The Secret Of Blogging in English Literature: An Apology



As a teacher of English I have seen that most of the students of English Literature cannot answer the questions on prose, poetry, novel and drama correctly, briefly and to the point, writing just what is wanted in the questions and avoiding unnecessary and irrelevant details. And as a result, they secure very poor marks in English, especially in test papers. I have, therefore, written this blog @ AD’s English Literature to provide the students with model answers by reading which they will be able to find out the flaws in their answers and rectify them. Sorry, I’m too bold to say you wrong. Let’s say here is an open space for discussions and shaking hands.




I have given model answers to all the specimen questions endorsed by the University Curriculum. In addition to these specimen questions, I have given many other models, both short-answer type and essay-type, on each piece of the text, with their model approaches.
I have spared no pains to make this AD’s English Literature really useful to those for whom it is intended. I shall regard my labour amply rewarded if the students derive benefit from the blog and if it receives recognition from my comrades in profession.




The nature of the blog has been revised from time to time in consonance with the changes demanded by the new trends in English Literature as well as the new pattern of understanding the text to be set in English Literature Learning.

The text materials included in the syllabus of University have been fully explained in this blog to frame varieties of questions on each of the these items (Key Tags are included in bracket)—

Short Answer-type Questions: (History of English Literature ( Short Questions) ; A to Z (Objective Questions) ; Model Question ;Short Stories ; Literary Terms ; Key Facts  )

Essay-type Questions: (History of English Literature ( Essay);literary essays ; Creative Writing )

Objective-type Questions: (History of English Literature ( Short Questions) ; A to Z (Objective Questions) ; Model Question ;Short Stories ; Literary Terms ; Key Facts  )

Linguistics: (TEFL ;Criticism ; Philology)

Major Genre of Literature: (Poetry ;Drama ; Novel ; Essay ; Short Stories ; literary essays; Creative Writing  )

Classifications by Age: (Modern Period ; Elizabethan Literature ;Victorian Period ; Romantic Period ;Criticism ; ;Neo-classical Age ; Old English Literature ; Age of Dryden ; Age of Milton ; The Revival of Learning (1450-1550) ;Middle English ;New Literature ;Transitional Period  )

Exam Types: (UGC NET ; Central Teacher Eligibility Test (CTET) ;TEFL ; Promotional Reviews )

An Approach to the English Literature Learning has been consulted among the peers and students and the Sample Questions suggested by them have been duly considered in preparing the posts. Model answers to these questions have been given in such a way that they will meet the requirements of all categories of students. And a constant vigil and critiques on these topics has enlarged the perspectives.

In critical works on literary types and theories, padding or lack of precision pose a hindrance to the clear understanding of the subjects. Books of essays on literary topics are few and far between, and those available in the market do not meet the requirements of students aspiring after higher education. Essays are generally either sketchy or heavy and fall short of the standards required of students at the Honours and Post-graduate levels. The essays in this blog are written in simple and precise style although scholarly works on the subject have been drawn upon. Political, social and economic topics have been discussed steering clear of the obscure jargon and cumbersome details.

Till now, in my humble way I have tried to analyze and explain the problems that the students of English Literature Learning have to face. Nowhere have I attempted to show any minute scholarship. I have simply given uncontroversial answers to the questions that a serious study of the topics gives rise to. I don’t claim any originality. I am, in fact, aware, at every turn, of my debts and obligations to the standard critics of English Language Learning. I gratefully acknowledge the debt, which, I suppose, any writer on Literature must have to his predecessors. At times, I have, unconsciously though, recast much of the thought of others. I am, however, not fancied a researched article nor there any APA or MLA citations. I have freely used or adapted Internet materials. I also take the opportunity of recording my obligations to my readers, who has spared no pains to make this blog presentable by commenting as well as sharing.

Now, after few years of blogging AD’s English Literature has earned a very favourable reception from the students and academics alike. With passing days more literary topics I wish to add to make the blog more comprehensive and up-to-date. I need to include some essays on general current English Literature topics as well as from modern era to make it useful to the students at undergraduate and post-graduate levels as well as to the candidates preparing for competitive examinations. But one constrain is ‘Time’?

I hope that AD’s English Literature will be of use to those who take avid interest in the literary problems, and aesthetic movements. It will be also rewarding to those who are interested in current creative writing.

Any constructive suggestion for further improvement of the blog will be thankfully received.

Ardhendu De

Comments

New comments are not allowed.
My photo

An English Teacher;    M. A.(English) , D. Ed., B. Ed., UGC- NET Qualified

"Dear Readers/ Students, I am a huge fan of books, English Grammar & Literature. I write this blog to instill that passion in you." 

Popular Posts

Analysis of Mulk Raj Anand’s Story, "The Lost Child": Accepted Part of Our Multicultural Neighborhood in the World

Image
Simply, Mulk Raj Anand’s story,The Lost Child narrates how a little boy was lost in the crowd of a village fair. It tells us how on his way to the fair he was attracted by various things such as toys, sweetmeat, balloons and birds, butterflies and flowers. But what attracted him most was the roundabout. It made him forget his parents and everything else in the world. Thus he lagged far behind his parents and got lost in the crowd of the fair. Here, Anand deals with the child psychology in a sensitive way without shying away from its reality. We too have grown up as an accepted part of our multicultural neighborhood in the world.Anand’s at his strongest when writing about the Child’s classic confrontational relationship with his world without parents. Young adult readers will be able to identify with the lost child’s struggle to live within his family’s ambit while trying to discover his own world outside.
Read more

Dr. West’s New Method of Teaching English :Its Merits and Demerits

Image
Dr. West conducted an extensive research and experiments on the problems of teaching English as a foreign language in India. Read More Teaching EnglishThe new method is the outcome of his research. It stood as a reaction against the Direct Method.
                Dr. West approached the problem of teaching English not from the standpoint of pedagogy, but from the standpoint of social needs of the Indian people. He holds that, “Indian boys need most of all to be able to read English, than to write it, and lastly to speak it and understood it when spoken”. Read More Teaching EnglishMoreover, he maintains that “learning to read a language is by far the shortest road to learning to speak and write it. “According to him it is easier to acquire a reading knowledge of a language than to acquire a speaking. So the teacher’s chief concern should be to develop the habit of purposeful silent reading in the children and not the habit of oral reading.
Read more

Critical Appreciation of Philip Larkin’s Poem, "The North Ship": Life Award for Best Philosophical Access

Image
"Travel is a vanishing act, a solitary trip down a pinched line of geography to oblivion." Paul Theroux (1941 - ) U.S. writer.
The Old Patagonian Express: By Train Through the Americas The North Ship, life tale about a man’s life who decides to immigrate to no man’s land. Released in every direction, this poem wins the life award for best philosophical access. Read More Poetry Despite life’s concern, we proclaim that we too must move on.
Read more

G.B. Shaw’s Radio Talk, ‘Spoken English and Broken English’:Broken English’s Relevance in Today’s English Spoken World

Image
In a lively, witty and conversational style G. B. Shaw in his essay (a transcript of a radio talk and was recorded in 1927. The talk was broadcast over Manhattan's radio station WNEW) ‘Spoken English and Broken English’ gives some instruction to a foreign student of the English Language in regard to speaking English when he travels in the British Commonwealth or in America or when he meets a native of those countries or it may be that he is himself a native but that he speaks in a provincial or cockney dialect of which he is a little ashamed, or which perhaps prevents him from obtaining some employment which is open to those only who speak in correct English. Read More Teaching English



Read more

Of Studies by Francis Bacon -- the Theme and Style of the Essay

Image
Of Studies is the first essay of the first collection of ten essays of Francis Bacon which was published in 1597. But it was revised for the edition of 1612. More than dozen new sentences were added and some words were also altered. Of Studies is typically Baconian essay with an astonishing terseness, freshness of illustrations, logical analysis, highly Latinized vocabulary, worldly wisdom and Renaissance enlightenment.
Bacon through a syllogistic tripartite statement begins his argument to validate the usefulness and advantage of study in our life. Bacon has the power of compressing into a few words a great body of thought. Thus he puts forward the three basic purposes of studies: “Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability”. He later expands his sentence to bring lucidity and clearness. Studies fill us delight and aesthetic pleasure when we remain private and solitary. While we discourse, our studies add decoration to our speech. Further, the men of study can decide bes…
Read more

Analysis of Virginia Woolf's Essay "Modern Fiction"

Image
Virginia Woolf in her Modern Fiction makes a fair attempt to discuss briefly the main trends in the modern novel or fiction. She begins her essay by mentioning the traditionalists like H. G. Wells, Arnold Bennett and Galsworthy, who, while they propound new ideas and open out new vistas to the human mind, still follow the Victorian tradition as far as the technique of the novel is concerned. Read More EssayThey believed that a great force on the individual was environment. However, they differed from one another in subject matter – in Arnold and Galsworthy the socialist point of view dominated and Wells, a brilliant writer of scientific romances. Read More EssayMrs. Woolf marks these three as ‘materialists’. While defining the term Woolf states that these writers as well as their writing is stuffed with unimportant things; they spend immense skill and dexterity in making the trivial and transitory a boost of truth of life. As life escapes, the worth of the literary piece in minimal. M…
Read more

Oliver Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer: Mr. Hardcastle and Mrs. Hardcastle - Comic Pair Contributing Fun and Laughter

Image
“Nullum quod tetigit non ornavit” (He touched nothing that he did not adorn). (A memorial to Oliver Goldsmith in Westminster Abbey)  The inscription, written by Dr. Johnson 
Oliver Goldsmith'sShe Stoops to Conquer is a witty comedy and it has as usual, five youths- Marlow, Hastings, Kate, Constance and Tony Lumpkin- at the centre of it. But this is not to say that the two old figures are pushed to the back ground. Mr. Hardcastle and his wife Mrs. Hardcastle are no insignificant. Rather, they make a comic pair contributing largely to the fun and laughter of the play. While the two characters are haply related to each other, they have points of divergence, and may go to the extent of pointing out that Mr. Hardcastle is a foil to his wife.
Read more

Brief Analysis of R.K Narayan’s ‘Engine Trouble’: Greater Simplicity of Plot and Language, even as it Develops a Greater Complexity of Meaning to Exhibit the Domain of India

Image
Malgudi Days fits neatly into R.K Narayan's literary evolution. According to the author himself, each of his stories displays a greater simplicity of plot and language, even as they develop a greater complexity of meaning to exhibit the domain of India. By the time Narayan wrote Malgudi Days the crowded action of his early fantasies was replaced by introspections of Indiannessstripped to its essence and resonant with meaning.
Read more

Critical Analyses of Henry Vaughan's poem " THE RETREAT"

Image
Introduction:The poems by which Vaughan is remembered are contained in Silex Scintillans, which appeared in two parts in 1650 and 1655 respectively. This is largely religious inspiration and its title is significant for the emblem on the title page that reveals its meaning to be a heart of flint burning and bleeding under the stroke of a thunder bolt and so throwing off sparks. It is of course the light of divinity.
Read more

Critical Appreciation of William Wordsworth's The Solitary Reaper

Image
"He spoke, and loos'd our heart in tears.
He laid us as we lay at birth
On the cool flowery lap of earth."
Matthew Arnold (1822 - 1888)
British poet and critic.Referring to William Wordsworth.
"Memorial Verses"
In Wordsworthian poetry the temple of Mother Nature is a constitution of three guiding principles: Solitude, Silence and Loneliness, and hisThe Solitary Reaperis typically characterized by them which results in a perfect ballad with its simplicity, suggestiveness, pathos and verbal music. Inspired by Wilkinson’s Tour in Scotland the poem is a sweet -melancholic memoirs of tour de Scotland. While poet Wordsworth was touring Scottish highland along with his dear sister Dorothy, he met a reaper girl in her spontaneous moods. Such of this sweet piece of memory of the highland reaper girl is beautifully exhibited through this poem.
Read more