Gujarat Board GSEB Class 8 English Textbook Solutions Honeydew Poem 5 The School Boy Textbook Exercise Important Questions and Answers, Notes Pdf.

Gujarat Board Textbook Solutions Class 8 English Honeydew Poem 5 The School Boy

GSEB Class 8 English The School Boy Text Book Questions and Answers

Working With The Poem

Answer the following questions:
Question 1.
Find three or four words / phrases in stanza 1 that reflect the child’s happiness and joy.
Answer:
The phrases that reflect the child’s joy and happiness are ‘love to rise in a summer morn’, ‘birds sing on every tree’, ‘the skylark sings with me’ and ‘sweet company’.

Question 2.
In stanza 2, the mood changes. Which words / phrases reflect the changed mood?
Answer:
The phrases that reflect the changed mood are ‘It drives all Joy away’ and ‘spend the day In sighing and dismay’.

Question 3.
‘A cruel eye outworn’ (stanza 2) refers to ……………
(i) the classroom which is shabby / noisy.
(ii) the lessons which are difficult / uninteresting.
(iii) the dull / uninspiring life at school with lots of work and no play.
Mark the answer that you consider right.
Answer:
(iii) the dull / uninspiring life at school with lots of work and no play.

Question 4.
‘Nor sit in learning’s bower,
Worn thro’ with the dreary shower.’ Which of the following is a close paraphrase of the lines above ?
(i) Nor can I sit in a roofless classroom when it is raining.
(ii) Nor can I learn anything at school though teachers go on lecturing and explaining.
(iii) Nor can I sit in the school garden for fear of getting wet in the rain.
Answer:
(ii) Nor can I learn anything at school though teachers go on lecturing and explaining.

GSEB Class 8 English The School Boy Additional Important Questions and Answers

Select the most appropriate options as answers and complete the following sentences:

Question 1.
On a summer morning, the boy likes to sing with ……………….
A. the hunter’s horn.
B. the skylark.
C. the birds.
D. the nightingale.
Answer:
B. the skylark.

Question 2.
In the line The distant huntsman winds his horn’ the word ‘winds’ means ………………
A. ‘turns’.
B. ‘twists’.
C. ‘blows’.
D. ‘bends’.
Answer:
C. ‘blows’.

Question 3.
The phrase ‘outworn’ refers to ……………….
A. the books that bore the boy.
B. the outdated teachers.
C. the eyes of the teacher that actually makes the boy anxious.
D. None of these three
Answer:
C. the eyes of the teacher that actually makes the boy anxious.

Question 4.
The learning’s bower’ refers to …………………
A. a garden.
B. a place where the child can be taught.
C. his own house.
D. a tree-shade.
Answer:
B. a place where the child can be taught.

Question 5.
The words ‘dreary shower’ mean ……………..
A. boring lectures by teachers.
B. harmful rain.
C. pleasant droplets of rain.
D. heaps of books to study.
Answer:
A. boring lectures by teachers.

Question 6.
The poet says that a bird is born for ………………..
A. singing songs.
B. joy
C. flying in the sky.
D. being in a cage.
Answer:
B. joy

Question 7.
Summer does not bear fruit if ………………
A. children are not freed to enjoy the way they like.
B. there is no terrible heat.
C. children are made to study in school.
D. parents are liberal.
Answer:
A. children are not freed to enjoy the way they like.

Answer the following questions in one sentence each:

Question 1.
What does ‘A cruel eye outworn refer to?
Answer:
‘A cruel eye outworn’ refers to the
strict control of the teacher and the dull and uninteresting life at school with lots of work and no freedom or enjoyment.

Question 2.
What does the child not like?
Answer:
The child does not like to go to school in a summer morning.

Question 3.
What does the child say about his
attitude in school?
Answer:
The child is neither interested in his j books nor in the boring lectures of his teachers.

Question 4.
What does the phrase ‘worn thro with the dreary shower’ mean?
Answer:
The phrase worn thro’ with the dreary shower’ means ‘to be tired with the dull and boring shower of continuous lectures of teachers being poured over the child’.

Question 5.
Who are being questioned here ? Why?
Answer:
Father and mother (Parents) are being questioned here by the child for being instrumental in depriving him of his freedom and joy that he is supposed to get at this age.

Question 6.
What does the phrase ‘plants are stripped of their joy’ mean?
Answer:
The phrase ‘plants are stripped of their joy’ means that joy is taken away from the children.

Answer the following questions in two to three sentences each:

Question 1.
Describe ‘the summer morn’ as described in the poem.
Answer:
‘The summer morn’ is very pleasant when the boy loves to rise. On every tree birds are singing. In a distance a hunter is blowing his horn. A skylark is singing very sweetly. The boy is also singing in the sweet company of the skylark.

Question 2.
Why do you think the school boy finds going to school an ordeal?
Answer:
Going to school for the boy is an ordeal because it will take away all the joy that he is enjoying that sweet morning of summer. There he will have to study under the strict control of that outdated teacher. His whole day will be spent in great disappointment.

Question 3.
Explain ‘Of their joy in the springing day, By sorrow and cares dismay’ as is perceived by the poet.
Answer:
In this poem of William Blake, parents are perceived as inhibiting and repressing their children. Their own fears and shame are communicated to the next generation through the parental desire to ‘protect’ children from their desires. According to Blake, parents misuse ‘care’ to repress children, rather than setting the children free by rejoicing in, and safeguarding, their capacity for play and imagination.

Question 4.
Explain the Theme of ‘The School Boy’ by William Blake.
Answer:
The poem ‘The School Boy’ discuss , a boy’s repelling imprisonment at his school.
His company from the animate objects of the summer morning (birds, flowers, etc.) to the inanimate object of his school is indeed a matter of concern and grief. School life is an ordeal for him.

The boy’s enjoyment of summer festivity is countered by the terrifying eye of the teacher that robs from him all his childhood happiness. School is nothing but a prison that negates the playful activity of childhood. The restriction of an imposed discipline in school forms a hurdle for the natural expression of creativity and kills the very the essence of genius.

Read the following stanzas and answer the questions given below them:

Question 1.
I love to rise in a summer morn,
When the birds sing on every tree;
The distant huntsman winds his horn,
And the skylark sings with me.
O ! what sweet company.

But to go to school in a summer morn,
O! it drives all joy away;
Under a cruel eye outworn,
The little ones spend the day,
In sighing and dismay.

Questions:
(1) ‘O ! what sweet company.’ What company is referred to here?
Answer:
The company of the sweet singing of birds like skylark is referred to here.

(2) What is it that the boy hates to do in a summer morning?
Answer:
In a summer morning, the boy hates to go to school.

(3) How do children spend their day at school in a summer morning? Why so?
Answer:
In a summer morning, children spend their day at school sighing and in utter disappointment as they do not like to learn under the strict supervision of a teacher with outdated ideas about schooling.

Question 2.
Ah! then at times I drooping sit,
And spend many an anxious hour.
Nor in my book can I take delight,
Nor sit in learning’s bower,
Worn thro’ with the dreary shower.

How can the bird that is born for joy,
Sit in a cage and sing.
How can a child when fears annoy,
But droop his tender wing,
And forget his youthful spring.

Questions:
(1) Why does the boy sit drooping in the classroom?
Answer:
The boy sits drooping in the classroom because he cannot enjoy the learning in an enclosed space when the spring is in full bloom outside.

(2) What does the boy not find any delight in?
Answer:
The boy does not find any delight in studying books and listening to the boring lectures of his teachers.

(3) What comparison is made in the second stanza?
Answer:
As a bird in a cage cannot enjoy singing, a child cannot enjoy learning being confined in a classroom when there is much to enjoy outside when spring is in full bloom.

Question 3.
Father and Mother, if buds are nip’d,
And blossoms blown away,
And if the tender plants are strip’d
Of their joy in the springing day,
By sorrow and cares dismay,

How shall the summer arise in joy,
Or the summer fruits appear?

Questions:
(1) What do the phrases ‘buds are nip’d’ and ‘blossoms blown away’ convey?
Answer:
The phrases ‘buds are nip’d’ and ‘blossoms blown away’ convey that children are smothered at their early age when they are supposed to enjoy freedom in full.

(2) What do the words ‘tender plants’ refer to?
Answer:
The words ‘tender plants’ are used for young children who are supposed to be allowed full freedom to grow and should not be suppressed in any way.

(3) What does ‘summer’ in this poem stand for?
Answer:
‘Summer’ in this poem stands for youth’ which is always spiritful and well-blossoming.

The School Boy Summary in English

The School Boy Summary:
The speaker in this poem is a young boy who feels joyful to rise in the fresh and delightful summer morning. The chirping of the birds announces the day-break. The boy gets entertained by the company of the hunter who blows his clarion from a distance field and sweet lullabies of skylark.

It is a matter of utmost disappointment for the speaker to attend school in a sweet summer morning where actually he wishes to enjoy the mirth of summer. He is tired and even puzzled under the strict supervision of his teacher. Instead of enjoying the pleasures of summer, the child has to attend school where he spends his day in boredom and dismay.

The child expresses his weariness. He sits drooping out in the sea of tediousness. The child restrains the assault on him by the oppressive personality of the teacher and unnecessary lectures (shower of meaningless words) the finicky teacher gushes his words of erudition without even attempting to understand the child’s intention and his urge for unchecked freedom.

A bird which is born cheerful and jovial can never sing sweet songs if caged. Similarly, a child if remained under the shade of constant fear and tension, can never enjoy the natural instincts of joy and playfulness. Indeed a world full of rigid course of discipline will ruthlessly take away the beautiful springs (the childhood days) of a person’s life.

The boy complains to the highest authority, to father and mother, if a budding child is picked and swept off in the early stage of life in an ocean of sorrow, where there is no one to care for. If misery withers the tender plants, the beautiful buds and the new born buds, summer can never be joyful.