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An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Summary in English by Stephen Spender

An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Poem by Stephen Spender About the Poet

Stephen Spender (1909-1995), an English poet and essayist, was one of the pioneers of poetic movement in the 1930s.. Spender took a keen interest in the social and political problems of his times. As a social reformer and pacifist of his time, he questions the value of education and the morals and ethics of individuals.

The trials and tribulations of the post-World War, Europe finds expression in Spender’s verse and prose. Books by Spender include ‘Poem of Dedication’, ‘The Edge of Being’, ‘The Creative Element’, etc.

An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Introduction to the Poem

In this poem, Spender depicts the injustice which prevails in society. He talks of social injustice and class inequalities, denial of opportunities to slum dwellers, and also expresses his thoughts on the widening gap between the rich and the poor. He somewhere or the other seems to be hitting hard at the capitalist economy, which helps the rich to get richer and the poor poorer.

The Civil Rights Movement in America had gained pace and Spender’s poem supports it when he exposes the condition of the ‘haves’ and the ‘have notes’. The poem lucidly brings forth the miserable condition of the children of the slum and the inadequate educational facilities provided to them. The poem talks of racial discrimination and is a socialist proclamation that a country can prosper only if education reaches to the downtrodden in the society.

An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Theme

• In ‘An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum’, Spender beautifully brings out the themes of social injustice and class inequalities.
• Poverty is also another theme of the poem. The poet creates an image of children in poverty. It is poverty that has caused the children to be weighed down, diseased and twisted. The poet believes that poverty is created through the oppressive power of capitalism.

An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Stanza Wise Explanation Summary in English

The poem describes a primary school in a slum. Children studying in the slum classroom depict the social injustice and perpetual poverty, prevailing among the slum dwellers.

In the first stanza, Spender describes the miserable condition of the children. The faces of the children are unlike the usual children of schools. Instead of being exuberant and energetic, they are like rootless weeds, withered and worn out. They are unclean and untidy, as they are malnourished, sick and hungry. Just as weeds are not wanted in the garden, so are these children of the slum unwanted in the society. They have pale faces. Their hair is uncombed. A tall slim girl has her head bowed down as though she is exhausted physically because of malnutrition and emotionally because of poverty. The other students of the class are also in the same situation. There is a boy, who is as thin as paper, again because of malnutrition and lack of civic amenities.

He has eyes like that of a rat, searching for food and betterment. Another child in the class, who is a victim of genetic disorder, has gnarled bones and stunted growth. He has inherited this debilitating disease from his father and recites his lesson from his desk in a mellow and weak voice. In one corner of this poorly-lit and ill-equipped class, is a sweet, unnoticed young child lost in the world of his dreams. The dull and monotonous classroom does not interest him and hence, his mind deviates towards the squirrel in her tree room. He too, dreams of fun and frolic in an open space.

In the second stanza, the poet describes the dirty classroom. On the walls are displayed the names of people who have given donations. The bust of Shakespeare is displayed in the clear background of the sky. Walls have pictures of the beautiful Tylorese Valley as well as a map of the world. The children’s eyes can only view a narrow road enclosed with a dull sky. It is quite a dreary and depressing place for children.

In the third stanza, the pensive poet suddenly turns belligerent (aggressive) and feels that Shakespeare is ‘wicked’. This is because he misleads the children. He shows them a beautiful world of ships, sun and love which is not only unreal for them but has a corrupting influence on these children and instigates them to steal and try to escape from their cramped holes. Their existence is indeed very sad.

These emaciated children are so thin that it appears that they are ‘wearing’ only skins. The spectacles they are wearing have glass which has been broken and mended. Their entire appearance reeks of their deprivation. The poet shows his outrage by suggesting that the maps on their walls should show huge slums instead of beautiful scenic graphics.

Finally, in the last stanza, the poet reveals the appalling truth that there can be no change for the better unless a governor, a school inspector or an educationist or a visitor comes to the school. The map in their classroom is the only medium for the children to view the world outside their slums. The windows of their classroom shut them and confine them to their world of poverty and helplessness.

Next, poet appeals to those people who are in power to liberate these slum children from the horrendous life that they are leading. He also exhorts the people themselves, to break open these windows which appear to have sealed the fate of these children. He would like to see these children bask in the educational facilities in this world, and run carefree on the golden sands and enjoy a new lease of life and freedom. The poet earnestly desires that each and every child should be able to enjoy the fundamental right to freedom. They should have access to all kinds of books, new as well as old. They should also be able to learn from nature around them.

Spender ends the poem on a positive note as he expresses his belief that people who are ignited by the spirit of knowledge and learning are the ones who create history. It is the moral liability of everyone to break barriers between the haves and the have-nots, and give a meaningful education to all. For history remembers only those people who are educated and have enlightened themselves for a better world.

An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum Summary Reference-to-Context Questions

Read the extracts given below and answer the questions that follow.

1. Far far from gusty waves these children’s faces.
Like rootless weeds, the hair torn round their pallor:
The tall girl with her weighed-down head. The paper-
seeming boy, with rat’s eyes.

a. What are the children compared to?
Answer:
The children have pale faces and torn and scattered hair all over their faces like rootless weeds. A thin boy is compared to a paper.

b. Why do you think the tall girl is sitting with a weighed-down head?
Answer:
The tall girl is sitting with a weighed-down head because she is depressed of being poor. She also feels humiliated and embarrassed because of the lack of education.

c. Give two phrases which tell us that the children are undernourished.
Answer:
(i) rootless weeds
(ii) rat’s eyes

d. Name the poetic device used in the second line.
Answer:
Simile

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 tree room, other than this.

a. Who is the ‘unlucky heir’ and what has he inherited?
Answer:
The stunted boy with twisted bones sitting in the slum classroom is the unlucky heir. He has inherited the deformity of gnarled disease.

b. What is the stunted boy reciting?
Answer:
The stunted boy has inherited the disease and despair of his parents and has become a carrier of his father’s disease and poverty. He is reciting his lesson in the class from his desk.

c. Who is sitting at the back of the dim class?
Answer:
One unnoted sweet and young dreamer, who dreams about a squirrel’s game, is sitting at the back of the dim class. He is dreaming of his future.

d. What is the ‘tree room’?
Answer:
It is the squirrel’s nest or hole from which the squirrel is moving in and out.

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.

a. Which walls have been referred to in these lines?
Answer:
They are the walls of a classroom in an elementary school in a slum.

b. What is meant by ‘sour cream walls’?
Answer:
The walls are damp, unpleasant and dirty. They have not been painted freshly and is pealing off the surface.

c. What donations are there on the walls?
Answer:
On this wall many donated items have been put up that represent different world. A bust of Shakespeare and domes of huge buildings in the cities. There is also a reflection of the early morning cloudless sky on the wall. There is the beautiful picture of the valley of Tyrolese and the world map.

d. Explain, ‘Awarding the world its world’.
Answer
The rich people who have drawn these maps have depicted these places that are unreachable for these children. They are giving the world its world which however, does not belong to them.

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 in with a lead sky
Far far from rivers, capes, and stars of words.

a. Who are ‘these children’? What do ‘these windows’ refer to?
Answer:
‘These children’ are the poor children living in a slum. ‘These windows’ are the windows of the classroom where the children are now sitting.

b. What has been said to be the world for these children?
Answer:
The narrow street under the dull sky has been said to be their world. Their fate is sealed by the windows in the classroom, and does not go beyond as the map suggests.

c. What has been said about their future?
Answer:
Their future is painted with fog. It means that the poor children have no bright hopes about their future. There is no one to guide them, their future is not clear and is sealed by the darkness of the sky that is above the narrow street they live in.

d. Explain the importance of the last line.
Answer:
These children have no access to the beauties of nature, they cannot see the rivers or the capes, or the stars of words. The highly literate people of the world will never be known to them.

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? On their slag heap, these children
Wear skins peeped through by bones and spectacles of steel
With mended glass, like bottle bits on stones.

a. Why is Shakespeare described as wicked?
Answer:
Shakespeare is an epitome of high literary excellences, but in the slum schools, where hardly any learning takes place and the children are troubled by disease and despair, literary training is a far cry. That is why, Shakespeare has been described as wicked.

b. Explain: ‘from fog to endless night’.
Answer:
The expression describes the miserable and pathetic lives of the slum children. From foggy mornings till late nights, these children make desperate attempts to live their life, sustaining it despite all odds. Their life is full of misery, hopelessness and suffering.

c. What does the reference of ‘slag heap’ mean?
Answer:
The poet is comparing the extremely starved and malnourished bodies to the large pile of waste metal remains. When they sit within their classrooms, they appear to be the heaps of untidy piles of bones, or like a slag heap.

d. How do the slum children look like?
Answer:
Slum children look like skeletons wearing broken glasses as spectacles.

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.
All of their time and space are foggy slum.
So blot their maps with slums as big as doom.

a. Which two images are used to describe these slums?
Answer:
The two images used to describe slums are:
(i) foggy slums
(ii) slums as big as doom

b. What sort of life do these children lead?
Answer:
These children lead miserable lives. They are physically weak.

c. Which figure of speech is used in the last line?
Answer:
In the last line, ‘Simile’ is used as the figure of speech.

d. What request does the poet make here?
Answer:
The poet wants the maps to mention clearly the slums that they live in.

7. 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

a. What is meant by ‘this map’?
Answer:
It is a map of the world which is hung on the wall in the classroom.

b. What are ‘these windows’ which the poet talks of?
Answer:
They are the classroom windows from where the children could see only a narrow street and a dull sky.

c. What has been referred to as ‘catacombs’?
Answer:
The little narrow homes of the slum-dwellers are referred to as ‘catacombs’. They lead a life that is shut inside the slum.

d. Why is there a mention of three categories of people?
Answer:
The three categories of people are the ones who can improve the conditions of the slum.

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.

a. To whom does ‘they’ refer?
Answer:
‘They’ refers to the children sitting in the classroom of an elementary school in a slum.

b. What would they break?
Answer:
The poet hopes that one day they would break free from the chains of the slum. They will rise above all deprivations and create a beautiful world for themselves.

c. What other freedom should they enjoy?
Answer:
They should enjoy equal rights as citizens and get education entitled to them. They should have a bright future like all others.

d. Explain the last line of the extract.
Answer:
The poet feels that history will be changed if the people are educated. And according to him, history is created by those who have the warmth and exposure to the sun and the brightness of the wide world.

9. The stunted, unlucky heir
Of twisted bones, reciting a father’s gnarled disease,
His lesson, from his desk. At the back of the dim class
One unnoted, sweet and young.

a. Who is the unlucky heir?
Answer:
The boy with stunted growth is the unlucky heir of his father’s gnarled disease of twisted bones.

b. What will he inherit?
Answer:
All that he will inherit is his father’s gnarled disease of twisted bones.

c. Who is sitting at the back of the dim class?
Answer:
A young unnoted, sweet boy is sitting unnoticed at the back of the dim class.

d. Why is the disease referred to as ‘gnarled’?
Answer:
The disease has been referred to as ‘gnarled’ because it has restricted his growth and gave him twisted bones.

We have decided to create the most comprehensive English Summary that will help students with learning and understanding.

The Third Level Summary in English by Jack Finney

The Third Level by Jack Finney About the Author

Jack Finney (2 October 1911-16 November 1995) was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and given the name John Finney. His father died when he was three years old and he was renamed Walter Braden Finney in honour of his father. Yet the nickname Jack remained with him throughout his life. He attended Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois. His best-known works are science fiction and thrillers. Two of his novels, ‘The Body Snatchers’ and ‘Good Neighbor Sam’ became the basis of popular films.

The Third Level Introduction to the Chapter

The Grand Central Station of New York has two levels. But Charley, the thirty-one year old protagonist of the story, a city dweller, declares that there are three and claims to have been there as well.

The Third Level Theme

The story, ‘The Third Level’ clearly explores the science fiction genre of ‘time travel’. Jack Finney, the recipient of the World Fantasy Award, interweaves fantasy with reality in his projection of time travel. Charley, the protagonist wishes to be transported to the third level, the world of Galesburg, Illinois, 1894, which is supposed to be a much happier and quieter place to be in.

The story also dwells on the theme of escapism as a psychological refuge from the grim realities of the present day world along with a desire to stay with the past—a desire that Charley’s wife Louisa does not contest. Sam has also happily escaped, with no desire to return to his old profession.

The story exposes the vulnerable side of the common man. Surrounded by myriad problems, we humans, sometimes experience a craving for peace and serenity, and look for possible escapes. This story is about time intersection, an illusion, a kind of long dream that we do not experience during our sleep.

The Third Level Summary in English

“The Third Level”, written by Jack Finney blends fiction with reality. It is also about a man’s wish to escape from the harsh realities of present life. Charley, though he does not admit it, wants to go into the past as he is unhappy. He is unhappy with his wife. In fact, he is as unhappy as he finds the world in which he lives full of hurry, tension and war. His psychiatrist friend, Sam tells his stamp collecting also as an escape into the past.

There were only two levels at Grand Central Station. However, Charley found a third one. It was by chance. Many a times, he was lost there. He was always discovering new doorways, new corridors and new tunnels. He had begun to think that the Grand Central was always pushing out tunnels and new corridors like roots of a huge tree.

There he lost his way and found himself on the third level. This level was entirely different and olcl-fashioned. The locomotive, the brass spittoons and the naked gaslights belonged to the previous century. He desired to escape to Galesburg, the town of his dreams. However, he was nearly arrested. The money he gave to pay the fare was different from that in use those days. The booking clerk thought that he was cheating. Charley, thus, ran into the present. He never found the third level again. However, his psychiatrist friend, who did not believe that the third level existed, found it and escaped to Galesburg of 1894.

The Third Level Main Characters in the Chapter

Charley

Charley is a thirty-one year old man in a tan gabardine suit and a straw hat. One night, on his way back from work, he decides to take the subway at the Grand Central Station, which as everyone knows, has two levels. Preoccupied and in a hurry, Charley discovers an unknown exit that takes him through a long corridor, into the third level.

Here, there were fewer ticket windows, the man at the booth wore green eye-shades, the lights were open-flame gas lights, and women wore old-fashioned, fully covered dresses. The newspaper, ‘The World’, was dated June 11,1894. Charley knows that from there, the third level of the Grand Central, he could go to anywhere in the United States, 1984. He decides to buy two tickets to Galesburg, Illinois, for his wife Louisa and himself from the ticket window in the third level.

Galesburg, with its big old houses, huge lawns and tremendous trees represents an idyllic world to Charley, with the World War II still forty years into the future. However, the clerk at the window refuses the currency Charley offers. Charley leaves, deciding to return the next day, after converting all his savings into old-style currency. But Charley has never again found the third level.

When Charley tells his psychiatrist friend, Sam Weiner about this, Sam tells him that it was “a waking dream wish fulfilment” as Charley was “unhappy” in the modern world with its insecurities and fears, and just wanted to escape. Charley never again found the corridor that led to the third level at the Grand Central. Ironically, his friend Sam, the psychiatrist, disappeared, only to reach Galesburg, Illinois, in 1894.

Sam

Sam Weiner is Charley’s friend, and psychiatrist, and the next most important character in the story. He concludes that the third level is a figment of Charley’s imagination, induced by the pressures of modern living.

When Charley fails to find the third level of the Grand Central Station, his wife Louisa is worried for him and tells him to stop looking for it. But after sometime, both start looking for it because they find proof that the third level exists. Charley’s friend, Sam Weiner disappears. A first-day cover that Charley discovers in his collection, is signed by Sam and is from Galesburg, Illinois, dated July 18,1894. Charley subsequently discovers that Sam had bought eight- hundred dollars worth of old-style currency and moved to Galesburg, Illinois, in 1894. He had . set up a hay, feed and grain business as he had always said that it is what he really wished to do. Clearly, he could not go back to his old business—psychiatry—in Galesburg, Illinois, in 1894.

Louisa

Charley’s wife Louisa was initially angry with Sam’s suggestion that Charley was unhappy, ‘ when Charley tells him about his sojourn to the third level of the Grand Central Station in New York. Then Sam explains that it is not marital unhappiness, but dissatisfaction and discontent with modern day living with its insecurity, fear, war and worry. To escape from these pressures, Charley’s mind had sought refuge in the idyllic world of the third level. Louisa’s conviction in the existence of the third level is affirmed only when she sees the note sent by Sam himself, from Galesburg, Illinois, dated July 18, 1894. Since then, Louisa has been actively involved in looking for the third level, along with her husband, Charley.

The Third Level Summary Questions and Answers

Question 1.
Why did Charley meet a psychiatrist?
Answer:
Charley met a psychiatrist, since he was in a dilemma. He felt sure that he had been on the third level of the Grand Central Station, which everyone knows has only two levels. Even the Presidents of the railroads would swear on a stack of timetables that there were only two levels.

Question 2.
What was the psychiatrist’s diagnosis?
Answer:
The psychiatrist said that Charlie was unhappy. The modern world, full of insecurity, fear, war and worry oppressed him, and he just wanted to escape.

Question 3.
What proof did the psychiatrist provide?
Answer:
Charley’s psychiatrist and his friends said that his stamp-collecting was an indication of his desire to seek “a temporary refuge from reality”, as was his collection of first-day covers.

Question 4.
What was Charley’s argument when the psychiatrist told him that the stamp collection was a temporary refuge from reality?
Answer:
Charley argued that his grandfather lived in nice and peaceful times, yet he was the one . who had started the stamp collection. He did not need any “temporary refuge from reality”. He added that President Roosevelt collected stamps too.

Question 5.
How does Charley describe Galesburg, Illinois, 1894?
Answer:
Charley describes it as a wonderful town with a leisurely way of life with big old frame houses, huge lawns, tremendous trees and a peaceful and tranquil world. During summer evenings, people sat in their lawns, with men smoking cigars and women waving palm-leaf fans. The first World War was twenty years away and the second World War was forty years into the future.

Question 6.
What is a first-day cover?
Answer:
When a new stamp is issued, stamp collectors buy some and use them to mail envelopes to themselves on the very first day of sale and the postmark proves the date. The envelope is called a first-day cover. They are never opened. You just put a blank paper inside the envelope.

Question 7.
What role does the first-day cover play in the story?
Answer:
One night,while fussing with his stamp collection, Charley comes across a first-day cover that should not have been there. It had been mailed to his grandfather at his home in Galesburg in July 18, 1894. However, instead of a blank paper, it contained a letter for Charley from Sam. It urged him to come back to the third level with Louisa, and keep looking for it till he found it.

Question 8.
What was the content of the note that Sam wrote to Charley?
Answer:
Sam said that he had found the third level, that he had already been there for two weeks, that life was peaceful, calm and tranquil. He urged Charley and Louisa to go back to the third level and keep looking for it till they found it.

Question 9.
How was Charley often lost on the Grand Central Station?
Answer:
Cllarley had went to the Grand Central Station hundreds of times. However, at times, he was always lost in new doorways and corridors. Once, he entered a tunnel and came out in the lobby of a hotel. Another time, he reached in an office building.

Question 10.
How did Charley compare the Grand Central to a huge tree? Why?
Answer:
Charley always found new tunnels and staircase at the Grand Central. He began to suspect that Grand Central was like a huge tree. It used to push out new corridors and tunnels like the roots of a tree.

We have decided to create the most comprehensive English Summary that will help students with learning and understanding.

The Laburnum Top Poem Summary in English by Ted Hughes

The Laburnum Top Poem by Ted Hughes About the Poet

The Laburnum Top Poem Summary in English

Laburnum is known as amaltas in Hindi.

On a bright September afternoon, the laburnum, a short tree with hanging branches and yellow flowers, stood soundless and motionless. A few leaves that had yellowed and some seeds lay scattered around it. Just then, all of a sudden a small singing bird with yellow feathers on its wings, the goldfinch, arrived chirping. She entered the foliage like a lizard—smooth, watchful and hasty.

As she entered, the tree suddenly seemed to come alive. It started up like a machine. There were shrill sounds of twittering arid the tree seemed to quiver with joy. The mother bird was like the engine of her family. Like an engine she added life to the tree and flitted from branch to branch, showing her striped face, with yellow and black markings that were peculiar to her. Then with a mysterious, low whistle she flew off into the sky. Once again the laburnum quietened down as it was before her arrival.

The Laburnum Top Poem Summary Questions and Answers

1. The Laburnum top is silent, quite still
In the afternoon yellow September sunlight,
A few leaves yellowing, all its seeds fallen.

a. Mention the poetic device used in the ‘The Laburnum top is silent, quite still’. Why has it been used? Alteration. The Laburnum top is silent, quite still. The repeated sound creates a musical effect.

b. Mention the colour suggested by the poet. Also mention the words that suggest colour.
The colour is yellow. The colour is suggested by the yellow September sunlight and the yellowing leaves.

c. What is the stillness disturbed by?
It is disturbed by the arrival of the goldfinch.

d. What season is the poet talking about? Mention the words that suggest the season.
Autumn. The words that suggest the season are September; leaves yellowing and all the seeds fallen.

2. Till the goldfinch comes, with a twitching chirrup
A suddenness, a startlement, at a branch end.
Then sleek as a lizard, and alert, and abrupt,
She enters the thickness, and a machine starts up
Of chitterings, and a tremor of wings, and trillings –
The whole tree trembles and thrills.

a. What changes the scene completely?
Answer:
The arrival of the goldfinch changes the scene completely.

b. What is the affect on the tree?
Answer:
There is a lot of movement and sound.

c. How does the bird enter the tree? Mention the poetic device.
Answer:
Like a lizard, watchfully and unexpectedly. Simile.

d. ‘… and a machine starts up.’ What is compared to a machine? What is the poetic device?
Answer:
The tree becomes noisy and trembles like a machine. Metaphor.

e. What is the mood of the poem now? How is it suggested?
Answer:
Happy and excited as if trembling with delight. The word that suggest it are ‘The whole tree trembles and thrills’. .

f. Mention the words that show movement?
Answer:
enters, machine starts up, tremor of wings, and trillings, trembles, thrills.

g. Mention the words that show sound. Name the poetic device,
Answer:
twitching chirrup, machine starts up; chitterings. Onomatopoeia.

h. Mention the adjectives used for the goldfinch.
Answer:
sleek, alert, and abrupt.

3. It is the engine of her family.
She stokes it full, then flirts out to a branch-end
Showing her barredface identity mask

a. Who is the‘she’in these lines?
Answer:
The goldfinch.

b. What is her arrival compared to?
Answer:
The starting of an engine.

c. What are the similarities in an engine and a tree then?
Answer:
Both are noisy and pulsating.

d. What does she do to the engine?
Answer:
She ‘stokes it full’ implying she adds fuel to it and causes it to come to life.

e. What is the ‘barred face identity mask’?
Answer:
It’s distinctive face with yellow and black markings.

f. What does she do on the tree?
Answer:
She moves about playfully from branch to branch.

4. Then with eerie delicate whistle-chirrup whisperings
She launches away, towards the infinite
And the laburnum subsides to empty.

a. What does the goldfinch finally do?
Answer:
It flies away from the laburnum after producing a whistling sound.

b. Why has the sound been described as ‘eerie delicate whistle-chirrup whisperings’?
Answer:
The sound of a goldfinch is peculiar. It is a liquid, twittering song with trills.

c. Where does she go?
Answer:
She flies into the sky.

d. What is the effect on the tree?
Answer:
It once again reverts back into silence.

e. What do the words ‘eerie delicate’ suggest?
Answer:
They suggest an unusual and weak sound.