Sir Stephen Harold Spender was born on February 28, 1909, in London. He attended Oxford University and fought in the Spanish Civil War. In the 1920s and 1930s, he associated with other poets and socialists, such as W.H. Auden, Christopher Isherwood, Louis MacNeice, and C. Day Lewis, and his early poetry was often inspired by social protest. During World War II Spender was a member of the National Fire Service (1941–44). After the war, he made several visits to the United States, teaching and lecturing at universities, and in 1965 he became the first non-American to serve as poetry consultant to the Library of Congress (now the laureate consultant in poetry) a position he held for one year. In 1970 he was appointed the professor of English at University College, London; he became professor emeritus in 1977. He was knighted in 1983. Spender died on July 16, 1995.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Poem
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. 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 the tree room, other than this.
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. And yet, for these
Children, these windows, not this world, are world,
Where all their future’s painted with a fog,
A narrow street sealed in with a lead sky,
Far far from rivers, capes, and stars of words.
Surely, Shakespeare is wicked, and 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.
All of their time and space are foggy slum.
So blot their maps with slums as big as doom.
Unless, governor, teacher, inspector, visitor,
This map becomes their window and these windows
That shut upon their lives like catacombs,
Break O break open ’till they break the town
And show the children 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 is theirs whose language is the sun.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Word Meanings
Gusty waves = stormy waves of the sea.
Weeds = wild plants.
pallor = pale and withered.
Gnarled = twisted.
Unnoted = unnoticed.
Dome = a large rounded roof, a ceiling that is shaped like half of a ball.
Cape = a point or extension of land jutting out into the water as a peninsula or as a projecting point.
Cramped = very narrow.
Slyly = secretly.
Slag = refuge, unwanted material, dross.
Blot = abolish, destroy.
Doom = death, ruin, very bad event, or situation that can not be avoided.
Catacomb = an underground place where people are buried.
Azure = the blue colour of the clear sky.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Theme
In this poem, Stephen Spender deals with the theme of social injustice and class inequalities. He presents the theme by talking of two different and incompatible worlds. The world of the rich and the civilized has nothing to do with the world of narrow lanes and cramped holes. The gap between these two worlds highlights social disparities and class inequalities.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Summary
Stephen Spender has presented a true picture of the life of the school children living in the slum of Tyrolese Valley of the Austrian Alpine Province. The children are in a very miserable condition due to their poverty and illiteracy. They are depressed. Their pale faces express sadness. They look lean, skinny, and bonny. They are like rootless weeds that can’t resist anything for their existence. They are physically very weak and undernourished. Spender voices his concern for these children who live all their life in slums and have no opportunity to enjoy the real blessings of life. He makes a frantic appeal to the educated and affluent sections of the society to better a lot of the slum children through education. It will remove social injustice and class inequality.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Detailed Analysis
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Analysis Stanza – 1
The poem describes an elementary school classroom in a slum. These slum children look very pathetic. Their faces are pale and reflect sadness. They are ‘like rootless weeds’ as they lack proper nutrition. Moreover, they are unwanted plants that grow on their own without being cared for, totally neglected. The tall girl has a ‘weighed – down head’ as she is burdened with a load of poverty. In fact, she is so subdued and suppressed that her head had bowed down with the burden of her misfortunes. The ‘paper-thin’ – extremely thin boy has ‘rat’s eyes’ because the poor undernourished boy is deprived of all the basic amenities of life. He is timid like a rat and full of anxiety, he searches for food and security. This unfortunate boy suffers from malnutrition and his growth is also ‘stunted’ – not properly developed. He has also inherited from his father ‘twisted bones’ – bent and distorted bones. He has inherited poverty, disease, and despair from his parents. His body is also deformed because of the twisted bones which he has inherited. He appears to be as sick as his parents. There is a sweet tender looking student who sits at the back of the class. This boy is different from the others as ‘his eyes live’ in a dream – he is dreaming and probably thinking about a better future. He is lost in his own world, therefore, not sad like the others. This boy thinks of the ‘squirrel’s game’ (metaphor). He wants to enjoy and play freely like the squirrel in the garden outside. The squirrel climbs trees and hides in their holes. The boy also dreams to be free but he cannot as he must sit in the dull and dreary classroom. In the boy’s imagination ‘tree room’ – the hollow in a tree, is full of fun, curiosity, and mystery. This is in contrast to the gloomy classroom.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Analysis Stanza – 2
The classroom is not well maintained. The pale cream walls which were painted long ago with the help of donations, make the place look more miserable and sad. Probably there is a portrait of Shakespeare on the wall. This is ironic as it is put up in a place where there is no serious teaching. ‘Cloudless dawn’ and ‘civilized dome’ suggest the monotonous life in the slum. These slums are surrounded by the civilized city and the children cannot experience the beauty of the sky at dawn and are unaware of it. All around them are concrete structures of the cities. The life in the slum contrasts with the cloudless sky at dawn and concrete structures that override the cities. There is also a picture of a beautiful valley full of sweet fragrant flowers and these children of the slum will never be able to experience this beauty. They are deprived of this beauty as they are condemned to live in the slums amidst garbage. The ‘open-handed map’ in the classroom contrasts with their world. The world given to us by God is full of all the bounties whereas the world of these slum children is full of poverty and hunger. The world which they see is not the real world. Their world is confined to the narrow, dusty streets of the slum. The map in the classroom gives them hopes and aspirations and motivates them to explore the world but they will never be able to see that world. These children can get a glimpse of the outside world from the windows and it is far beyond their reach. They are far away from nature. These slum children have a bleak and foggy future in store for them. ‘Their future is painted with a fog’ – it is blurred by hopelessness. There is no hope for the slum children. Instead of the normal blue sky, they live under the ‘lead sky’ – dark and dull, polluted – shows there is no hope for them. The atmosphere hints at their monotonous life and the slum children remain confined throughout their lives confined to the filth and dirt of the narrow slum streets. They are away from the glory of the natural beauty of the rivers, mountains, stars, etc.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Analysis Stanza – 3
The children of the slum are fighting the battle of life unarmed. They are troubled by disease and despair. For them, Shakespeare is ‘wicked’ and ‘map’ a bad example’. The literary excellence of Shakespeare and the scenic beauty portrayed in the map cannot relieve them from their despair. For these slum children, literary excellence is a far-fetched thing and hence seems wicked. The map on the wall gives them false aspirations as it makes them aware of the beautiful world given by God. The world of these children is confined to the narrow streets of the slums. Therefore, the map is ‘a bad example’. They feel cheated in being deprived of the thrilling sensations of the sun, the ships, and the emotions of love. The ‘ship’, ‘sun’, and ‘love’ symbolize joy and happiness which these children are deprived of. Their only experience is that of hunger and poverty. To reach out to the world beyond, these children are sometimes tempted to adopt the wrong means even stealing to fulfill their dreams.
These slum children live in cramped holes, striving and struggling for survival in the small, dirty rooms from ‘fog to endless night’ – from foggy mornings till long endless nights, trying to meet both ends. The slum children live on ‘slag heaps’ – piles of waste material. Their world is full of dirt and garbage. These children are very weak and undernourished. They look like skeletons as their bones peep through their thin skin.
They wear ‘spectacles of steel with mended glass’ – discarded spectacles by the rich, mended (repaired) and worn. Their life is like ‘bottle bits on stones – shattered and broken like bits of a bottle on a stone. They are deprived of even the basic amenities of life. Their world is comprised of the foggy slums where they live nightmares. Slums are the reality for these children, their home, where they spend their life. The maps displayed in their classroom are no reality for them. They cannot locate their slum in that map. It is urgently required to give these slum inhabitants means and opportunities to lead a dignified and civilized life.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Analysis Stanza – 4
The elementary school in the slum exists for namesake. The infrastructure is poor with hardly any serious teaching. The school springs in activity only when a governor, a school inspector, or a visitor comes on a round of the school. The administrative machinery of the school also gears up at that time. Then the map becomes their window from where they can see the world beyond their slums. Since they are confined to the slums, these sights and glimpses are shut upon them as they are deprived of all opportunities and means. Their lives are shut up in the cemeteries of these slums where they slither and slog to make both ends meet. The poet hopes that these children will break free from their morbid life, from the chains of the slums. He appeals to those in power to liberate these children from the miserable slums and enable them to breathe in the fresh, beautiful, and healthy environment away from the foggy slums. They should be able to bask in the open green fields and let them run free on the golden sands. Their world should not be confined to the horrendous and gory slums. The poet visualizes freedom for these children. He wants a carefree life where they get economic and social justice, where they have the right to be happy. These slum children should be able to enjoy the fundamental right to education otherwise their lives will be miserable. They should be able to learn not from books alone but also from the world, the nature around them.
The poet ends on a note of positivity and wants opportunities to be available to these children. The people who strive for knowledge are the ones who create history. The ones who are let free are the ones who will create history. People who outshine others, who glow like the sun, who break free from the constraints of their restricted life are the ones who create history.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Questions and Answers (2 Marks)
Q1. Describe the slum children mentioned in the poem?
Ans. The slum school children are ill-fed and undernourished. Their faces lack the spark of life. Their hair hangs about their pale faces like rootless weeds. They look weak and tired. Some of these children have inherited their parent’s diseases. They lack vigour and vitality and show no interest in their lessons.
Q2. How does the poet describe the classroom walls?
Ans. The classroom walls have not been painted for years. They are off-white in colour like sour cream. There is a portrait of Shakespeare and a map of the world hanging in the classroom. Besides, there are some pictures of some beautiful places. All these wall hangings look irrelevant and out of place in the dark and dismal surroundings.
Q3. Why does the poet Stephen Spender say that the pictures and maps are meaningless? /Why does Spender call Shakespeare wicked and the map a bad example?
Ans. The pictures, portraits, and maps present a sharp contrast to the reality of slum children’s lives. These children live in dark cramped places devoid of beauty and sunshine. Shakespeare can not inspire noble thoughts into the minds of these children who have no basic necessities of life. These pictures and maps exhibit a world of opportunities that is so far away that the slum children cannot even dream of reaching out to them. This is why these pictures and maps are meaningless and a bad example.
Q4. What does the poet want for the children of slums? How can their lives be made to change?
Ans. The poet wants these children to get a real and meaningful education that would open up a world of opportunities for them. He wishes that these children ought to be brought out of their dark and dingy world. He wishes these children to come out and play into green fields and golden sands.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Important Extracts
An Elementary School………….. Extract – 1
(a) Read the following extracts and answer the questions that follow:
The stunted, unlucky heir of twisted bones, reciting a father’s
Gnarled disease, His lessons 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 the tree room, other than this.
Questions:
Q1. Who is the unlucky heir? Why is he called unlucky?
Ans. The thin slum boy is the unlucky heir. He is so-called because he has inherited poverty, despair, and disease from his parents.
Q2. Who sits back unnoted? Why?
Ans. A young boy sits at the back. This boy is different from the others as ‘his eyes live’ in a dream – he is dreaming and probably thinking about a better future. He is lost in his own world, therefore, not sad like the others. This boy thinks of the ‘squirrel’s game’. He wants to enjoy and play freely like the squirrel in the garden outside.
Q3. Pick two images each of despair and disease from these lines.
Ans. The images of despair are – ‘unlucky heir’, ‘dim class’, and that of diseases are – ‘twisted bones, gnarled disease’.
An Elementary School………….. Extract – 2
(b) Read the following extracts and answer the questions that follow:
And yet, for these
Children, these windows, not this map, their world,
Where all their future’s painted with a fog,
A narrow street sealed in with a lead sky
Far far from rivers, capes and stars of words.
Questions
Q1. Who are these children?
Ans. These are the slum children of Tyrol Valley.
Q2. What is their world like?
Ans. The school windows are their world because they cannot move beyond them.
Q3. What kind of future does the poet foresee for them?
Ans. The future of these children is quite dim. As we can’t see things in the fog, in the same way the future of these children is looming under darkness. Their future is bleak.
Q4. Why does the poet say that the narrow street is sealed?
Ans. The narrow street is sealed as these provide no opportunity to make access to the outer world of wisdom.
An Elementary School………….. Extract – 3
(c) Read the following extracts and answer the questions that follow:
Unless, governor, inspector, visitor,
This map becomes their window and these windows
That shut upon their lives like catacombs,
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 white green leaves open
History is theirs whose language is the son.
Questions:Q1. Who can improve a lot of the poor slum children?
Ans. The rulers, the educationists, the teachers, and the general public can pool their efforts to give a better life to the poor slum children.
Q2. What kind of life do they live in?
Ans. They are shut up in their dim classrooms and small hovels like dead bodies in the grave.
Q3. What is the poet’s appeal to the upper-class people?
Ans. The poet urges them to bring some light into the lives of the slum children. They may be imparted education in a healthy atmosphere.
Q4. What should they break?
Ans. They should break all barriers and obstructions that hinder the school children’s growth.
Q5. What kind of a world does the poet imagine for these children?
Ans. The poet imagines a world where these children run around in the fields or on sea beaches in a carefree manner. They should also enjoy the freedom of knowledge and expression.
Q6. What does the word ‘sun’ symbolize?
Ans. ‘Sun’ symbolizes light and brightness which, comes from education. Proper education alone can improve the lives of these slum children.
Q7. What is the poet’s advice?
Ans. The poet suggests that the slum children should not only be educated properly but also removed from their dirty surroundings to sunny and green fields.
Q8. Explain: “History is theirs whose language is the sun.”
Ans. The language that has warmth and power of the sun only can mould and write history.
Q9. What does the poet want for the children of the slums? How can their lives be made to change?
Ans. The poet wants an improvement in the quality of the lives of the slum children. He feels that the government has a moral obligation to provide a meaningful education to these children and to break down the barriers that stand in the way of improving their lives.
An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Important Stanzas For Comprehension
Read the stanzas given below and answer the questions that follow each:
1.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.
Questions
(a)Where, do you think, are these children sitting?
(b)How do the faces and hair of these children look?
(c)Why is the head of the tall girl ‘weighed down’?
(d)What do you understand by ‘The paper-seeming boy, with rat eyes’ ?
Answers:
(a)These children are sitting in the school classroom in a slum which is far far away from the winds or waves blowing strongly.
(b)The faces of these children look pale. Their uncombed and unkempt hair look like rootless wild plants.
(c)The head of the tall girl is ‘weighed down’ by the burdens of the world. She feels depressed, ill and exhausted.
(d)It means that the boy is exceptionally thin, weak and hungry.
2.…………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 the tree room, other than this.
Questions
(a)Who is the ‘unlucky heir’ and what will he inherit ?
(b)What is the stunted boy reciting ?
(c)Who is sitting at the ‘back of the dim class’ ?
(d) ‘His eyes live in a dream’—what dream does he have ?
Answers:
(a)The lean and thin boy having rat’s eyes and a stunted growth is the ‘unlucky heir’. He will inherit twisted bones from his father.
(b)He is reciting a lesson from his desk. He is enumerating systematically how his father developed the knotty disease.
(c)A sweet young boy sits at back of this dim class. He sits there unnoticed.
(d)The boy seems hopeful. He dreams of a better time—outdoor games, of a squirrel’s game, of a room made inside the stem of a tree. He dreams of many things other than this dim and unpleasant classroom has, such as green fields, open seas.
3.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.
Questions
(a) What is the colour of the classroom walls?What does this colour suggest ?
(b) What do these classroom walls have ?
(c) Which two worlds does the poet hint at?How is the contrast between the two worlds presented?
(d) Explain:(i) ‘Open-handed map’
(ii) ‘Awarding the world its world’.
Answers:
(a)The colour of the classroom walls is ‘sour cream’ or off white. This colour suggests the decaying aspect and pathetic condition of the lives of the children in a slum-school.
(b) The walls of the classroom have pictures of Shakespeare, buildings with domes, world maps and beautiful valleys.
(c)The poet hints at two worlds : the world of poverty, misery and malnutrition of the slums where children are underfed, weak and have stunted growth. The other world is of progress and prosperity peopled by the rich and the powerful. The pictures on the wall suggesting happiness, richness, well being and beauty are in stark contrast to the dim and dull slums.
(d) (i) ‘Open handed-map’ suggests the map of the world drawn at will by powerful people/ dictators like Hitler.
(ii) ‘Awarding the world its world’ suggests how the conquerors and dictators award and divide the world according to their whims. This world is the world of the rich and important people.
4.…………And yet, for these
Children, these windows, not this map, their world,
Where all their future’s painted with a fog,
A narrow street sealed ip with a lead sky
Far far from rivers, capes, and stars of words.
Questions [All India 2014]
(a)What are the ‘children’ referred to here?
(b) Which is their world?
(c) How is their life different from that of other children? id) What is the future of these children?
Answers:
(a)Those children are referred to here who study in an elementary school classroom.
(b) Their world is limited to the window of the classroom. They are confined only within the narrow streets of the slum, i.e., far away from the open sky and rivers. Their view is full of despair and despondency. The life of the children seem to be bleak.
(c) “The slum children spend their life only in the narrow streets of the land. They do not get the basic necessities of life. They are deprived of food, clothing and shelter. But the main thing that they differ from other children is freedom. They do not enjoy the freedom of life.
(d) The future of these children is uncertain and bleak.
5. 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?
Questions [Delhi 2014]
(a)Who are ‘them’ referred to in the first line?
(b)What tempts them?
(c)What does the poet say about ‘their’ lives?
(d)Explain: ‘From fog to endless night’.
Answers:
(а)Here ‘them’ refers to the children studying in a slum school.
(b)All beautiful things like ships, sun and love tempt the children of slum school.
(c) The poet says that the children spend their lives confined in their cramped holes like rodents. Their bodies look like skeletons because they are the victims of malnutrition. Their steel-frame spectacles with repaired glasses make them appear like the broken pieces of a bottle scattered on stones. Their future seems to be bleak. id) Their future is foggy or uncertain. The only certainty in their lives is the endless night of their death. In other words, their birth, life and death are all enveloped by darkness.
6.………On their slag heap, these children
Wear skins peeped through by bones and spectacles of steel With mended glass, like bottle bits on stones.
AII of their time and space are foggy slum.
So blot their maps with slums as big as doom.
Questions
(a)What are the two images used to describe these slums? What do these images convey?
(b)What sort of life do such children lead?
(c)What blot’ their maps? Whose maps?
(d)What does the poet convey through ‘So blot their maps with slums as big as doom’?
Answers:
(а)The images used to describe the slums are:
(i)slag heap
(ii)bottle bits on stones
(iii)foggy slums
(iv)slums as big as doom. (Any two acceptable)
These images convey the misery of the children and the poverty of their dirty and unhygienic surroundings.
(b)In the dirty and unhygienic surroundings the slum children lead very pathetic and miserable lives full of woes, wants, diseases, poverty and uncertainty.
(c) These living hells i.e. these dirty slums blot their maps. These are the maps of the civilized world—the world of the rich and great.
(d) The poet conveys his protest against social injustice and class inequalities. He wants the islands of prosperity to be flooded with the dirt and stink of the slums.
7. Unless, governor, inspector, visitor,
This map becomes their Window and these windows
That shut upon their lives like catacombs.
Questions
(a)Why does the poet invoke ‘governor’, ‘inspector’, ‘visitor’? What function are they expected to perform?
(b)How can ‘this map’ become ‘their window*?
(c)What have ‘these windows’ done to their lives?
(d)What do you understand by ‘catacombs’?
Answers:
(a)Governor, inspector and visitor are important and powerful persons in the modem times. The poet invokes them to help the miserable slum children. They are expected to perform an important role in removing social injustice and class inequalities. They can abridge the gap between the two worlds—the beautiful world of the great and rich and the ugly world of slums.
(b)Two worlds exist. This map’ refers to the beautiful world of prosperity and well being inhabited by the rich and great and shaped and owned by them. Their windows’ refer to the lairs, holes or hovels of the dirty, stinking slums where the poor and unfortunate children of slums live. The slum children will be able to peep through windows only when the difference between the two worlds is abridged.
(c)These windows’ of dirty surroundings have cramped their lives, stunted their growth and blocked their physical as well as mental development. They have shut them inside their filthy, dull and drab holes like the underground graves.
(d) ‘Catacombs’ means a long underground gallery with excavations in its sides for tombs. The name catacombs, before the seventeenth century was applied to the subterranean cemeteries, near Rome.
8. 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.
Questions
(a)‘Break O break open’. What should they ‘break*?
(b)Explain: ‘. till they break the town’.
(c)Where will ‘their world’ extend up to then ?
(d)What other freedom should they enjoy?
Answers:
(a)They should break all the barriers and obstacles that bind these children and confine
them to ugly and dirty surroundings.
(b)Till they come out of the dirty surroundings and slums of the town and come out to the green field and breathe in the open air.
(c)Then their world will be extended to the gold sands and azure waves as well as to the green fields.
(d) They should enjoy freedom of acquiring knowledge as well as freedom of expression. Let the pages of wisdom (contained in the books) be open to them and let their tongues run freely without any check or fear.
QUESTIONS FROM TEXTBOOK SOLVED
Q1. Tick the item which best answers the following.
(a)The tall girl with her head weighed down means The girl
(i)is ill and exhausted
(ii)has her head bent with shame
(iii)has untidy hair.
(b)The paper-seeming boy with rat’s eyes means The boy is
(i)sly and secretive
(ii)thin, hungry and weak
(iii)unpleasant looking.
(c)The stunted, unlucky heir of twisted bones means The boy
(i)has an inherited disability
(ii)was short and bony.
(d)His eyes live in a dream. A squirrel’s game, in the tree room other than this means The boy is
(i)Full of hope in the future
(ii)mentally ill
(iii)distracted from th,e lesson.
(e)The children’s faces are compared to ‘rootless weeds’
This means they
(i)are insecure
(ii)are ill-fed
(iii)are wasters
Ans: (a)(i) is ill and exhausted
(b)(ii) thin, hungry and weak
(c)(i) has an inherited disability
(d)(i) full of hope in the future
(e)(i) are insecure.
Q2. 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 off white. The poet has used this expression to suggest the decaying aspect. The deterioration in the colour of the classroom walls symbolises the pathetic condition of the lives of the scholars—the children of this slum school.
Q3. 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 world of these children?
Ans: The pictures that decorate the walls hold a stark contrast with the world of these underfed, poverty-stricken, slum children living in cramped dark holes. Obstacles hamper their physical and mental growth. The pictures on the wall suggest beauty, well-being, progress and prosperity—a world of sunshine and warmth of love. But the world of the slum children is ugly and lack prosperity.
Q4. What does the poet want for the children of the slums? How can their lives be made to change?
Ans: The poet wants the people in authority to realise their responsibility towards the children of the slums. All sort of social injustice and class inequalities be ended by eliminating the obstacles that confine the slum children to their ugly and filthy surroundings. Let them study and learn to express themselves freely. Then they will share the fruit of progress and prosperity and their fives will change for the better.
MORE QUESTIONS SOLVED
SHORT ANSWER TYPE QUESTIONS (Word Limit: 30-40 words)
Q1. In the opening stanza the imagery is that of despair and disease. Read the poem and underline the words /phrases that bring out these images.
Ans: The following words/phrases bring out these images of despair and disease:
‘Rootless weeds’; ‘the air tom round their pallor’;
The tall girl with her weighed-down head’;
The paper-seeming boy, with rat’s eyes’.
‘The stunted, unlucky heir of twisted bones’.
‘gnarled disease’.
Q2. Why does Stephen Spender use the images of despair and disease in the first stanza of the poem and with what effect?
Ans: He uses the images of despair and disease to describe the miserable and pathetic fives of the children living in slums. The faces of these children are pale and lifeless. They and their hair are like ‘rootless weeds’. The burden of fife makes them sit with their head ‘weighed down’. The stunted growth is depicted by ‘the paper-seeming bo/ and ‘the stunted unlucky heir of twisted bones’. Their weak bodies recite their fathers’ ‘gnarled disease’.
Q3. In spite of despair and disease pervading the lives of the slum children, they are not devoid of hope. Give an example of their hope or dream.
Ans: The burden of poverty and disease crushes the bodies of these slum children but not their souls. They still have dreams. Even their foggy future has not crashed all their hopes. They dream of open seas, green fields and about the games that a squirrel plays in the tree room.
Q4. How does Stephen Spender picturise the condition of the slum children?
Ans: Stephen Spender uses contrasting images in the poem to picturise the condition of the slum children. For example:
“A narrow street sealed in with a lead sky Far far from rivers, capes and stars of words.”
The first line presents the dark, narrow, cramped holes and lanes closed in by the bluish grey sky. The second fine presents a world of beauty, prosperity, progress, well-being and openness.
Q5. What is the theme of the poem ‘An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum’ ? How has it been presented?
Ans: In this poem Stephen Spender deals with the theme of social injustice and class inequalities. He presents the theme by talking of two different and incompatible worlds. The world of the rich and the ‘civilized’ has nothing to do with the world of narrow lanes and cramped holes. The gap between these two worlds highlights social disparities and class inequalities.
Q6. What message does Stephen Spender convey through the poem An Elementary School Classroom in a. Slum’ ? What solution does he offer?
Ans: Stephen Spender conveys the message of social justice and class equalities by presenting two contrasting and incompatible worlds. He provides a way out. For achieving any significant progress and development the gap between the two worlds must be abridged. This can be done only by breaking the barriers that bind the slum children in dark, narrow, cramped holes and lanes. Let them be made mentally and physically free to lead happy lives. Only then art, culture and literature will have relevance for them.
Q7. How do the conquerors and dictators change this world ?
Ans: The conquerors and dictators change the map of the world according to their whims and will. They change the boundaries of various nations and shape the ‘map’. Their fair map is of a beautiful world full of domes, bells and flowers, rivers, capes and stars.
Q8. Th e poet says. Aria yet. for these Children, these windows, not this map, their world’. Which world do these children belong to? Which world is irue ecssihlc to them?
Ans: The world of stinking slums is the world that belongs to these poverty-stricken, ill-fed, under-nourished children. The narrow lanes and dark, cramped, holes or hovels make their world. The world of ‘domes’, ‘bells’ and ‘flowers’ meant for the rich is inaccessible to them. They can only dream of rivers, capes and stars.
Q9. Which images of the slums in the third stanza pr sent the picture of social disparity, injustice and class inequalities.
Ans: The slum dwellers slyly turn in their ‘cramped holes’ from birth to death i.e. ‘from fog to endless nights’. Their surroundings are ‘slag heap’. Their children “wear skins peeped through by bones.’ Their spectacles are “like bottle bits on stones.” The image that sums up their harsh existence reads : “All of their time and space are foggy slum.”
Q10. So blot their maps with slums as big as do,in;” says Stephen Spender. What does the poet want to convex?
Ans: The poet notices the creation of two different worlds—the dirty slums with their narrow lanes and cramped houses which are virtual hells. Then there are islands of prosperity and beauty where the rich and powerful dwell. The poet protests against the disparity between the lives of the people in these two worlds. He wants that the poor should enjoy social equality and justice. The fair ‘map’ of the world should have blots of slums as big as doom. The gap must be reduced between the two worlds.
Q11. Stephen Spender while writing about an elementary classroom in a slum, questions the value of education in such a milieu, suggesting that maps of the world and good literature may raise hopes and aspirations, which win never be fulfilled. Yet the gown offers a solution/hope. What is it?
Ans: The slum children are being imparted education in a room whose walls are off-white in colour but are decorated with the pictures of ‘Shakespeare’, ‘buildings with domes’, “world maps’ and ‘beautiful valleys’. The maps of the world and good literature may raise hopes and aspirations. They may try to steal slyly from their milieu but it is quite unlikely that their hopes and aspirations may be fulfilled. The only solution/hope for them is to break the artificial barriers that bind and cramp them. Once free from their milieu, they can enjoy beauty.
Q12. How can powerful persons viz. governor,inspector,visitor may contribute to improve the lot of slum children?
Ans: Powerful persons like governors, inspectors and visitors may take an initiative and start abridging the gap between the worlds of the rich and poor. They can play an important and effective role in removing social injustice and class inequalities. They should break and dismantle all the barriers that bind these children and confine them to the ugly surroundings. They will have their physical and mental development only when they leave the filthy and ugly slums. All good things of life should be within their reach. They must enjoy the freedom of expression.
Q13. How far do you agree with the statement: “History is theirs whose language is the sun.”
Ans: This metaphor contains a vital truth. This world does not listen to the ‘dumb and driven’ people. Only those who speak with confidence, power, authority and vision are heard and obeyed. Those who create history are people whose ideas and language can motivate, move, inspire and influence millions of people. In order to be effective, their language must have the warmth and power of the Sun.
Q14. How are the decorations on the wall of the elementary school room different from their
lives?”
Ans: Here through these pictures the poet wants to suggest the prosperity, progress, well being and development of the civilized world. But the slum world of these poor children is in the troubled state of life. They are devoid of education, money and other necessities of life. They are underfed and live in dire poverty on the heaps of waste. Their bonny bodies can be seen through their skins. So the poet contrasts the poor world with the rich and civilized world.
MCQ Questions for Class 12 English Flamingo Poem 2 An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum with Answers
Question 1.
Identify the literary device in ‘slums as big as doom’.
(a) simile
(b) metaphor
(c) alliteration
(d) personification
Answer
Answer: (a) simile
Question 2.
Identify the literary device in ‘whose language is the sun’.
(a) simile
(b) metaphor
(c) alliteration
(d) personification
Answer
Answer: (b) metaphor
Question 3.
‘Break O break’. What should they break?
(a) the donations
(b) all bathers
(c) the slums
(d) the schools
Answer
Answer: (b) all bathers
Question 4.
The imprisoned minds and lives of the slum children can be released from their bondage if they are given an experience of the outer world.
(a) never
(b) soon
(c) eventually
(d) magically
Answer
Answer: (d) magically
Question 5.
Identify the literary device in ‘spectacles of steel’.
(a) simile
(b) metaphor
(c) alliteration
(d) personification
Answer
Answer: (b) metaphor
Question 6.
The last stanza is unlike the rest of the poem.
(a) long
(b) short
(c) optimistic
(d) pessimistic
Answer
Answer: (c) optimistic
Question 7.
Where do their lives ‘slyly turn’?
(a) in their cramped holes
(b) towards the sun
(c) towards the school
(d) towards the windows
Answer
Answer: (a) in their cramped holes
Question 8.
The map is a bad example as it makes one aware of
(a) the beautiful world
(b) cleaner lanes
(c) the political structure
(d) the civil design
Answer
Answer: (a) the beautiful world
Question 9.
Identify the literary device in ‘future’s painted with a fog’.
(a) simile
(b) metaphor
(c) alliteration
(d) personification
Answer
Answer: (b) metaphor
Question 10.
Shakespeare is wicked because he the children.
(a) educates
(b) tempts
(c) loves
(d) hates
Answer
Answer: (b) tempts
Question 11.
What does the map represent?
(a) world of the rich and powerful
(b) world of the poor
(c) world of the slum school children
(d) world the poet wants for the slum children
Answer
Answer: (a) world of the rich and powerful
Question 12.
What is the stunted boy reciting?
(a) the lesson from his desk
(b) Shakespeare’s poetry
(c) leaves of nature
(d) his composition
Answer
Answer: (a) the lesson from his desk
Question 13.
‘On sour cream walls. Donations’ suggests
(a) schools are well equipped
(b) schools are small but they try to impart education
(c) schools have a poor and ill-equipped environment
(d) schools meet the education requirements of the children through donations
Answer
Answer: (c) schools have a poor and ill-equipped environment
Question 14.
Who sits at the back of the class?
(a) a sweet and young pupil
(b) a paper seeming boy
(c) a tall girl
(d) a girl with hair like rootless weeds
Answer
Answer: (a) a sweet and young pupil
Question 15.
The colour of sour cream is
(a) white
(b) yellow
(c) off-white
(d) pale
Answer
Answer: (c) off-white
Question 16.
The paper-seeming boy with rat’s eyes’ means the boy is
(a) sly and secretive
(b) short and lean
(c) hungry and thin
(d) sad and depressed
Answer
Answer: (c) hungry and thin
Question 17.
Identify the literary device in ‘father’s gnarled disease’.
(a) simile
(b) metaphor
(c) alliteration
(d) personification
Answer
Answer: (b) metaphor
Question 18.
Identify the literary device in `rat’s eyes’.
(a) simile
(b) metaphor
(c) alliteration
(d) personification
Answer
Answer: (b) metaphor
Question 19.
Identify the literary device in ‘like roofless weeds’.
(a) simile
(b) metaphor
(c) alliteration
(d) personification
Answer
Answer: (a) simile
Question 20.
What does ‘gusty waves’ imply?
(a) slum children
(b) energetic children
(c) deceased children
(d) unhappy children
Answer
Answer: (b) energetic children
Question 21.
What does the expression ‘Break O break open’ suggest?
(a) barriers on the road
(b) barriers of garbage heap
(c) barriers of dirty environment must be broken
(d) None
Answer
Answer: (c) barriers of dirty environment must be broken
Question 22.
What have the windows done to the children’s lives in the poem?
(a) shut the doors
(b) blocked the passage
(c) clocked the Sunlight
(d) have shut the children inside and blocked their growth
Answer
Answer: (d) have shut the children inside and blocked their growth
Question 23.
What does the poet show through expressions ‘so blot their maps with slums as big as doom’?
(a) his clot the street
(b) enjoy the maps
(c) big maps
(d) poet’s protest against social injustice and inequalities
Answer
Answer: (d) poet’s protest against social injustice and inequalities
Question 24.
Mention any two images used to explain the plight of the slum children.
(a) open handed map
(b) from his desk
(c) belled, flowery
(d) foggy slums and bottle bits on stones
Answer
Answer: (d) foggy slums and bottle bits on stones
Question 25.
What attracts the slum children?
(a)The animals
(b) The movies
(c) icecream
(d) All beautiful things like ship, Sun
Answer
Answer: (d) All beautiful things like ship, Sun
Question 26.
In what sense are the slum chidren different?
(a) their IQ
(b) their wisdom
(c) their dresses
(d) because of no access to hope and openness of the world
Answer
Answer: (d) because of no access to hope and openness of the world
Question 27.
What does the expression ‘Open handed map ” show?
(a) power of the poor
(b) the poor are powerful
(c) the poor are powerless
(d) maps are drawn at the orders of the powerful people like hitler
Answer
Answer: (d) maps are drawn at the orders of the powerful people like hitler
Question 28.
What is the stunted boy reciting?
(a) a happy song
(b) a religious song
(c) a sad song
(d) a lesson from desk
Answer
Answer: (d) a lesson from desk
Question 29.
Who was sitting at the back of the dim class?
(a) a girl
(b) an old man
(c) a teacher
(d) an unnoticed young boy
Answer
Answer: (d) an unnoticed young boy
Question 30.
What kind of look the faces and hair of the children give?
(a) a rich and beautiful
(b) organized
(c) healthy
(d) pale faces and scattered and undone hair
Answer
Answer: (d) pale faces and scattered and undone hair
Question 31.
Why is the head of the tall girl ‘weighed down’?
(a) by the burden of studies
(b) by the burden of work
(c) by the burden of the world
(d) All these
Answer
Answer: (c) by the burden of the world
Question 32.
What does the poet wish for the children of the slums?
(a) He wish them to be happy and healthy
(b) He wishes a good change for them
(c) he wants them to lead a healthy and happy life
(d) All these
Answer
Answer: (d) All these
Question 33.
How can powerful people help the poor children?
(a) by fighting with the government
(b) by fighting with the powerful
(c) by bridging gaps of inequalities and injustice
(d) by fighting with the rich
Answer
Answer: (c) by bridging gaps of inequalities and injustice
Question 34.
What do Catacombs signify?
(a) underground cemetry showing irrelevance of the map hanging on the wall of the classroom
(b) irrelevance of the classroom
(c) irrelevance of the school
(d) irrelevance of the children
Answer
Answer: (a) underground cemetry showing irrelevance of the map hanging on the wall of the classroom
Question 35.
What was the boy with rat’s eyes trying to escape from?
(a) bright light outside
(b) openness of trees
(c) dim light of the class
(d) children in the room
Answer
Answer: (c) dim light of the class
Question 36.
What do the faces of children in the slum areas reflect?
(a) happiness
(b) their aspirations
(c) their happiness
(d) sadness and lack of enthusiasm
Answer
Answer: (d) sadness and lack of enthusiasm
Question 37.
What are the poetic devices used in the poem?
(a) alliteration and simile
(b) metaphor and imagery
(c) synecdoche, and irony
(d) All these
Answer
Answer: (d) All these
Question 38.
What kind of life the children living in slums have?
(a) full of love
(b) full of care and warmth
(c) Hopeless and full of struggle
(d) all these
Answer
Answer: (c) Hopeless and full of struggle
Question 39.
What does the poet portray in the poem?
(a) young minds
(b) playfulness of the children
(c) questions of young mind
(d) the plight of young children in the slums
Answer
Answer: (d) the plight of young children in the slums
Question 40.
Who has written Elementary School Classroom in a Slum?
(a) Kipling
(b) Wordsworth
(c) Kamlanath
(d) Stephen Spender
Answer
Answer: (d) Stephen Spender
Question 41.
What does the poet want?
(a) to send the children out of the slums
(b) to send the children to America
(c) to send the children to open fields
(d) to send the children to a beach
Answer
Answer: (a) to send the children out of the slums
Question 42.
What other freedom the poet wants the slum children to enjoy?
(a) Freedom of roaming
(b) freedom to spend money
(c) freedom to eat
(d) freedom of knowledge, wisdom and expression
Answer
Answer: (d) freedom of knowledge, wisdom and expression
Question 43.
What do the ‘governor’, inspector, visitor in the poem depict?
(a) higher officials
(b) Government officials
(c) Political people
(d) Powerful and influential people
Answer
Answer: (d) Powerful and influential people
Question 44.
What blots the maps of the slum children?
(a) garbage
(b) blockage
(c) stones in the streets
(d) Dirty slums
Answer
Answer: (d) Dirty slums
Question 45.
What do the words ‘From fog to endless night mean?
(a) bright light outside
(b) bright future
(c) hopelessness
(d) Dark and uncertain future of slum children from birth to death
Answer
Answer: (d) Dark and uncertain future of slum children from birth to death