2. AN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CLASSROOM IN A SLUM BY STEPHEN SPENDER

COMPLETE SOLUTION OF THE POEM 'AN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL CLASSROOM IN A SLUM'

          (A) Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow.

                              “Far far from gusty waves these children’s faces.

                          Like rootless weeds, the hair torn around their pallor:

                                 The tall girl with her weighed-down head.

                                  The paper seeming boy, with rat’s eyes.”

Q1. Name the poem and the poet.

Ans:- The poem is “An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum” and the poet is Stephen Spender.

Q2. How do these children of the slum look?

Ans:- These lines have been taken from the poem “An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum” written by Stephen Spender. These children of slum appear sitting in their classroom in the pathetical condition. They are pale and their unkempt hair is scattered all over their faces. They look like rootless weeds in the garden as if they have no any proper origin.

Q3. Why is the girl sitting with her head down?

Ans:- The girl who is sitting there is very depressed. The burden of her thoughts has weighed-down her head.

Q4. Explain ‘weighed-down head’.

Ans:- The burden of poverty and misfortune has depressed that tall girl and bent down her head.

(B) Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow. 

                                              “The stunted unlucky heir

                         of twisted bones, reciting a father’s gnarled disease,

                          His lesson, from his desk. At back of the dim class

                     One unnoted, sweet and young. His eyes live in a dream,

                         Of squirrel’s game, in tree room, other than this.”

Q1. Who is the ‘unlucky heir’?

Ans:- The boy who has a stunted growth with twisted bones, sitting in the slum school classroom, is the ‘unlucky heir’.

Q2. What has the boy inherited?

Ans:- The boy is suffering from the disease which has been inherited from his father.

Q3. Who is sitting at the back of the dim classroom?

Ans:- There is a sweet young boy who is sitting at the back of the dim class. He has a dream in his eyes. He peeps out while dreaming of squirrel’s game in a tree.

(C) Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow.

                        “ On sour cream walls, donations. Shakespeare’s head,

                            Cloudless at dawn, civilized dome riding all cities.

                            Belled, flowery, Tyrolese valley. Open-handed map

                                              Awarding the world its world.”

Q1. What is the colour of the walls of slum school?

Ans:- The colour of the walls of slum school is yellow and pale like sour cream.

Q2. What has been put up on the walls?

Ans:- Many donated items have been put up on the walls of the classroom in the school of slum. These include a portrait of Shakespeare, a picture of the beautiful Tyrolese valley and a world’s map.

Q3. Explain ‘Awarding the world its world’.

Ans:- The map which is on the walls of classroom divides the world into countries, big and small. It forms the world with boundaries as we know it, thus awarding the world its world in a miniature form.

(D) Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow.

                                        “And yet, for these

             Children, these windows, not this map, their world,

                        When all their future is painted with fog,

                         A narrow street sealed In with a lead sky

                  Far far from rivers, capes and stars of worlds.”

Q1. What is the poet talking about these children?

Ans:- The poet is taking about the pathetic and poor living condition of children in the slum.

Q2. Which is their world?

Ans:- Their world is within dull and unpleasant classroom and its windows amongst the dirty surroundings of the slum.

Q3. Why is the future of these children ‘painted with fog’?

Ans:- The future of these children is dark and uncertain. That’s why the poet Spender says that it is ‘painted with a fog.’

(E) Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow.

              “Surely Shakespeare is wicked, the map a bad example,

                With ships and sun and love tempting them to steal-

                 For lives that slyly turn in their cramped holes

        From fog to endless night? On their slag heap, these children

         Wear skins peeped through by bones and spectacles of steel

                     With mended glass, like bottle bits on stones.”

Q1. Why is Shakespeare described as wicked?

Ans:- Shakespeare has been described as ‘wicked’ because his works have no meaning for these poor children of slum. Such slum schools hardly been provided any literary training. The children of slum haven’t ever heard such names.

Q2. Explain ‘from fog to endless night’.

Ans:- ‘From fog to endless night’ has been taken from stanza five of “An Elementary school classroom in a Slum”. It refers to the period from morning till night. It describes the miserable life of the poor helpless children in the slum. The children of the slum suffer since morning to night each day. There is no end to their pain and suffering.

Q3. What is the mean by ‘slag heap’?

Ans:- ‘Slag heap’ means a huge pile of waste material. The impoverished bodies of the slum children have been referred to as ‘slag heap’. It reveals the extreme poverty and misery of the slum people.

Q4. How do they live in their ‘holes’?

Ans:- They live like rats in their cramped little holes. For and darkness have conquered not only their congested little but their lives too.

(F) Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow.

                       “Break O break open till they break the town

          And show the children to green fields, and make their world

                     Run azure on gold sands, and let their tongues

              Run naked into books the white and green leaves open

                        History theirs whose language is the sun.”      

Q1. What is meant by ‘Break O break’?

Ans:- The poet Stephen Spender wants to bring these children out of their dirty environment. He wants them to break the fetter of slavery living in the slum and come out in the new dazzling world.

Q2. Who are those children?

Ans:- They are poor and hungry children of slum whose lives are in dark. They have no vision of future.

Q3. What does the poet want for them?

Ans:- The poet Spender expects for a better life for these children of the slum. He wants that they must be given a proper education and every kinds of facilities whatever are required for a common child.

 FROM OUT OF STANZA

Q1. What do you think is the colour of ‘sour cream’? Why do you think the poet has used this expression to describe the classroom walls?

Ans:- The colour of sour cream is pale yellow. The poet Spender has used this expression to show the poor and grim pathetical condition of the classroom.

Q2. The walls of the classroom are decorated with the pictures of ‘Shakespeare’, buildings with domes, ‘world maps’ and beautiful valleys. How do these contrast with the word of these children?

Ans:- ‘Shakespeare’ symbolizes the study of literature, ‘buildings with domes’ stand for power and riches, the ‘world maps’ represent the world outside and beautiful valleys’ refer to nature’s beauty. All these seem nothing valuable for the children of slum. They don’t really mean this anymore.

Q3. What does the poet want for the children of the slums? How can their lives be made to change?

Ans:- The poet wants a better life for these children of the slum, he also wants to bring out them from their pathetic and poor condition. The poet expects these children must be given better environment and enough facilities for study as  common children.