English Literature

MA I Sem (English) CCE December 2025 Questions. Place: Department of English Date: 12 & 13 January 2026 Time: 11:30 AM to 3:00 PM Note: Attempt any one for CCE I and one more for CCE II of the following questions in each paper. Separate answer book for each CCE is required. Oral presentation is essential. The CCE will carry 20+20=40 marks in each paper. Only original and handwritten assignments will be accepted. Paper I (Poetry): 01. Chaucer's characters are both individuals and types. Discuss. 02. Discuss John Donne as a metaphysical poet with reference to his poems prescribed in your syllabus. 03. Discuss Robert Browning as a writer of Dramatic Monologues . Illustrate your answers on the basis of the poems prescribed in your syllabus. Paper II (Drama): 01. Discuss Hamlet's madness . 02. Give a character sketch of Barabas . 03. Discuss Pinter as a playwright. Paper III (Fiction): 01. Comment on Tess' relationship with Alec and Angel . 02. Analyse Robinso...

The Flute-Player of Brindaban: Sarojini Naidu Why didst thou play thy matchless flute 'Neath the Kadamba tree, And wound my idly dreaming heart With poignant melody, So where thou goest I must go My flute-player with thee? Still must I like a homeless bird Wander, forsaking all The earthly loves and worldly lures That held my life in thrall, 'And follow, follow, answering Thy magical flute-call. To Indra's golden-flowering groves Where streams immortal flow, Or to sad Yama's silent Courts Engulfed in lampless woe, Where'er thy subtle flute I hear Belovèd I must go! No peril of the deep or height Shall daunt my wingèd foot; No fear of time-unconquered space, Or light untravelled route, Impede my heart that pants to drain The nectar of thy flute! (An Anthology of English Literature: Madhya Pradesh Hindi Granth Academy से साभार)

Where the Mind is Without Fear: Objective Type Questions (i) The poem Where the Mind is Without Fear is written by:a. Rabindranath Tagore b. Sarojini Naidu c. William Wordsworth d. Toru Dutt Answer: a. Rabindranath Tagore (ii) Rabindranath Tagore is a well-known poet from: a. Orissa b. West Bengal c. Bihar d. Kerla Answer: b. West Bengal (iii) Rabindranath Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in the year: a. 1931 b. 1921 c. 1913 d. 1945 Answer: c. 1913 (iv) Which of the following is a very famous work by Tagore? a. Sharadhanjali b. Gitanjali c. Geetmala d. Savitri Answer: b. Gitanjali (v) What is meant by the sub clause 'Where the mind is without fear and head is held high': a. To be fearless and self respecting b. To be proud of one's high position c. To stand straight d. To be fearless and haughty Answer: a. To be fearless and self respecting (vi) According to Tagore what is meant by the sub-clause 'Where knowledge is free'? a. Where people do ...

Elements of Composition: A. K. Ramanujan Composed as I am, like others, of elements on certain well-known lists, father’s seed and mother’s egg gathering earth, air, fire, mostly water, into a mulberry mass, molding calcium, carbon, even gold, magnesium and such, into a chattering self tangled in love and work, scary dreams, capable of eyes that can see, only by moving constantly, the constancy of things like Stonehenge or cherry trees; add uncle’s eleven fingers making shadow-plays of rajas and cats, hissing, becoming fingers again, the look of panic on sister’s face an hour before her wedding, a dated newspaper map, of a place one has never seen, maybe no longer there after the riots, downtown Nairobi that a friend carried in his passport as others would a woman’s picture in their wallets; add the lepers of Madurai, male, female, married, with children, lion faces, crabs for claws, clotted on their shadows under the stone-eyed goddesses of dance, mere pillars, moving as n...

Snakes: A. K. Ramanujan   No, it does not happen when I walk through the woods. But, walking in museums of quartz or the aisles of bookstacks, looking at their geometry without curves and the layers of transparency that make them opaque, dwelling on the yellower vein in the yellow amber or touching a book that has gold on its spine, I think of snakes. The twirls of their hisses rise like the tiny dust-cones on slow-noon roads winding through the farmers’feet. Black lorgnettes are etched on their hoods, ridiculous, alien, like some terrible aunt, a crest among tiles and scales that molt with the darkening half of every moon. A basketful of ritual cobras comes into the tame little house, their brown-wheat glisten ringed with ripples. They lick the room with their bodies, curves uncurling, writing a sibilant alphabet of panic on my floor. Mother gives them milk in saucers. She watches them suck and bare the black-line design etched on the brass of the saucer. The snakeman wre...