Extracts of Animals | Walt Whitman | Class 10 | English | Poetry |

Extracts of Animals | Class 10 | English | Poetry |

Stanza 1

I think I could turn and live with animals, they are
so placid and self-contain’d,
I stand and look at them long and long.

Q1. Name the poem.

Ans : Animals

Q2. Who is the author of Animals?

Ans : Walt Whitman

Q3. Where does the poet want to live?

Ans : The poet wants to live with animals.

Q4. What does the word ‘Placid’ mean?

Ans : The word placid means ‘Calm and Peaceful’.

Q5. Which poetic device has been used in ‘Look at them long and long’?

Ans : Repetition

Q6. How are animals better than that of human beings according to the poet?

Ans : According to the poet, animals do not interfere in others’ life as humans do. Besides, they are calm and self-contained. They have no greed for worldly and materialistic things.

Stanza 2

They do not sweat and whine about their condition,
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God,
Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with
the mania of owning things,
Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that
lived thousands of years ago,

Q1. Which poetic device has been used in ‘They do not…., They do not…., They do not… ‘ in the first three lines?

Ans : Anaphora

Q2. What does the word ‘Whine’ mean?

Ans : The word ‘Whine’ means to complain peevishly.

Q3. Who cries at their wrongdoings according to the poet?

Ans : According to the poet, humans cry at their sins (wrongdoings).

Q4. Who are ‘They’ in the first line?

Ans : They are animals.

Q5. What does the word ‘Demented’ mean in the fourth line of the stanza?

Ans : The word ‘Demented’ mean ‘Mad or Insane’.

Q6. What do the words ‘Whine and sweat’ refer to?

Ans : The words ‘Whine and Sweat’ refer to complaints and cries of human beings.

Q7. What word from the stanza has the same meaning as ‘Bow down’?

Ans : The word ‘Kneel’ means ‘bow down’.

Q8. What does the poet mean by ‘nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago’ mean?

Ans : Here the poet is talking about the ancestors of human being in front of whom humans kneel (bow down) every day.

Stanza 3

Not one is respectable or unhappy over the whole earth.
So they show their relations to me and I accept them,
They bring me tokens of myself, they evince
them plainly in their possession

I wonder where they get those tokens,
Did I pass that way huge times ago and negligently drop them?

Q1. What does the word ‘Evince’ mean?

Ans : The word ‘Evince’ means to show.

Q2. What does the poet mean by ‘So they show their relations to me…?

Ans : Here the poet wants to say that humans beings are so biased with poor that they don’t respect them whereas the rich are given more importance and respect as compared to them.

Q3. Which poetic device has been used in ‘They bring me tokens…?

Ans : Metaphor (Human qualities are referred to as tokens here)

Q4. Find out the synonym of the word ‘Carelessly’ from the stanza?

Ans : Negligently

Q5. Which qualities of animals has the poet lost according to him?

Ans : According to the poet, he has lost all the qualities like truthfulness, kindness, helpfulness and many more. On the contrary, animals still have all these qualities in them.

We would love your reading of The Making of a Scientist, Madam Rides the Bus, The Sermon at Benares, Glimpses of India, The Proposal, Bholi, The Necklace, The Hack Driver, Amanda, Animals & The Tale of Custard The Dragon for better understanding of the chapters/poems and scoring higher.

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