|
| Television - Evergreen Publication |
Comprehension (Unsolved Passages)
Passage 1
(1) The word 'we' refers to the poet and the persons of his opinion.
(ii) The poet addresses the parents that they should convince their children about the negative impact of watching television on their minds.
(iii) The idiotic thing is television. It is called idiotic because it makes the viewers dull, stupid and idiotic.
(iv) The poet advises the parents that children should not be allowed to watch the programmes on the television.
(V) His advice seems to be an exaggerated one. In the present-day world, the new generation gets every type of knowledge, information and entertainment from television. The viewers get visual as well as auditory pleasure. Though Dahl's viewpoint has been endorsed by several eminent persons, it is generally rejected by the new generation.
Passage 2
(1) The poet uses 'we' instead of 'I' because the viewpoint he projects in this poem is not merely his own, but of many persons who are aware of the harmful effects of television on the young minds.
(ii) The poet calls the television 'an idiot box' because makes the viewers stupid and dull. So according to the poet, the children should not be allowed to view the programmes on television.
(iii) It has been observed that children sit or stand before the television set lazily and stare at the screen continuously. They go on watching television until their eyes seem to come out.
(iv) When the children stare at the screen continuously, their eyes seem to pop out. (V) A metaphor - we saw / A dozen eyeballs on the floor - has been used in the last two lines.
Passage 3
(1) The parents whose children watch television excessively have been addressed to in the poem. It is the parents who will convince their children about the negative impact of watching television on their minds.
(ii) The poet's main concern is that those children who watch television continuously for a long time tire their eyes. Their eyes seem to bulge out. When they go on staring at the television screen, they seem to be hypnotised. But what they get out of this activity is useless and harmful stuff.
(iii) When children stare at the television screen in order to watch the programmes, they get hypnotised by the programmes. But what they get is frightening, useless and harmful stuff. The programmes on the television contain horrible and meaningless contents.
(iv) The parents let their children watch television uninterrupted because they remain quiet and do not disturb them. They do not climb out of the windows and they do not fight with one another. They leave their parents free to cook lunch or wash utensils lying in the sink.
(V) Television watching is a passive activity. It blocks fresh thinking. It rots their minds and fills them with useless thoughts. It destroys their imaginative faculty. It makes children dull as they cannot distinguish between the real and the fantastic. Their brains become soft and they lose the power to think and imagine things.
Passage 4
(1) The parents let their children watch television for long so that they remain quiet and do not disturb them. The children leave their parents free to cook lunch or wash utensils lying in the sink, as they go on watching television.
(ii) Television watching is a passive activity. It blocks fresh thinking. It rots the minds of the children and fills them with useless thoughts. It destroys their imaginative faculty. It makes children dull as they cannot distinguish between the real and the fantastic. Their brains become soft and they lose the power to think and imagine things.
(iii) Television watching is a passive activity. It blocks fresh thinking. It rots the minds of the children and destroys their imaginative faculty. It makes the children dull and they lose the power of imagine things. Thus it makes them unimaginative.
(iv) Reading books is a fruitful activity. It makes the minds of the children active. It helps them think new thoughts. It sharpens the brain.
(V) The poet's attitude is disdainful towards television. He does not have any soft corner for television viewing.
Passage 5
(1) The parent's response to the poet's advice is not very positive. They will ask the poet that if the television set is removed, there will be no means left with them to entertain their children. They do not know how to entertain them.
(ii) The poet reminds them that as children they used to read and read. The nursery shelves were full of books. They would spend half of their lives reading books. Reading books was the only and the main source of entertainment in the past.
(iii) The poet has used these exclamations to reveal his surprise and disbelief that one could lead half of life in reading books.
(iv) The poet uses all the capital letters in this line to emphasize the importance of reading as a substitute to watching television. The poet wants to remind the parents that as children they used to read and read and read.
(v) The poet recommends reading of books because reading activates the minds of the readers. It helps the children to think about new thoughts. It sharpens their brains and their imaginative faculty. It also entertains the children. It is, in fact, a very fruitful activity.
Passage 6
(1) The poet expresses his anxiety by saying that watching of television blocks the fresh thinking of children. It rots the minds of children. It destroys their imaginative faculty. It makes them dull as they cannot distinguish between the real and the fantastic. It hampers their power to think and imagine things.
(ii) The poet wants children to give up watching television and start reading books. The poet exhorts the children to read books which contain wonderful stories. He tells them that books will provide them good entertainment and knowledge.
(iii) Reading of books is better than watching television because it activates the minds of the readers. It helps the children to think about new thoughts. It sharpens their brains and their imaginative faculty. It also entertains them. In fact, it is fruitful activity. On the other hand, television watching is a passive activity. It blocks fresh thinking. It makes the children dull. It destroys their imaginative faculty.
(iv) The stories that told about huge monsters, gypsies, queens, princesses, whales and treasure islands captivated the young minds in the past. The stories about elephants and the cannibals also fascinated the young minds in the past.
(V) Yes, the poet is right in saying so because reading activates the minds of the readers. It helps them to think new thoughts. It sharpens their brains and their imaginative faculty. It also provides them entertainment. In fact, it is a fruitful activity. On the other hand, television watching is a passive activity. It blocks fresh thinking and makes children dull. It destroys their imaginative faculty.
Passage 7
(1) Reading of books activates the minds of readers. It helps the children to think about new thoughts. It sharpens their brains and their imaginative faculty. It provides entertainment to the children. It is a fruitful activity.
(ii) The stories about huge monsters, gypsies, queens and princesses, whales and treasure islands interested the children in the past. The stories about elephants and cannibals fascinated the children.
(iii) Penelope was the name of the wife of a great Greek hero Odysseus. Here the cannibals ate a very sweet smelling dish named after Penelope.
(iv) Beatrix Potter was a British writer who was famous for his animal stories. He was popular with children because he told the stories about Mr Tod and his dirty dog, the squirrel Nutkin, the small pig named Bland or about Mrs Tiggy-Winkle. These stories were very fascinating. They were about camel's getting the hump on his back or about the monkey losing the rear part of his hairy body.
(v) The animal characters are dog, squirrel, pig, camel and monkey.
Passage 8
(i) Poet has reminded the parents that when they were children they used to read a lot of books to entertain themselves. Books could provide entertainment to their children as well.
(ii) The poet's advice to parents is to throw away the television set and in its place on the wall install a bookshelf and fill it with books.
(iii) The poet refers to the 'dirty looks' of the children who would protest against the parents for removing the television set from the wall.
(iv) The children would be angry and annoyed if the television set is removed from the wall of their house. They would protest and make dirty faces. They might cry and even bite and hit the elders with sticks.
(v) No. I would be annoyed, unhappy and uneasy. I would request my parents to allow me to watch the television for some time.
Passage 9
(1) Persuasive tone is adopted by the poet here. The poet wants to assure the parents that after the initial violent reaction to the absence of television their children would be normal again.
(ii) The action of replacing the television set with a book shelf by the parents would not be liked by the youngsters. They would protest loudly and even violently.
(iii) The parents should ignore the initial reaction of their children. They would see that their children would come to read books as entertainment in the absence of television.
(iv) The poet uses the exclamation to express the sense of surprise of the parents on seeing unexpected change in their children.
(v) The youngsters will improve their imagination and creativity by reading more and more books.
Passage 10
(1) The 'ridiculous machine' here is the television set. The poet describes it as something nauseating, foul, unclean and repulsive.
(i) The children would entertain themselves by reading interesting books such as story books. (iii) Interesting stories in books would fill their minds with joy.
(iv) A change would occur in the minds of children. They would come to love books. They would be grateful to their parents for replacing television with book shelf.
(v) The poet is against watching television because watching television for long is an addictive and useless activity. Television makes the viewers dull. It kills imagination and creativity.
Assignment: Class Activity.
