EXTRACT BASED QUESTIONS

I. Read the given stanzas and answer the questions that follow:
“The cardboard shows me how it was
When the two girl cousins went paddling,
Each one holding one of my mother’s hands,
And she the big girl- some twelve years or so”

1. What does cardboard mean in this context?

A A thick paper on which the poet’s photograph was pasted

B A thick envelope
C A thick piece of paper with a photo of the poet’s mother attached
D A paper boat

2. What does the cardboard depict?

A A scenery
B The picture of a house
C The picture of a school
D The picture of three girls

3. Who is the big girl mentioned here?

A The poet herself

B The poet’s mother
C The poet’s relative
D The poet’s friend

4. In the picture, what are the three of them doing?

A playing in the sand
B standing beside house
C holding hands
D holding hands and paddling

II. Read the given stanzas and answer the questions that follow:

“All three stood still to smile through their hair

At the uncle with the camera.
A sweet face, My mother’s,
that was before I was born.
And the sea, which appears to have changed less.
Washed their terribly transient feet.

1. What does the phrase “smiling through their hair” signify in the poem?
A The girls who were photographed had their hair decorated
B The photographed girls were wearing a mask
C When the girls were smiling for the camera, their hair was covering their faces.
D The hair of the girls in the picture was smiling as well

2. What has remained constant over time?

A The photo
B The cardboard
C The girls
D The sea

3. Identify a term in the extract that describes something as “lasting only briefly”?
A Still
B Transient
C Changed
D Less

4. What poetic device involving epithets was used in the poem?

A Terribly transient
B Through their
C Both wry
D Laboured ease

III. Read the given stanzas and answer the questions that follow:
“Some twenty-thirty-years later
She’d laugh at the snapshot.
“See Betty And Dolly, she’d say, “and look how they
Dressed us for the beach
The sea holiday Was her past, mine is her laughter
Both wry With the laboured ease of loss.”

1. Why did she laugh?

A Seeing the absurd dresses they were sporting while on holiday by the sea
B One of them cracked a joke
C Seeing the weird dresses they were wearing at the party
D Because they saw a funny man at the sea holiday

2. Who are Betty and Dolly?

A They are poet’s cousins
B They are poet’s friends
C They are poet’s mother’s friends
D They are poet’s mother’s cousins

3. The word ___________ in the extract is the synonym of photograph.

A Snapshot
B Picture
C Mine
D Laboured
 4. What do you mean by the word ‘wry’?
A ironic
B cry
C sad
D None of the above

IV. Read the given stanzas and answer the questions that follow:
“Now she’s been dead nearly as many years
As that girl lived
And of this circumstance
There is nothing to say at all
Its silence silences”
1. Who does she refer to?
A The poet’s dead aunt
B The poet’s dead mother
C The poet’s dead cousin
D The poet’s sister

2. Why is there nothing to be said regarding the poet’s mother’s passing?

A The poet is perplexed
B When her mother passed away, the poet was not in her senses
C The death of the poet’s mother has left a deep void in the poet’s heart
D The poet and her mother did not get along well

3. The phrase “events that change your life, over which you have no control” is
synonymous to which word in the extract?
A Silences
B Circumstances
C Situation
D Circumstance

4. What does the author feel in the last phase?

A pain and grief
B happy and nostalgic
C sad and nostalgic
D pain and nostalgic

V. Read the following extract and answer the questions that follow:
The cardboard shows me how it was When the two girl cousins went paddling, Each
one holding one of my mother’s hands, And she the big girl--some twelve years or so

(a) What does the cardboard refer to?

(b) Who was the big girl and how old was she?
(c) How did the cousins go paddling with mother?
 VI. Read the following extract carefully and answer the questions that follow.

All three stood still to smile through their hair At the uncle with the camera. A sweet
face, My mother’s, that was before I was born.

(a) Who does ‘all three’ refer to here?

(b) Where are they now?
(c) Why did they smile through their hair?

VII. Read the following extract and answer the questions that follow:
……………………..A sweet face, My mother’s, that was before I was born And the sea,
which appears to have changed less, Washed their transient feet.

(a) Where was her mother?

(b) When did this incident take place?

(c) What has stood the onslaught of time and what has not?

VIII. Read the following extract and answer the questions that follow:

Now she’s been dead nearly as many years As that girl lived. And of this circumstance
There is nothing to say at all, Its silence silences.

(a) When did the poet’s mother die?

(b) What is ‘this circumstance’?
(c) Explain: ‘Its silence silences’.

IX. Read the following extract carefully and answer the questions that follow:

Some twenty--thirty--years later She’d laugh at the snapshot. “See Betty And Dolly,”
she’d say, “and look how they Dressed us for the beach.”

(a) Who would laugh at the snapshot after twenty—thirty years later?
(b) How did mother remember her past?
(c) Who were Betty and Dolly?
 MCQ Based Questions

1. What is the subject of the poem “A Photograph”?

A About poet’s childhood memories
B tribute to the poet’s mother
C Poet’s photograph
D Poet’s father

2. What Epithet poetic device was used in the poem?

A Terribly transient
B Through their
C Both wry
D Laboured ease

3. What do you mean by the word ‘wry’?

A ironic
B cry
C sad
D None of the above

4. What is the most cherished memory of the poet?

A her mother’s memories
B her mother’s laughter
C her own vacation memories
D her childhood memories

5. After how many years did her mother laugh on seeing the photograph?
A twenty-one
B twenty-three
C twelve
D twenty-five|

6. Who was the photographer for the picture of her mother and cousin?
A Her grandfather
B Her uncle
C Her mother’s friend
D Her grandmother

7. Who is on both sides of her mother?

A Cousins, Betty and Dolly
B Parents
C Cousins, Dolly and Adam
D Friends

8. How many people were in the photograph?

A two girls
B three girls
C two girls and one boy
 D only her mother

9. What was the age of the poet’s mother when the photograph was taken?
A eleven years old
B thirteen years old
C twelve years old
D fourteen year old

10. Who is the poet/poetess of the poem “A Photograph”?

A Shirley Toulson
B Rudyard Kipling
C Elizabeth Jennings
D Markus Natten

11. What was the last phase in the poem?

A after her mother died
B after she grown up
C after her mother grown up
D None of the above

12. What does she feel in the last phase?

A pain and grief
B happy and nostalgic
C sad and nostalgic
D pain and nostalgic

13. How many phases were depicted in the poem by the poet?
A one
B two
C three
D four

14. What Oxymoron literary device was employed in the poem?

A Terribly transient
B Through their
C Both wry
D Laboured ease

15. In the picture, what are the three of them doing?

A playing
B standing beside house
C holding hands
D holding hands and went for paddling