First Attempt by S P Raj

5 The Gift in Wartime Tran Mong Tu (translated by Vann Phan)  Before Reading  Answer these questions. a. Have you ever experienced the death of someone close to you? If yes, how did  you feel? b. Is war always destructive? c. Using a cause-and-effect chart like the one given here, describe the immediate  effects that person’s death had on you and others.                                Cause Effect       Effect           Effect       Effect       Effect Tran Mong Tu was born and grown up in Hai Dong, North Vietnam in 1943. She worked for Associated Press in South Vietnam in the 1960s. She moved to the US in 1975 after South Vietnam fall. Tran had wanted to be a writer since elementary school, but her poetry was not published until she reached the United States. Today, she freque...

 English: Grade 11    page no. 251 4 . Who are you, little i? E. E. Cummings   Before Reading  Answer these questions. a. Have you ever looked out through a window and taken pleasure in what you  saw? If so, what did you look at? b. Which beautiful scenes do you think would make you want to look out through  the window? c. Do you write the pronoun ‘I’ capital or small in writing? E(dward) E(stlin) Cummings (1894-1962), often styled as e e cummings, was an American poet, painter, essayist, novelist, and playwright. He wrote approximately 2,900 poems, two autobiographical novels, four plays, and several essays, as well as numerous drawings and paintings. He developed the style of poetry writing for which he became renowned, with its unconventional use of capitalization, punctuation, spacing, and structure. He is regarded as an eminent voice of the 20th century English literature. Cummings’ poem 'who are you, little i' describes a child looking out a wind...

3. All the World's a Stage William Shakespeare  Before Reading  Answer these questions. a. How does life begin? b. Do you think that the whole world is a stage? c. Are we the actors in the world? What roles can a person play in his/her life? William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was an English poet, dramatist and actor of the Renaissance era. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in English language and the world's greatest dramatist. His most famous works include Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth.  This poem is taken from William Shakespeare's play As You Like It. With these words “all the world’s a stage” begins the monologue by the character Melancholy Jaques in Act II Scene VI of the play. In this poem, Shakespeare has compared life with a stage. The seven stages of a person’s life are infant, school going boy, lover/husband, soldier/fighter, justice/ability to understand the right and wrong, Pantalone (greediness and high in status) and old-ag...

2. A Red, Red Rose Robert Burns Before Reading Answer these questions. a. How do people express love? b. What is the symbolic meaning of ‘rose’? c. What images in nature would you use to express love? Robert Burns (1759-1796) was a Scottish poet and lyricist. He is considered the national poet of Scotland and a central figure in Scottish literature. His father was a tenant farmer, and Burns worked as a plowboy. He grew up poor but well-read and began writing poetry in Scottish dialect. As an adult, he was as unsuccessful as his father in making a living at farming. In 1791, however, he quit farming for good and moved his family to the nearby town of Dumfries. Never in good health, on the morning of July 21, 1796, he died in Dumfries at the age of 37. He is best known as a pioneer of the Romantic Movement for his lyrical poetry. The poem 'A Red, Red Rose' is a lyrical ballad that describes the speaker’s deep love for his beloved and promises that this love will last longer than ...