CBSE Academic Class XII English Elective NCERT Sample Question Paper 2015-16

SECTION – A

READING – 20 MARKS

Q.1 b)

1. On the banks of the Thames it is a tremendous chapter of accidents – the London-lover has to confess to the existence of miles upon miles of the dreariest, stodgiest commonness. Thousands of acres are covered by low black houses, of the cheapest construction, without ornament, without grace, without character or even identity. In fact there are many, even in the best quarters, in all the region of Mayfair and Belgravia, of so paltry and inconvenient and above all of so diminutive a type, that you wonder what peculiarly limited domestic need they were constructed to meet.

2. The great misfortune of London, to the eye (it is true that this remark applies much less to the City), is the want of elevation. There is no architectural impression without a certain degree of height, and the London street-vista has none of that sort of pride. All the same, if there be not the intention, there is at least the accident, of style, which, if one looks at it in a friendly way, appears to proceed from three sources.

3. One of these is simply the general greatness, and the manner in which that makes a difference for the better in any particular spot, so that though you may often perceive yourself to be in a shabby corner it never occurs to you that this is the end of it. Another is the atmosphere, with its magnificent mystifications, which flatters and superfuses, makes everything brown, rich, dim, vague, magnifies distances and minimises details, confirms the inference of vastness by suggesting that, as the great city makes everything, it makes its own system of weather and its own optical laws.

4. The last is the congregation of the parks, which constitute an ornament not elsewhere to be matched and give the place a superiority that none of its uglinesses overcome. They spread themselves with such a luxury of space in the centre of the town that they form a part of the impression of any walk, of almost any view, and, with an audacity altogether their own, make a pastoral landscape under the smoky sky.

1. What does the author mean by, ‘ a tremendous chapter of accidents’?
2. Which two sources does the author mention as being instrumental in giving London its style?
3. What is the great misfortune of London to the eye?
4. Why does the author refer to the parks in London as an ornament?
5. How does the author describe the view from the bridge over the Serpentine?

Read the following poem and answers the questions that follow:
Night by William Blake
The sun descending in the west, The evening star does shine; The birds are silent in their nest. And I must seek for mine.
The moon, like a flower In heaven’s high bower,
1. What does ‘bower’ represent here?
2. What is the moon compared to? 3. Why have the Birds’ nest been described as ‘thoughtless’?
4. Explain the figure of speech used, in the line ‘In heaven’s high bower’ . 5. Where do the angels move?
6. Complete the following summary of the poem by filling in the blanks with suitable words or phrases.

5+5=10 marks