English

Photographs

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Question

Photographs 

Answer in Brief
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Solution

Photographs are memories that we cherish forever. It is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever..... it remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything. 

         Photographs are created with the future in mind. They are one of the few things that never matters in the moment, never serves any purpose, but are still often taken. They are used for memories, so the image will not fade in your mind as the years move on. Or, as social media has exploded as a popular tool, they are for others, so they can know what is happening in your life. So they can know how much fun you are having, and envy you. Or, so they can simply obtain a glimpse into your life, and know what you are doing even when yu are far away and never talk to them. They are a connection . 

          They are the truth. The moment as you see it, completely unexaggerated, as events often are when stories are told. It is true that filters may distort an image, but the basic outlines and construct of the image will hold true. 

          They are a lie. We smile when we do not want to, pretend to laugh, put our arms around someone we barely know. They are a highlight reel, each one strategically placed in a magazine or on the internet. They are touched and retouched within an inch of their life.

         The oldest photo that still exists is the view from a window. It took eight hours of exposure, an average full day at work, and the quality is terrible. The view could be considered, at best, a faint blur of a memory for anyone who witnessed it.

          The first known picture ever taken including a human looks out a window at a busy street, where a man in the distance receives a shoe shine. Due to the long exposure time needed to take a picture, the street looks deserted. That man was the only person remaining stationary for long enough to be captured by the camera. He is real, but his surroundings are a lie, leaving him on a silent street in a ghost town.

          It is a concept that everyone has considered: The idea of photos controlling your life. When your friend yells at you to wait while she takes a picture of an average view, or you live the concert through your phone screen, you are falling subject to placing memory higher than experience on your importance scale.

             People used to only take pictures of the important moments in life. They had to carefully choose what was worth taking a picture of, because of the cost and difficulties in obtaining a camera and developing pictures.

           Photos have other meaningful uses besides simply capturing a memory. They transport people to locations they could never dream of going, or help someone understand the troubles and wonders on opposite sides of the world. They elicit a reaction, whether it be a laugh at an amusing expression, or anger at a terrain ravaged by war. They are universal in what people can physically see, but incredibly individual in how they feel.

             Photos are a mechanism used to transport memories through time, and even if the photo is not your own, it will bring forth a memory that no one else can truly understand. The deceiving nature of the photo tells us how it can easily convince you to believe in the impossible.

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Writing Skills
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2018-2019 (March) Set 1

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Read the passage given below and answer the questions (a), (b) and (c) that follow : 

(1) At the Literary Society’s meeting, Isola read out the letters written to her Granny Pheen, when she was but a little girl. They were from a very kind man – a complete stranger.  Isola told us how these letters came to be written.
(2) When Granny Pheen was nine years old, her cat died. Heartbroken, sitting in the middle of the road, she was sobbing her heart out.
(3) A carriage, driving far too fast, came within a whisker of running her down. A very big man in a dark coat with a fur collar, jumped out, leaned over Pheen, and asked if he could help her. Granny Pheen said she was beyond help. Muffin, her cat, was dead.
(4) The man said, ‘Of course, Muffin’s not dead. You do know cats have nine lives, don’t you?’  When Pheen said yes, the man said, ‘Well, I happen to know your Muffin was only on her third life, so she has six lives left.’ Pheen asked how he knew.  He said he always knew - cats would often appear in his mind and chat with him.  Well, not in words, of course, but in pictures.
(5) He sat down on the road beside her and told her to keep still – very still. He would see if Muffin wanted to visit him.  They sat in silence for several minutes, when suddenly the man grabbed Pheen’s hand.
(6) ‘Ah – yes! There she is!  She’s being born this minute!  In a mansion – in France. There’s a little boy petting her, he’s going to call her Solange. This Solange has great spirit, great verve – I can tell already! She is going to have a long, venturesome life.’
(7) Granny Pheen was so rapt by Muffin’s new fate that she stopped crying.  The man said he would visit Solange every so often and find out how she was faring.
(8) He asked for Granny Pheen’s name and the name of the farm where she lived, got back into the carriage, and left.
(9) Absurd as all this sounds, Granny Pheen did receive eight long letters. Isola then read them out. They were all about Muffin’s life as the French cat − Solange. She was, apparently, something of a feline musketeer.  She was no idle cat, lolling about on cushions, lapping up cream – she lived through one wild adventure after another – the only cat ever to be awarded the red rosette of the Legion of Honour.
(10) What a story this man had made up for Pheen – lively, witty, full of drama and suspense. We were enchanted, speechless at the reading. When it was over (and much applauded), I asked Isola if I could see the letters, and she handed them to me.
(11) The writer had signed his letters with a grand flourish :
                                 VERY TRULY YOURS,
                                          O.F. O’F. W.W.
It was highly possible that Isola had inherited eight letters written by Oscar Wilde, for who else could have had such a preposterous name as Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Willis Wilde. 
                     Adapted from : The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society – By Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows

(a) (i) Given below are four words and phrases.  Find the words which have a similar meaning in the passage :[4]

(1) adventurous
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(3) appreciated
(4) received something on someone’s death

    (ii) For each of the words given below, write a sentence of at least ten words using the same word unchanged in form, but with a different meaning from that which it carries in the passage :[4]

(1) kind (line 2)
(2) mind (line 13)
(3) still (line 15)
(4) sounds (line 26)

(b)  Answer the following questions in your own words as briefly as possible:
(i) Where did Isola get the letters from to read at the Literary Society’s meeting?[2]
(ii) Who consoled Granny Pheen when she was heart-broken?  What did he say about Muffin’s lives?[2]
(iii) What did the man say when Granny Pheen asked him how he knew about cats’ lives?[2]
(iv) According to the man, what was Muffin’s new fate?[3]

(c) In not more than 100 words, summarise why the eight letters were a treasure to Granny Pheen. (Paragraphs 2 to 10).  Failure to keep within the word limit will be penalised. You will be required to write the summary in the form of a connected passage in about 100 words.[8]


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