans- English for Class XI

 

Childhood by Markus Natten

Short Answer-type Questions (About 30-40 words each)

Q1. What answer /answers did the poet provide to the question put in the first stanza:  “When did his childhood go?”

Ans. The answered himself by asking if it was the day when he completed the eleventh year of his age. It was the time when he had started realising the difference between ‘Hell and Heaven’. He came to know that ‘Hell and Heaven’ did not exist (present) anywhere. Those were only the states of mind.

Q2. What answer /answers did the poet provide to the question put in the second stanza: “When did my childhood go?”

Ans. The poet answered himself by asking if it was  the time when he realised that adults were not
what they all they seemed to be. They appeared what they were not from inside. They talked and preached about love. But they did not follow what they preached. They were hypocrites.

Q3. What answer /answers did the poet provide to the question put in the third stanza:  “When did his childhood go?”

Ans. He answered himself by asking if it was the time when he found his mind was really his and he started using his own thoughts to decide the problems. At that time he had stopped depending on others for solving his own problems.

Q4. What answer /answers did the poet provide to the question put in the fourth stanza:  “Where did my childhood go?”

Ans. The poet answers himself by saying that it went to some forgotten place. The line “That’s hidden in an infant’s face” shows that the poet has searched his childhood everywhere. At last, he found its reflection on an infant’s face. It means that the poet has been able to reach the realization that childhood lives in the innocence reflected in infant’s face.

Q5. What truth does the poet seem to realize at the end of the poem?

Ans. The poet seems to realize the truth that the state of innocence must give way to the state of experience. The knowledge of worldly wisdom is desirable for the human mind. Otherwise, it would be difficult for human beings to live peacefully.

Q6. What does the poet say about the adults?

Ans. He tells us about the hypocrisy shown by the adults. He lost faith in the adults because they did not act what they preached. They always preached to him to love others, while they themselves did not love others. They showed to others as if they were very close and loving to them. But in reality, they criticised and disliked them at their back. They showed them only mouth honour.

Q7. When did the poet’s mind start to rationalize the thoughts and how?

Ans.In the third stanza, the poet talks about his adulthood although he does not mention it. He has gained in the wisdom of life. His faculty of the mind to rationalize things has developed. Now he can differentiate between good and evil; right and wrong. He can make his own decisions and form opinions about others. He would no more depend on others’ opinions that are usually full of prejudice and jealousy.

Q8. What does the poet conclude at the end of the poem?

Ans. Thus the poem ends at the poet’s conclusion that his childhood has been transferred to another child. If a person wants to see his own childhood, he or she can watch a child’s face and feel glad to see the lost childhood reflected in it.

(B) Some Important Stanzas for Comprehension

Stanza 1

When did my childhood go?
Was it the day I ceased to be eleven,
Was it the time I realized that Hell and Heaven,
Could not be found in Geography,
And therefore could not be,
Was that the day!

Q1. Name the poem and its poet.

Ans. The poem is “Childhood’ and its poet is Markus Natten

Q2.When did the poet’s childhood come to an end according to the poet in the above stanza?

Ans. It came to an end when the poet completed the eleventh year of his age.

Q3. What knowledge did the poet gain about ‘Hell and Heaven’?

Ans. He gained the knowledge that Hell and Heaven cannot be found in geography because these are the states of the human mind.

Q4. Give the meaning of ‘ceased’.

Ans. Stopped

Stanza 2

When did my childhood go?
Was it the time I realised that adults were not
all they seemed to be,
They talked of love and preached of love,
But did not act so lovingly,
Was that the day!

Q1. What did the adults talk and preach to the poet?

Ans. The adults talked of love and preached of love.

Q2. What knowledge did the poet gain about the adults?

Ans. He came to know that the adults did not do what they talked and preached.

Q3. What did the behavior of the adults show to the poet?

Ans. It showed their hypocrisy.

Stanza 3

When did my childhood go?
Was it when I found my mind was really mine,
To use whichever way I choose,
Producing thoughts that were not those of other people,
But my own, and my alone,
Was that the day!

Q1. What does the poet mean by “my mind was really mine”?

Ans. It means that the poet has become able to depend on his own thoughts.

Q2. What has the poet stopped doing now?

Ans. The poet has stopped depending on others for taking opinions.

Q3. How does the poet use his own thoughts now?

Ans. He uses his thoughts in his own way now. He solves his problems himself now.

Stanza 4

Where did my childhood go?
It went to some forgotten place,
That’s hidden in an infant’s face,
That’s all I know.
Q1. Where did the poet’s childhood go according to the poet in the above stanza?

Ans. It went to some forgotten place.

Q2. Where did the poet find his childhood?

Ans. He found it in the infant’s face.

Q3. How does the poet feel after losing his childhood?

Ans. He feels sad after losing his childhood.

Q4. Which poetic device has been used in this poem?

Ans. It is ‘refrain’.

 

 

The Voice of the Rain by Walt Whitman

 

           The Voice of the Rain by Walt Whitman

(A)   Short Answer-type Questions (about 30-40 words each)

Q1. There are two voices in the poem. To whom do they belong to? Which lines indicate this?

Ans. There are two voices in this poem. The first voice is that of the poet and it is in the form of a direct question, “And who art thou?” The second voice belongs to the rain in the form of a reply that continues till the end of the poem: “I am the poem of Earth...”

Q2. What does the phrase “strange to tell” mean?

Ans. The poet had never expected that the rain would ever reply to the question he put to her in a casual manner. That is why the poet used the phrase “strange to tell.”

Q3. There is a parallel drawn between rain and music. Which words indicate this? Explain the similarity between the two.

 Ans. The rain and music both take birth from their sources of genesis (origin). After that, they return to their source of origin. This is the similarity between these two.

 Q4. How is the cyclic movement of rain brought out in the poem? Compare it with what you have learned in science.

  Ans. The rain takes its birth from the sources of water on the earth and the seas and then goes up in the sky in the form of vapours. Finally, it returns to its place of birth in the form of rainwater through the process of condensation.

Q5. Why are the last two lines put in brackets?

 Ans. The last two lines are bracketed as they do not form the part of the reply of the rain given to the poet. These are the poet’s own reflections about the song which also has similarities with the rain.

Q6. What is the purpose of the rain to descend on the earth from the sky?

Ans. The rain says that she comes down on the earth to supply water to the areas that are drought-stricken. She also washes small particles of dust, which have made layers on various objects of nature and those on the earth.

Q7. How does the rain help the seeds?

Ans.  The rain helps the unborn seeds that lay hidden in the soil, sprout by supplying them with sufficient water. But without her help, they would have remained only seeds.

Q8. Explain the words ‘yet the same’.

Ans. These words mean that the properties of the rain remain the same. The rainy water becomes vapours and then they form clouds. After that, the clouds pour in rain. So the water does not lose its basic property in every change.

Q9. What does the phrase ‘‘Out of the land’’ refer to? 

Ans. It may refer to thousands of ponds, lakes, rivers, and other small water pools wherefrom vapours rise up in the sky through the process of evaporation.

Q10. How does the rain work for the Earth day and night?

Ans. It works day and night to make this planet the earth lively by supplying the most needed thing ‘water’ without which the whole earth would become barren (infertile)

Q11. What would have happened on the earth without rain?

Ans. The whole earth would become barren (infertile)

No life would breathe there without water. It gives life to the place from which it takes its birth. It purifies and beautifies it.

Q12. What for does the song not care?

Ans. They do not care as to who has listened to it carefully or not.

 Some Important Stanzas for Comprehensions

Stanza 1

“And who art thou?” Said I to the soft falling shower,
This, strange to tell, gave me an answer, as here translated:
“I am the poem of Earth, said the voice of the rain”

Word-meanings

     1. I stand for the poet.     2. Art thou: are you? (old English)     3. ‘soft falling shower’: a light shower of   rain

Q1. What is the title of this poem and the poet’s name?

Ans. The title of the poem is The Voice of Rain and its writer is Walt Whitman.

Q2. What is meant by the word ‘thou’?

Ans. The word ‘thou’ is used for the pronoun ‘you’.

Q3. What did the poet ask about the rain?

Ans. The poet asked the rain who it was.

Q4. What occurred strangely to the poet?

Ans. It occurred very strangely to the poet that the voice of the rain replied to the poet’s question.

Q5. What was the reply given by the rain to the poet?

Ans. The rain replied that it was the poem of the Earth.

Stanza 2

“Eternal I rise impalpable out of the land
And the bottomless sea,
Upwards to heaven, whence, vaguely form’d altogether changed, and yet the same”

Word-meanings: Eternal: permanent 2. Impalpable:  the thing that cannot be touched, but it can be felt by mind or senses  3. Bottomless:  that has no bottom/ very deep 4. Heaven:   sky 5. Whence: from where   6. Vaguely:  unclearly, randomly 7. altogether: combining together, completely 8. ‘yet the same: not losing the basic properties

Q1.From where does the rain rise?

Ans. The rain rises up from the bottomless ocean.

Q2 In what form does the rain rise up?

Ans. It rises up in the form of vapours.

Q3. Where does the rain go after rising?

Ans. After rising, the rain goes up in the sky.

Q4. In what form does the rain get changed in the sky?

Ans. It gets changed into clouds.

Q5. Explain the words ‘yet the same’.

Ans. These words mean that the properties of the rain remain the same. The rainy water becomes vapours and then they form clouds. After that, the clouds pour in rain. So the water does not lose its basic property in every change.

Q6. What does the phrase ‘‘Out of the land’’ refer to? Ans. It may refer to thousands of ponds, lakes, rivers, and other small water pools wherefrom vapours rise up in the sky through the process of evaporation.

Stanza 3

I descend to lave the droughts,

Atomies, dust- layers of the globe,

And all that in them without me were

 seeds only, latent, unborn

Word meanings: 1. Descend: to come down/fall down in the form of drops 2. Lave:  to wash/remove/end up 3. Drought: a long period in which there has not been any rain for a long time.  4. Atomies: small particles 5. Globe: the earth   6. Latent: Hidden

Q1. What is the purpose of the rain to descend on the earth from the sky?

Ans. The rain says that she comes down on the earth to supply water to the areas that are drought-stricken. She also washes small particles of dust, which have made layers on various objects of nature and those on the earth.

Q2. How does the rain help the seeds?

Ans.  The rain also tells the poet about its contribution in helping the unborn seeds that lay hidden in the soil, sprout by supplying them with sufficient water. But for her help, they would have remained only seeds.

Q3. Who is ‘I’ in the above stanza?

Ans. “I” is the rain.

 

Stanza 4

 And forever, by day and night, I give back life to my own origin,
And make pure and beautify it;

 Word-meanings: 1. Origin: birthplace

Q1. How does the rain work for the Earth day and night?

Ans. It works day and night to make this planet the earth lively by supplying the most needed thing ‘water’ without which the whole earth would become barren (infertile)

Q2. What would have happened on the earth without rain?

Ans. The whole earth would become barren (infertile)

No life would breathe there without water. It gives life to the place from which it takes its birth. It purifies and beautifies it.

Stanza 5

 “ (For the song, issuing from its birth-place, after fulfillment, 
wandering

  Reck’d or unreck’d, duly with love returns)”

  Word-meanings: 1. Wandering: moving here and there 2. Reck’d: cared for or heeded for 3.Unreck’d: uncared for/ unheeded for

Q1. What service does a song do to human beings?

Ans. It makes every human heart happy and thrilled by its sweet music.

Q2. Where does the song go after doing its service to human hearts?

Ans. It goes back to its place of origin i.e. heart.

Q3. What for does the song not care?

Ans. It does not care as to who has listened to it carefully or not, but it returns to its place of origin with love which it always carried with it in the form of emotions.