English Literature Made Easy for Students

  The Myth of Rama-Sita and Ravna in Kanthapura   Ans. The novel Kanthapura really revolves around the myth of Rama-Sita and Ravana. The Ramayana was narrated by the great Sage Valmiki long ago. In the same way, there is a narrator, Achakka, in Kanthapura also, though not a great Sage, but the grandmother of the village Kanthapura. She compares Gandhiji with lord Rama and India with Sita. Achakka, the narrator says that as Sita was overpowered by the chief of Evil, Ravana, so was the mother India overpowered by the British. The people of India had been made slaves by the British. The miserable condition of the labourers working at the Skeffington Coffee Estate is the living example in miniature size. One can guess easily how the people of India were being treated under the foreign rule in India at that time. Lord Rama collected the ‘Vanara-sena’ (the army of the monkeys) and attacked Ravana, the king of Lanka (now SriLanka), defeated and killed him. Thus Sita was liberated b...

  6. Oxymoron In oxymoron, two apparently contradictory statements are yoked together to achieve the  dramatic effect and some flavour in speech.   Difference between Paradox and Oxymoron In Oxymoron two words giving two opposite meanings/ideas are placed together to achieve flavour in speech or to produce a  dramatic effect on it.   In Paradox mainly two statements contradictory to each other are placed together. Deep meaning is hidden somewhere in the paradox used by the poet or the writer.   There may be certain purposes in using paradoxical statements.   These may be used in day-to-day life to criticise an idea, to provoke  new thought , to add a witty idea for creating fun and humour.   Example : Freedom is slavery. (Paradox) Cruel kindness (Oxymoron) More examples of Oxymoron:   Great Depression                 ...

  5.Epigram: It is a pithy (condensed/full of meaning) remark made in a very clever and amusing way. It may be a short poem usually having a satirical tone.   Read the following lines from William Blake’s ‘Auguries of Innocence’:   “To see a world in a grain of sand,/And a heaven in a wildflower,   Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,/And eternity in an hour.” Some more brief epigrams, which are used as quotations:   “Candy /Is dandy,/But liquor/ Is   quicker” (Ogden Nash)   “It comes once a year/But fades with fear.” (Harry Potter)   “I can resist everything but temptation.” (Oscar Wild) "It is better to light the candle than curse the darkness.” (Eleanor Roosevelt)      “Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about things, and small people talk about wine.” (Fran Lebowitz) History of Epigrams The Greeks had the tradition of using epigrams in fond memory of their loved ones. They did not u...

4. Elegy:   An elegy is a poem of having serious thought, especially, written in memory or lamentation (weeping/expression of grief) at the death of someone very close to the person. It is written in elegiac meter. In the  elegiac couplet , each couplet consists of a hexameter verse f ollowed by a pentameter verse.    It has its origin in classical Greek and Latin literature , in which it addressed various subjects including love, sorrow, and politics characterized by their metric forms. It is derived from the Greek word ‘elegus’, which means to lament. Elegy is composed to honour the life of a single individual of high importance to the poet, society, or the nation.   The elegies were written in ancient time in Greece in elegiac couplets, alternative hexameter with pentameter lines.    But in English literature , particularly since the sixteenth century, an elegy has come to acquire the status of a poem of lamentation on t...

  3.   Irony:   When the speaker intends something and in reality, it happens just opposite to it, that is called irony. This may be found in the use of words giving just opposite effect or meaning to what the speaker has thought or wished. We find the use of dramatic irony in plenty in Shakespeare’s plays and In Greek tragedy also. There are three types of irony: Verbal, Situational and Dramatic    In verbal irony , the speaker intentionally uses the words which he does not really mean to say. He may exaggerate (overstate/inflate) or overestimate the character of a thing or person.       If you say, “You are a great scholar” to someone and, in your opinion, you intend to make fun of the person only to please yourself or you may intend to please others while the person for whom you have uttered the words is rather flattered and pleased at the words, it is an example of verbal irony .   Here, we may note the difference b...

  2. Assonance:   Assonance is produced when some words beginning with or having the same vowel sounds are placed next to each other or almost in proximity (nearby).  The purpose of the poet or the writer by using assonance is to produce rhythm and music in the lines written.  In assonance, the vowel sounds produced by letters matter, but not the letters. There is a slight difference between assonance and consonance.  It is that the consonance is produced by the repetition of the consonant sounds while assonance is produced by the repetition of the vowel sounds. Examples: “Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” (From the  poem "Do Not Go Gentle into the Good Night" by Dylan Thomas   See the long ‘o’ sound in the lines below:   “Poetry is old, ancient, goes back far. It is among the oldest of living things. So old it is that no man knows how and why the first poem came.”   "I lie down by the side of my bride" [The sound ...

  1.Onomotapoeia:  It is a figure of speech very much used in literary works to create an illusion of the actual sound of the things being described.  For example, the word ‘thunder’ creates the illusion of the sound produced by the clouds. Similarly, we have the words used for the illusion of the sound/voice/noise created by the words like ‘roar’ for by the lions, ‘howling’ by the wolves, etc., buzzing by the bees, ‘boom’ by an explosion of some fireworks, etc., thud by the falling of a thing, grumbling by human beings, ‘tick-tick’ for the clock, ‘gong’ for the hitting on a big-bell, ‘ding-dong’ for some musical instrument, etc. We have a long list of the words used under the name of this literary device. But a few of them are mew, moan, groan, mumble, mutter, whisper, whooping, knell, hush, churning, throbbing, screech, chatter, etc. Examples:   (i)‘He saw nothing and heard nothing but he could feel his heart pounding and then he heard the  cla...