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Literary Terms for English Literature, SSC and Net, Set students

 Important Literary Terms for students of  WBCSSC, NET, SET


Anti-sentimental comedy

This type of comedy basically comes as a kind of protest against the sentimental drama. It discarded the sentimental elements like overdose of pathos, note of seriousness and moral purpose. Instead, such comedies try to produce hearty or often hilarious laughter. Ex. - Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer.

Absurd Drama

Absurd drama is a new invention in the mid 20th century in the field of theatre. This kind of drama is based upon the belief that the human condition is essentially and ineradicably absurd, and that this condition can be adequately represented only in this kind of play. Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, Malone Dies, The Unnamable are examples of Absurd drama.

Ambiguity


Ambiguity in literature can be called the language of paradox. It is the assertion of the union of opposites. True poem, like Keats" "Ode on a Grecian Urn", is an amalgamation of varied experiences, widely different from and even opposite to each other. Here ambiguity or paradox synthesizes and reconciles these experiences. Keats in this odc expresses a life which is above life, but it is at the same time a kind of death.


Autobiographical Essay


When in the essay the author will speak out his vital experiences of life, either external or emotional, it will become autobiographical. That means, in such essay the personal or subjective elements must be much more strongly present. Ex: Dream Children: A Reverie by Charles Lamb.



Personal Essay

In this kind of essay the author brings out his personality in much more bolder details than in the formal essays or any other kind. The author assumes a tone of intimacy with the readers, deals with everyday matters in a relaxed, self-revelatory fashion. It is also called familiar essay. By nature it is subjective to a great extent.

Formal Essay

This kind of essay is relatively impersonal by nature. Here the author writes as an authority or as a highly knowledgeable person and expounds his subject in an orderly way without the least of intimacy with the readers. Ex. 'The Principles of Good Writing' by L.A. Hill.

Allegory

The term 'Allegory' has been derived from the Greek term 'allegoria' which originally meant 'speaking otherwise'. As a rule, an allegory is a story in verse or prose with double meaning - primary/surface meaning and the under the surface meaning. It can be read and interpreted at more than one level. The story in allegories often teaches a moral. Ex. - Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. It is an allegory of Christian Salvation.

Burlesque

'Burlesque' is an incongruous imitation. It imitates the manner or the matter of a serious literary work or of a literary genre but makes the imitation amusing by a ridiculous disparity between the manner and the subject matter. It is a form of satire usually. It may be high burlesque or low burlesque. Ex. - Pope's 'The Rape of the Lock'.

High Burlesque

*Burlesque' is an incongruous imitation. It imitates the manner or the matter of a serious literary work or of a literary genre but makes the imitation amusing by a ridiculous disparity between the manner and the subject matter. If the form and style may be higher in level and dignity than the subject. Then it becomes high Burlesque. Ex.Dryden's 'Mac Flecknoe' and Pope's 'The Rape of the Lock'.

Low Burlesque

'Burlesque' is an incongruous imitation. It imitates the manner or the matter of a serious literary work or of a literary genre but makes the imitation amusing by a ridiculous disparity between the manner and the subject matter. If the form and style are low and undignified when subject is elevated, it becomes a low Burlesque. Ex. 'The Owl and the Nightingale' Butler's Hudibras, Virgil's Aeneid.

Ballad

Ballad is a narrative poem, usually simple and short, originally meant for singing. Ballads begin abruptly suggesting the previous action. They tell the story simply through dialogues and narrations. A popular Ballad (known also as the folk ballad or 'traditional Ballad') is a song, transmitted orally, which tells a story. Ballads are folk songs in the narrative, which are unwritten originally and are communicated orally. Ex. A Ballade upon a Wedding by Sir John Suckling, Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Coleridge.

Ballad Variants

 A 'broadside ballad' is a ballad that was printed on one side of a single sheet (called a broadside), and it dealt with a current event or person or issue. The 'traditional ballad' has had immense influence on the form and style of lyric poetry in general, in addition to engendering the literary ballad' which is a narrative poem written in deliberate imitation of the form, language and spirit of the traditional ballad.

Bildungsroman

"Bildungsroman" (German word) signifies 'novel of formation' or 'novel of education', Such novel must have the development of the central protagonist's mind and character. The protagonist thus gradually develops into his state of maturity, and the recognition of his or her identity and role in the world are asserted at the end. Ex. George Eliot's The Mill on the Floss, Dickens's Great Expectation.

Elegy

The primary meaning of the word 'Elegy' was probably "a funeral song set to the flute." Elegy is a lyric usually formal in tone and diction, suggested either by the death of an actual person or by the poet's contemplation of the tragic aspects of life. The term in Greek literature referred both to a specific verse form and to the emotions frequently conveyed by that verse form. Ex. Gray's Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, Goldsmith's The Deserted Village. -

Lyric

A lyric is originally a song poem, intended to be sung to the accompaniment of a lyre or harp. It means a short poem usually divided into stanzas. It expresses the poet's thoughts, moods or experiences. We can enumerate impulsiveness of the poet, his imagination, subjectivity, reflection, song-element, universal element and organic unity as essential features of a lyric. Ex. - The Seafarer, Helen Waddell's Medieval Latin Lyrics (1929).

Epic Meter

It refers to the verse or line of a poem which consists of the five regular iambic feet usually without any variation. So it is an iambic pentameter Ex. "An like / a qui- / vered mymph/with ar- / rows keen." It is so called from its use in the narrative and didactic or epical poetry by Milton, Dryden, Spenser and so on.


Free Verse

is a kind of verse of varying line-lengths, usually not rhymed. Such verse is composed without any attention to the conventional rules of meter. Inspired by vers libre of the French poets, Free Verse seeks to recreate the free rhythm of natural speech. Its chief exponents are Walt Whitman, Amy Lowell, Ezra Pound ctc. Ex. - Milton's Lycidas, Samson Agonistes.

Objective Correlative

Eliot in his essay "Hamlet and His Problems" said that the writer should not express his emotion directly: "The only way of expressing emotion in the form of art is by finding an objective correlative', in other words, a set of objects, a situation, a chain of events which shall be the formula of that particular emotion". Eliot also added that this emotion of the writer will evoke the same emotion from the reader. Eliot goes on to suggest that in Lady Macbeth's sleep-walking speech and in the speech that Macbeth makes when he hears of his wife's death, the words are completely adequate to the state of mind.

Sonnet

Sonnet' comes from the word 'Sonnetto', which means a short poem of 14 lines expressing one single thought or feeling. It is a lyric variant having all the essential qualities of a lyric. What is special about the sonnet is its restricted form of 14 lines, its specific division into octave and sestet, or into quatrains and couplet as well as a special rhyme scheme having 5 or 7 rhymes.

Classification of Sonnets

There are three most widely recognised forms of the sonnet with their traditional rhymeschemes. The first is the Italian or Petrarchan form, the second the Spenserian form and then the English or Shakespearean form.

Petrarchan Sonnet

In the Italian or Petrarchan form, a two-part division of thought is invited, and the octave offers an admirable unified pattern and leads to the 'volta' (turn of thought) in the sestet. This sonnet is divided into octave and sestet, the rhyming scheme in the octave' is abba abba in 'sestet' cde cde (or cd cd cd).

Shakespearean Sonnet

The Shakespearean or English form is a simplified one, easier for use - three quatrains followed by a couplet with the rhyme-scheme abab cdcd efef gg. The English form invites a division of thought into three quatrains and a summarising couplet. Having no *caesure' (pause) or 'volta' (turn of thought) at the end of 8th lines, it works up right to the final couplet, the apex of the poetic thought.



Alexandrine Meter

It refers to the verse or line of a poem which consists of the six regular iambic feet usually without any variation. So it is an iambic hexameter. Ex. "And now / by winds / and waves/thy life / less limbs / are tossed." It is so called from its use in an old French poem on Alexander the Great.



Spenserian Sonnet

The Spenserian sonnet, a notable variant of the Shakespearean of English form, offers two thoughts dialectically presented. It is called 'link sonnet' because each quatrain is linked to the next by a continuing rhyme or the linked rhyme, abab bcbc cdcd ee.

Flat and Round Character

E.M. Forster in his Aspects of the Novel (1927) classified the characters into Flat and Round kinds. A "flat character does not change in the cause of a story or play. A Round character is a three dimensional character which appears more life-like in spite of being a fictional character. Primarily those characters must undergo some changes in their action and behaviour in course of the narrative. Each of them changes and their change surprises the readers. Forster cites Mrs. Micawber as a flat character and Becky Sharp as a round character.

Soliloquy

This term has come from Latin 'Soliloquium' meaning ‘alone to speak'. Soliloquy is a talk to oneself, whether silently or aloud. In drama it denotes the convention' by which a character, alone on the stage, utters his or her thoughts aloud. Playwrights like Shakespeare and Marlowe have used this device as a convenient way to convey information about a character's motives and state of mind, or for purpose of exposition, or in order to guide the judgements and responses of the audience. Shakespeare's Hamlet, Macbeth and Marlowe's Dr. Faustus have major soliloquies.

Monologue and Aside

In a monologue, a single person speaking alone - with or without an audience. Most prayers, much lyric verse and all laments are monologues. Ex. - Browning's My Last Duchess'. In aside a character expresses to the audience his or her thoughts or intentions in a short speech, which by convention is inaudible to the other characters present on the stage; unless of course the aside be between two characters and therefore clearly not meant for anyone else who may be present. It is still liberally used in pantomime and in farce.

Symbol

A symbol, in the broadest sense of the term, is anything which signifies something else. As commonly used in literature, however, "symbol is applied only to a word or set of words that signifies an object or event which itself signifies something else". For example, a peacock in its literal meaning is a kind of bird. But as a symbol it is associated with pride.

Short Story

It is a narrative tale with physical brevity. It requires anything from half an hour to one or two hours in its 'perusal'. It deals with a single episode or situation to reveal a single of the central protagonist. With limited number of characters, with the precision aspect in words and expressions, it must produce a single effect or impression, either tragic or comic. Ex. - Katherine Mansfield's 'The Fly'.

Supernaturalism

Supernaturalism is an artistic device, a theory or a technique. It means the application of some superstitious mystical belief in those irrational rules and laws which go beyond the laws of nature, or beyond our usual everyday practical experiences. Ex. - The Arabian Nights.

Willing suspension of Disbelief

It is a particular poetic theory of Coleridge relating to art of supernaturalism. By the term he meant that, if any reader wants to enjoy his supernatural poems, he must discard his rational doubts or questionings. That means, he must intentionally drive away or suspend all his rational doubts to enjoy the poem to his heart's content.

Thesis Play

It is a kind of play, tragedy or comedy, which is constructed with the basic intention or purpose to establish some novel and revolutionary ideas or ideals exactly in the manner of a thesis. It very probably, offers a solution. It is originated in France in the 19th A Doll's House by Ibsen. century. Ex. -

Farce

It is type of comedy, which is designed to rouse a simple hearty laughter by presenting highly exaggerated physical actions, improbable and ludicrous situations, and like anomalies and mix-ups. The characters and dialogues are nearly always subservient to plot and situation. The plot is usually complex and events succeed one another with almost bewildering rapidity. Ex. - Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors.

Ode

An ode is a long lyric poem that is serious in subject and treatment. Generally it is in the address form, encomiastic in tone, elevated in style and elaborated in stanza structure.Ex.  Keats's Ode to a Nightingale'.

Carpe Diem

Horace in one of his odes first used the Latin phrase "carpe-diem" which means “seize the day”. The speaker in a 'crape diem' poem emphasizes that life is short and time is fleeting. The more complex poem of this kind communicates the poignant sadness or even desperations of the pursuit of pleasures under the inevitability of death. Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress" is the greatest example.

Genre

The term 'genre' (French) denotes a recurring type of literature, or as we now often call it a literary form'. The 'genres' into which works of literature have been classified at different times are numerous. In time of Plato or Aristotle, literature was divided into three genres 'Lyric', 'epic' (or ‘narrative') and 'drama'. Over the last three centuries, to them have been added genres like 'biography', 'essay' and 'novel'.

Metaphor

*Metaphor' is a combination of "meta' (Gk-change) and 'phera' (Gk. - I bear). According to this original meaning, in any Metaphor there is a change or transfer to a word from one object to another, whereby a comparison is implied.

Metaphor is perhaps the most important figure of speech for the poets. Simply it refers to an implicit comparison between two dissimilar objects. In it a word or expression is applied to a distinctly different kind of thing or action. For example, Burns said "O my love is a red, red rose". Here we've an implicit comparison between love and rose. The similarity between them is in their beauty.

Tenor-Vehicle in a Metaphor

I.A. Richards called one compared object 'tenor' and the other vehicle'. The vehicle' means the metaphorical term itself, e.g. 'rose' in the given example from Burns. In the expression, "camel is the ship of the desert", the vehicle is the 'ship'.

Point of View

Point of view means the perspective through which the writer presents his characters and events. There are mainly three kinds of point of view. First, there is the omniscient point of view where the narrator relates the story, comments on the characters and situations. Next, we have the first person auto-biographical point of view. Thirdly, there is the composite point of view.


Verbal Irony

discrepancy between expectation and reality, between apparent and the real. Verbal irony means to say one thing while meaning the opposite. Ample use of this verbal irony is found in satirical poems by Dryden and Pope. The first sentence of Austen's Pride and Prejudice is well-known for its vorbal irony.

Structural Irony

Structural irony is another species. In Austen's Pride and Prejudice Darcy is guided by pride and Elizabeth by prejudice, but it is found that they react in a way contrary to what is wise or appropriate. Contrast is there between the character's understanding of his acts and what the narrative demonstrates among them.

Dramatic Irony

In drama or even in novels dramatic irony can be found. It implies a contrast between the ignorance of the character and the knowledge of the spectators or readers. Oedipus married his own mother ignorantly when the spectators have the full knowledge of the mistakes. It contributes to the ultimate tragic effect. So it is an example of dramatic irony.

Consonance

In this device, there is a repetition of consonantal sounds while the vowel sounds differ. Here the pair of words are usually of equal number of syllables. Ex. 'black-block, slipslop', 'criss-cross', 'jig-jag' etc. This device is the base of what came to be known as para rhyme' in modern poetry.

Scansion

Scansion is the art of determining the metrical scheme or pattern of some piece of poetry by going through every line of it, dividing it into feet or measures of which it is composed. To scan, we have to follow the different steps like, syllabification, accentuation, determining the number and pattern of feet etc.










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Suggestive important questions and answers for WBSSC English from 'The Rape of the Lock'.

 The Rape of the Lock

Alexander Pope


Selected Questions and Answers for WBSSC English ( H/ PG) aspirants from 'The Rape of the Lock'.

1) Write a note on the fairy machinery in Pope's "The Rape of the Lock'.

Ans:-  

The four elements of the earth, the air, earth, water and fire are inhabited by the four types of spirits, the sylphs, gnomes, nymphs and salamanders. In Pope's "The Rape of the Lock', while the sylphs are presented as the guards of young ladies, the gnomes are the wicked one. The salamanders are associated with fiery women while the nymphs are shown dwelling in water.

2) ' Know then, unnumbered spirits round thee fly,  The Light Militia of the lower sky '-  What is referred to as the 'Light Militia of the lower sky' ? Why is it so called ?

Ans:-  'The Light Militia of the lower sky' refers to the order of supernatural brings-sylphs, quomes, nymphs and salamanders. These spirits act as guardians of human beings. They keep watch on men and are imagined as ranged in military formulations during their surveillance.

3) What does the title of the poem allude to? Bring out the significance of the title.

Ans:-  The title of Pope's "The Rape of the Lock" alludes to a real incident where a young gallant Lord Petre cut off a  strand of a young lady Arabella Fermor's hair. Thus the title of the poem which refers to the outraging of Arabella is highly appropriate and mocking. The poet seems to say that it is a trivial issue which was blown out of proportions in aristocratic circles.

4) What are "billet-doux? 

Ans:- The word billet-doux' in French for love
letter. Here they refer to the letters that the baron has received from his various beloved. He uses them all to make a pyre and light a fire which
presents not only his intense passion for Belinda but is also a type of invocation of the gods to help-him in winning Belinda.

5) Why does Pope invoke the Muse ?

Ans:- Invocation of the Muse is an epic convention. However, Pope does not need divine inspiration. He wants to learn the secret cause of the Lord's assault on the gentle maid. He also wants the Muse to enlighten him how a little man could dare such a bold task and how a soft female heart could harbour such violent anger.





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Suggestive important questions and answers for WBSSC English from 'One Day I Wrote Her Name'.

 One Day I Wrote Her Name

Edmund Spencer


Selected Questions and Answers for WBSSC English ( H/ PG) aspirants from 'One Day I Wrote Her Name'.


1) To what sonnet sequence does the poem belong?

Ans:- Spenser's sonnet 'One Day I Wrote Her Name' belongs to the famous sonnet sequence 'Amoretti'. Based on the conventional Elizabethan sonnet form, the series relates Spenser's love affair with Elizabeth Boyle.

2)  What is the chief argument in Spencer's Sonnet ?

Ans:- Spenser's chief argument is that as his pactury ives it will give life to things he has created. Above all poetry will immortalize his beloved and his love as he celebrates and records them in his verse.

3) Where do you find this Sonnet ? What is its serial number ? And what is the rhyme scheme used here?

Ans:- This sonnet occurs in Spenser's immortal sonnet sequence 'Amoretti' which means love or amor. In the serial of 'Amoretti', 'One Day' stands in 75th position. The rhyme scheme used here is a peculiar one. It is ab ab bcbc in octave and cdcd ee in the sestet.

4) What is the central theme of the poem?

Ans:-  The central theme of Spenser's sonnet 'One Day I Wrote Her Name' is love and the effort of the poet to preserve both his love and his beloved in a mortal world. Thus even though his beloved is sceptical and does not buy his ruse, the poet is
confident that his verse would stand the test of time and bestow immortality on both the poet and his beloved.

5)"But came tide ...... His prey" - What is the implication of this line ?

 Ans:- The lover poet to eternalise his love wanted to write his beloved's name on the strand. But, the seá waves came and wiped it out. But the poet is in no mood to give up his attempts. As a result, he wrote the name with a second effort. Naturally, the same event took place again and the name
was removed. Here, the poet wants to mean that all the mortal things and efforts are subject to death and destruction which none can escape. So according to him, ideal love is the only way to defeat all the adverse situations in life.

6) How would you analyse the argumentative pattern of spenser's sonnet ?

Ans. Though divided into three quartrains and a concluding complete the poem has a sharp argumentative division. In the first eight lines there is a problem, the problem of immortalizing the beauty and fame of the lady love. The next six lines resolve the problem. The poet asserts that he will immortalize his lady love through his verse.

7) "Vayne man said she that doest in vain assay" -Explain. 

Ans:- This line from Spenser's sonnet 'One Day I Wrote Her Name' presents the rebuke of the poet's beloved at his efforts. The first word 'vayne' means that the poet has become vain and full of pride or vanity which makes him do foolish things. The second word 'vain' means futile expressing the futile effort of the poet at writing the name of the beloved.

8) How does the poet want to immortalise the love between himself and his beloved ? "To die..your glorious name." -explain the line.
  
Ans:- Firstly, the lover poet wants to immortalise his love with his lady by writing her name on the strand. But twice his attempts were proved as futile. The lady-love also ridiculed at this. Therefore, the poet thinks that he will make his beloved ever glorious by writing verse where her eternal virtues and fame will be shown. The poet also thinks that poetry which is an immortal art will make their love eternal.

9)  How does Spenser assert the power of his poetry ?

Ans. Spenser tells his lady-love that his poetry will make the name of his beloved eternal and will renew their love in afterlife. He, therefore, asserts that his poetry is immortal and has power to live beyond life. This was a cómmon Elizabethan theme particularly in the sonnets.

10) "Our love shall liue...Renew" -Explain.

Ans:- The lover poet frantically  wants to immortalise his love by writing his beloved's name on the strand. But it is washed away by sea-tide and the lady-love makes the lover aware of the transitoriness  of the earthly things. So the poet changes his idea and wants to write it eternally
in lines of verse. He is of the view that they will die but there love story will reign and people will find pleasure in it. In this way, the lofty ideals of their love- making will be handed over to the people of consequent generation when they themselves will be no more in this world.









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Suggestive important questions and answers for WBSSC English from 'Loving In Truth'

 

LOVING IN TRUTH

Philip Sidney


Selected Questions and Answers for WBSSC English ( H/ PG) aspirants from Loving in Truth.


1)What is the central theme of the poem? Is the poem a love poem?

Ans:-  The central theme of Sidney's poem Loving in Truth' is love with the poet expressing his desire of writing poetry so as to wi pity and grace. To write such a poem, he initially looks to copy others, but later realizes that all the inspiration he needs is in his heart and he is able to express a lovers intimate feelings and emotion.

2) What type of a poem is Sidney's poem? What is a Petrarchan sonnet?

Ans:- Sidney's poem 'Loving in Truth' is cast in the mould of a typical Petrarchan sonnet of 14 lines and is divisible into the octave and the sestet. While the octave presents the efforts of the poet at writing poetry, the sestet narrates his failure and subsequent revelation.

4) What  is implication of the Muse's advice to Sidney ?

Ans. The Muse's advice to Sidney to look into his heart for words
indicates the triumph of the inspiratorial theory of poetry. Poetry is born out of inspiration. It is not a product imitiation. Its spontaneous and natural source is the human heart, the receptacle of all emotions, feelings and thoughts.

5) Why did Sidney turn to other poets ?
Ans. Sidney found himself stifled to express his pain in verse. He
wanted expressions and words that did not come to him spontaneously. So he turned to the words of other poets so that he might borrow their words to express himself.

6) Whose 'feet' is referred to as strangers by the poet?

Ans:- In Sidney's poem Loving in Truth, the poet using a pun on the word feet explains that both others poems and the metrical feet of their poems are nothing but strangers to him and are inefective to quell his creative urge.

7) "Invention, nature's child, fled step-dame Study's blows"- Comment on the line.

Ans. Poetic invention is the child of Nature while study is taken to be the step-mother of the poetic invention. As a child runs away from the command of his step-mother. poetic invention tries to escape from the authority of painstaking study. What Sidney wants to mean through this brilliant analogy in "Loving in Truth" is that the poetic impulse is a
spontaneous urge which comes from within not from without. This very idea evokes Wordsworth's concept of poctry -"Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful
feelings." The personification of "Invention"," Nature" and "Study" is worth mentioning.

8) What is the main objective of the poem? What is the moral of the
poem?

Ans:-   In Sidney's poem  'Loving
in Truth', all of a sudden there is a revelation. He need not seek works of other to be inspired-his inspiration lay inside him, in his heart. He would only have to look into his heart and write.Thus the main objective of the poem to bring out the importance of the spontaneity of the heart to be the source of all great inspiration in the world- is successful.






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WBCSSC Syllabus of English ( HONS/PG)

 West Bengal Central School Service Commission English Syllabus ( Hons/ PG) 


POETRY:- 

1) Loving in Truth : Philip Sidney

2) Oneday I Wrote Her Name :  Edmund Spencer

3) Shall I Compare Thee :  William Shakespeare 

4) The Good Morrow : John Donne

5) Virtue : George Herbert

6) The Rape of the Lock ( Cantos I&II)  : Alexander Pope

7) The Tyger, The Lamb : William Blake

8) Tintern Abbey : William Wordsworth 

9) Christabel,  Kubla Khan : S.T. Coleridge

10) Ode to a Nightingale,  Ode to Autumn : John Keats 

11) Ulysses : Alfred Tennyson 

12) My Last Duchess : Robert Browning 

13) The Wild Swans at Coole : W.B. Yeats

14) Strange Meeting : Wilfred Owen 

15) Hollow Men : T.S. Eliot 


DRAMA

1) Macbeth : William Shakespeare 

2) She Stoops to Conquer : Goldsmith 

3) Arms and the Man : G.B. Shaw

4) Riders to the Sea : J.M. Synge 


NOVEL

1) Pride and Prejudice : Jane Austen 

2) David Copperfield : Charles Dickens


SHORT STORY

1) The Lagoon : Joseph Conrad 

2) Araby : James Joyce 

3) The Lotus Eater : Somerset Maugham

4) The Fly : Katherine Mansfield


ESSAY 

1) Dream Children: A Reverie, The Superannuated Man : Charles Lamb

2) Freedom : G.B. Shaw

3) Francis Bacon : Of Studies


Grammar and Usage

1) Common Errors

2) Subject Verb Agreement,  Tenses, Active and Passive Voice,  Articles, Prepositions, Adverbs, Adjectives

3) Sentence Forms:  Simple, Compound, Complex, Joining and Spliting of Sentences

4) Narration: Direct and Indirect

5) Composition

6) A single paragraph of about 50-60 words to be written on a given topic.

7) Literary devices 

8) Rhetoric and Prosody


This is the Old Syllabus for WBCSSC English.  New Syllabus will be published after Commission's announcement. 

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SSC ENGLISH ( H/PG) MODEL QUESTION SET WITH ANSWER- 1

 Model Qestion set with Answer For WB SSC English. 

1) " Invention, nature's child, fled step-dame Study's blows"- Comment on the line.

Ans:- Poetic invention is the child of Nature while study is taken to be the step-mother of the poetic invention. As a child runs away from the command of his step mother poetic invention tries to escape from the authority of painstaking study. What Sidney wants to mean through this brilliant analogy in "Loving in Truth" is that the poetic impulse is a spontaneous  urge which comes from within not from without. This very idea evokes Wordsworth's concept of poetry - "Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of power feelings". 

2) " To thy high requiem become a sod"- Explain with reference to the context.

Ans:- John Keats imagines that he would die a painless death while listening to the nightingale's song. The nightingale would continue  to sing when he would be lying in his grave but the poet being dead would not be able to listen to the nightingale's sweet song which would serve as requiem, a funeral song sung for the peace of the departed soul.

3) What do the wild swans at Coole symbolize for the poet?  

Ans:- The wild swans at Coole stand for the life force their hearts do not grow old. They symbolize the everlasting spirit of youth. They symbolize tge immortality of natural objects. In another sense they also symbolize the undying tie between time and timelessness.  According  to Unterecker,  departure of birds naturally should remind the poet of his own death and thought of immortality.

4) "Like a poet hidden/ In the light of thought"- Explain.

Ans:- Shelley in " To a Skylark" compares the skylark singing sweetly in the sky to a poet who is completely absorbed in his lofty idealism,  singing prophetic songs to inspire people to high ideals. The skylark resembles an unknown poet living in the realm of his majestic idealism, creating a stir in the sleeping conscience of mankind. 

5) "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife"- What is the significance of this sentence? 

Ans:- The above line is the opening sentence of Jane Austen's novel, Pride and Prejudice. The first half of this sentence suggests that some great 'universal' truth is the subject of the novel. There is an ironic deflation in the second half when this truth is found to be concerned with a common social problem- marriage. The sentence itself means that people assume that a well-to-do young man should be on the look- out for a suitable wife. It conceals beneath it an ironic thought that in reality things may be the other way round. 

6) Why does Wordsworth call nature the nurse, the guide,  the Guardian of heart and the soul of moral being? 

Ans: Wordsworth looked upon Nature as his teacher. He turned to Nature for solace and peace of mind whenever he felt begged down by the "fever and fret" of an unintelligible world. In "Tintern Abbey", he speaks about Nature's chastening and therapeutic influence on the life of man. 

7) What does the phrase the "forests of the night" symbolise?  

Ans: The phrase "forests of the night" suggests and symbolises oppression, ignorance and superstition. The tiger is a creature of revolt and wrath.  It burns in the forests of oppression and cruelties.  It is ferocious spirit symbolising the wrath of God.  

8) Bring out the significance of the title 'Vertue'. 

Ans: Herbert's 'Vertue' is a simple and well-known poem which ends with a moral.  Everything in the world must end but a virtuous soul is immortal. The sweet day, the sweet rose and the sweet spring- all will come to a close but a sweet and virtuous soul will never perish. Thus the title of the poem speaks of the theme and hence is very much apt and just. 

9) What is "the seven sleepers" den referred to in 'The Good Morrow"?  Bring out the relevence of the reference.

Ans. This legend is found in Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire". In 250 AD seven noble Christian Youths fled from the persecution of Decius, the Persian Emperor. When they hid themselves in a cave, the emperor ordered them to be walled in there. They slept there for 200 years. Donne in "The Good Morrow" compares this state of insensitivity of the seven sleepers when they were in deep slumber with his own state when he had not met his becloved. Before this meeting, his life was dull and insipid. When the sleepers woke up they found real joy and mirth. After meeting his beloved the poet was full of joy, happiness and ecstasy.

10) Who is the Lotus-eater and why is he so called? 

Ans:-  Thomas Wilson is the lotus-eater in Maugham's story The Lotus Eater. The Greek veterans in Homer's Odyssey eat the lotus fruit on the lotusisland. The fruit has an enchanting effect making them oblivious of the past and mesmerising them into a blissful indolence. Drawing on this analogy, Maugham calls his hero Thomas Wilson a lotus-eater. Wilson is enchanted by the beauty of Capri, and abandons his life in the city to live in indolence and pleasure of beauty.

11) How does Arsat bear his tragedy? 

Ans. Arsat plays the losing game of life nobly and heroically. The world has become dark for him. But he would not accept defeat. He would wreck vengeance on those men who murdered his brother. The dignity of manhood which he displays even in midst of the great stress and trial of life elevates him to the position of a tragic hero.

 12) Why does Louka tell Sergius that she is worth six of Raina? 


Ans.  Sergius's romantic love or higher love has been exposed by Louka. He himself says
that he is half a dozen persons all at once - a hero, a fool, a humbug, a villainous person,
a coward and a suspicious lover. Louka exposes Raina's sham show of higher love for Sergius while Raina's real love lies elsewhere with a fugitive officer. Louka also tells him that Raina is a liar and a cheat while she herself is not. Hence she is worth half a dozen of Raina Who can make love with two persons at the same time while Louka has no such scam.

13) What moral lesson does Tennyson's Ulysses drive at? 

Ans. Tennyson's"Ulysses"drives at the moral that life is action, not contemplation. Mere
existence is not life. Life must be nobly lived. Dull and idle life is the very negation of the life-force. We must have the courage "to strive, to seek, to find and not to yield".

14) Write a few lines on the significance of the porter's scene. 

Ans. Act II Scene ii of Macbeth which is called as the porter's scene, relieves the tragic tension of Duncan's murder. Porter is a porter of hell-gate, and Macbeth's castle is the hell. So the porter scene emphasizes the irony and accentuates the horror by the grimness of its contrast. The porter who is tipsy, whose language is vulgar and whose jests are filthy serves as a contrast to Macbeth, a valiant warrior who speaks golden poetry but is a murderer. It also covers the gap between the crime and discovery and gives Macbeth the time to wash his hands and put on the night gown.

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