Arts (English Medium) Class 12 - CBSE Question Bank Solutions

Comment on the use of the image of the shadows for the idea that the poet wants to convey.

The poet seems to be addressing his beloved in the poem. What is the message he wishes to convey to her?

Instead of ‘A Lecture Upon Love’ the poet calls the poem ‘A Lecture Upon the Shadow’. What is the effect that this has on our reading of the poem?

Examples from other poems from this period:

• How neatly doe we give one onely name
• To parents issue and the sunnes bright starre!

Why has the poet pitted the flight of Time against the ‘lazy leaden-stepping hours’ and ‘the heavy Plummets pace’?

What are the things associated with the temporal and what is associated with the eternal?

What guides human souls towards divinity? Who is the final winner in the race against Time?

How are these two matched poems related to each other in content? How is the human being depicted in the Song of Innocence and how is he/she depicted in the Song of Experience? Do we find both aspects working in an average human being?

How would you explain the lines

For Mercy has a human heart,

Pity a human face,

And Love, the human form divine,

And Peace, the human dress.

Find out where the river Alph is.

Does the poem have a real geographical location? How does the poet mix up the real and the imaginary to give a sense of the surreal?

Pick out

contrasting images that are juxtaposed throughout the poem.

Pick out

images that strike the eye and images that strike the ear, both positive and negative.

Pick out

the words used to describe the movement of water.

What is the discordant note heard at the end of the third stanza? Can we relate this to the grandeur and turmoil that are a part of an emperor’s life?

Which are the lines that refer to magical elements?

What is poetic ecstasy likened to?

The poem is a fragment. What do you think has made it a lasting literary piece?

Write short descriptions of five other rare musical instruments that are used by folk cultures.

The poem is a product of the subconscious fusion of dream images and ideas from Coleridge’s wide reading. Which of the details in the poem do you think are factual, and which imaginary? Surf the internet to get interesting details.