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ICSE English Language Marking Scheme: What instructions are given to examiners for checking the composition?  Check out more resources (Click on the links alongside the topics):- For complete revision/practice of all Topics on ICSE English Language Click here:  https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/p/english-language-important-links.html For other Subjects, ICSE Class 10 All Subjects Notes:  https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/p/icse-class-10all-subjects.html ICSE Class 9 All Subjects Notes:  https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/p/icse-classes-9-10-all-subjects.html Research-Backed Study Strategies:  https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/p/tips-and-tricks.html Brief Summaries of Best Motivational Books for Students :  https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/p/book-reviews-to-keep-you-motivated.html Career Counseling:  https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/p/career-options-out-there-and-how-do-you.html 1000+ Intriguing and...

Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold  Stanza-wise Explanation Stanza 1 "The sea is......... of sadness in"  Tonight the sea (at Dover) is calm. The tide is full. The moon shines brightly on the whole strait. The moonlight shines dimly on the French coast and it soon disappears. The cliffs of England stand firmly, bathed in the moonlight. They extend up to the calm strait. Come to the window. The night atmosphere is very pleasant. A long line of water drops rises up from the sea to touch the land bathed in the moonlight. The poet, then, asks his beloved to listen to the harsh sound of the pebbles as they strike against the shore when the waves advance. When the waves retreat they throw the pebbles on the sandy shore of the sea. The rise and fall of the waves in a set pattern produces a slow, trembling kind of music which brings in a note of melancholy which is everlasting. Stanza 2 'Sophocles... northern sea' Long ago Sophocles listened to the sound of the ocean, the IEgean S...

The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy Stanza-wise Explanation Stanza 1 I leant upon household fires." I stood leaning against a wooden gate and watched the scene outside. Frost appeared like a ghost. The last part of the winter had turned the gloomy and desolate. The light of the sun was fading fast. The tangled stems of the climbing plants lined the sky. They looked like the useless, broken lyres. Due to coldness and darkness all human beings except I had retired to their homes to sit by the fireside to warm themselves. Stanza 2 The land's sharp features............ Fervourless as I' The sharp features of the land seemed to be the Century's (19th Century's) dead body, laid out for burial. The clouds hanging in the sky would serve as the tomb for the dead body. The wind that blew seemed to sing the funeral song. Owing to extreme cold the rhythm of conception and birth had slowed down considerably. Everybody, including myself, seemed to be devoid of zest and enthusias...

The Dolphins by Carol Ann Duffy : Stanza-wise Summary Stanza1 Worldiswhat....flowingguilt.' Itisquitesimple.Theworldisthatinwhichyoucanswim inordance.We(dolphins)areinour element(water),butwearenotfreeasweusedtobe.Outsidethisworldyoucannotlivefor long,itistrue.Theotherdolphin(inthepool)hasthesameshapeandappearance,andher movementsrevealthatourthoughtsaresimilarOutsidethepoolisaman(ourtrainer)andthere arehoops(whichwehavetocross)Andthereisaconstantflowofguilt(water)inthepool. Stanza2 Wehave.......theman Inthenewworld(thesewaters)wehavefoundnotruthWehavefailedtofindanyreasonofour beinghereinanartificialhabitat)Theonlythingthatwecanunderstandisthatoncewewere blessed(whenwewereinournaturalhabitat)andthatnowwearenomoreblessedWehave verylimitedspacetomoveaboutWehavetotravelthesamespaceagainandagainandwe alwaysfindthemanaboveus-themanwhocontrolsus. Stanza3 Andnowwe......hasdisappeared Wearenomoreblessedasthenewartificialworldisquiteshallowforustodream inaswe usedtodream e...

Notes on The Spider and the Fly The Cunning Spider: A spider lured a fly, that had happened to come up to his web, to come into his drawing room. In order to tempt the fly, it praised the room highly, saying that it was the prettiest room she had ever seen. He told her to come through the winding stair to his room. The room, he added cleverly, had many rare things for her to see. The little fly who seemed to know the cunningness of the spider lost no time in declining the invitation. She said that she would not get tempted as she knew that whoever went there never came back again. Unyielding Spider: The spider did not give up. He said that the fly must be tired for she had flown very high. He asked her to come to his room and rest on his little, comfortable bed. He said that there were beautiful curtains round the room. The bedsheets on the bed are quite fine and delicate. He added that if she wanted to rest in his room, he would himself put her down on the bed comfortably. The fly aga...

 Gift of India (all) 1. Context and Summary:  https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-gift-of-india-context-and-summary.html 2. Form and Language:   https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-gift-of-india-form-and-language.html 3. Stanza-wise Explanation:  https://novakidhs.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-gift-of-india-stanza-wise.html

Transformation of Sentence: Affirmative & Negative (The Basics) Sentences can be transformed from affirmative (positive) to negative and vice versa in the following ways:- 1. Only – none but Only you deserve to get the promotion. – None but you deserve to get the promotion. Only a fool would think that way. – None but a fool would think that way. 2. As soon as – no sooner than As soon as → No sooner did + Verb1 / No sooner had + Verb3 The comma (,) must be replaced by “than”. As soon as we reached the station, the train arrived. – No sooner did we reach the station than the train arrive. As soon as I reached home,it started raining. – No sooner had I reached home than it started raining.  3. Too…to – so…that too → so to → that + sub + negative She is too weak to walk. – She is so weak that she cannot walk. Yash was too proud to ask for forgiveness. – Yash was so proud that he could not ask for forgiveness. These sums are too easy to need an explanation. – These sums are so easy...

The Gift of India: Stanza-wise Explanation The Gifts of India: Stanza-wise explanation Stanza One Is there ought you need that my hands withhold, Rich gifts of raiment or grain or gold? Lo! I have flung to the East and West Priceless treasures torn from my breast, And yielded the sons of my stricken womb To the drum-beats of duty, the sabers of doom. The first stanza begins with Mother India asking if there are any more sacrifices left for her to make. She has given the world rich gifts of cloth, food grains, and precious things like gold. India has flung priceless treasures of her land to the countries of the East and the West. Moreover, she has sent her sons, that is, the youth of her land in distant battlegrounds to fight someone else's war. She questions what more can the nations of the world expect her to give them. In order to understand these lines, we must look at India's history - especially the time around which this poem was written. It was 1915, in the middle of Wor...

The Gift of India: Form and Language Form and language of the poem The poem The Gift of India has a simple and elegant rhyme scheme of aabbcc. Each of the stanzas have six lines, where the first two lines introduce either an idea or create a picture, the next two lines build up on them, and the final two present a sort of small conclusion for the stanza. (In many anthologies and websites the poem is treated as a whole undivided piece.  The poem as an entire piece has a subtle flow in it where Mother India herself proclaims proudly her gifts to the west. The first stanza introduces the various gifts India has bestowed upon the colonisers, which include both its riches and people. The second stanza focuses more on the wistful state of martyred Indian soldiers. The third stanza talks of the grief those deaths have brought. And finally, the fourth stanza is a sort of appeal to honour the sacrifices of the Indian soldiers for the cause of the war.The poem ‘The gift of India’ started as ...

The Gift of India: Context and Summary Context :  The Gift of India is a poem written in 1915 by the Indian poet, freedom fighter and politician Sarojini Naidu. The poem is a tribute to the contribution of Indian soldiers in World War I. Over one million Indian troops from Britain’s colonial empire served in the British army in World War I. Nearly 75, 000 died on foreign fields, never returning home, and over 70,000 were wounded. Serving in the Ypres Sector and other sites on the Western Front, as well as in Mesopotamia and Gallipoli, Indian troops were of vital significance in many battles of the First World War.    However, the contribution of the Indian soldiers is overlooked in the vast expanse of the War’s history. These selfless sacrifices of the Indian soldiers for the western agitation are captured in Naidu’s poem ‘The Gift of India’. The poem not only concentrates on the theme of soldiers making their ultimate sacrifice for someone else’s war, but also talks a...