NIOS Class 12 English Chapter 18 Night Of The Scorpion, Solutions to each chapter is provided in the list so that you can easily browse throughout different chapters NIOS Study Material of Class 12 English Chapter 18 Night Of The Scorpion and select need one. NIOS Class 12 English Chapter 18 Night Of The Scorpion Question Answers Download PDF. NIOS Study Material of Class 12 English Notes Paper 302.
NIOS Class 12 English Chapter 18 Night Of The Scorpion
Also, you can read the NIOS book online in these sections Solutions by Expert Teachers as per National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) Book guidelines. These solutions are part of NIOS All Subject Solutions. Here we have given NIOS Class 12 English Chapter 18 Night Of The Scorpion, NIOS Senior Secondary Course English Solutions for All Chapter, You can practice these here.
Night Of The Scorpion
Chapter: 18
ENGLISH
TEXTUAL QUESTION & ANSWER
Intext Question 18.1
Can you answer the following questions?
Q. 1. Was it a dark night?
Ans: Yes, it was a dark night.
Q. 2. Had it been raining for long?
Ans: Yes, it had been raining for last 10 hours.
Let us, now, read the following lines once again:
I remember the night my mother
Was stung by a scorpion. Ten hours
Of steady rain had driven him
To crawl beneath a sack of rice.
Parting with his poison-flash
Of diabolic tail in the dark room (-)
He risked the rain again.
Intext Question 18.2
Q.1. What drove the scorpion inside the house?
Ans: Continuous rain drove the scorpion inside the house.
Q. 2. Where did the scorpion crawl?
Ans: The scorpion crawled under a sack of rice.
Q. 3. Choose the correct option to complete the following sentence.
The word ‘flash’ means:
(i) a cowardly action
(ii) a quick and sudden action
(iii) a wicked action
Ans: (ii) a quick and sudden action.
Q. 4. Why does he call the tail ‘diabolic’?
Ans: He call the tail diabolic because it poisons the person it stings.
Let us read further:
The peasants came like swarms of flies
And buzzed the Name of God a hundred
Time to paralyse the Evil one.
With candles and with lanterns
Throwing giant scorpion shadows
On the mud-baked walls
They searched for him; he was not found
They clicked their tongues.
Intext Question 18.3
Q. 1. Who came into the house?
Ans: The peasants came into the house.
Q. 2. What is the scorpion referred to in the third line?
Ans: In the third line the scorpion is referred to the evil one.
Q. 3. Why did the peasants say the name of God a hundred times?
Ans: The peasants say the name of God a hundred times to paralyse the evil one.
Q. 4. Whose shadows were thrown on the walls?
Ans: The shadows of peasants were thrown on the wall.
Q. 5. Choose the correct option
The phrase ‘clicked their tongues’ express
(i) The peasants’ worries about the sting
(ii) The peasants’ sorrow for the mother.
(iii) The peasants’ failure to find the scorpion.
Ans: (ii) The peasants’ failure to find the scorpion.
Q. 6. Pick out a simile and a metaphor from the above lines.
Ans: Simile: peasants came like swarm of flies.
Metaphor: giant scorpion shadows.
Let us read on:
With every movement that the scorpion made
his poison moved in Mother’s blood they said
May your suffering decrease
the misfortunes of your next birth, they said.
May the sum of evil
balance in this world
against the sum of good
become diminished by your pain
May the poison purify your flesh
Of desire, and your spirit of ambition,
They said, and they sat around
On the floor with may mother in the center,
The peace of understanding on each face.
Intext Question 18.4
Q. 1. (a) How many times they said’ has been repeated?
Ans: They said’ has been repeated six times.
(b) Who are ‘they’ in the the above lines?
Ans: “They are the peasants in the above lines.
(c) Why did they want the scorpion to sit still ?
Ans: The peasants had a belief that with the movement of the scorpion the poison would move into mother’s body, so they wanted the scorpion to sit still.
The peasants, in the above lines, are praying for the woman. They begin each prayer with the world ‘may’.The repetitive use of the word is known as chanting. It also shows here the peasant’s concern for the suffering woman.
Q. 2. List the prayers that the peasants make for the mother
Ans: (i) May your suffering decrease the misfortunes of your next birth.
(ii) May the sum of evil against the sum of good become diminished.
(iii) May the poison purify your flesh.
(iv) May he sit still.
(v) May the sins of the previous birth be burned away.
Let us read further:
More candles, more lanterns, more neighbours
more insects, and the endless rain.
My mother twisted through and through
groaning on a mat
My father, sceptic, rationalist
trying every curse and blessing.
powder, mixture, herb and hybrid.
He even poured a little paraffin
upon the bitten toe and put a match to it.
I watched the flame feeding on my mother
I watched the holy man perform his rites
to tame the poison with an incantation.
After twenty hours
It lost its sting.
My mother only said
Thank god the scorpion picked on me
and spared my children.
Intext Question 18.5
Q. 1. The poet says that his father who was a rationalist tried everything. Why did he do so? Pick out the correct answer from the options given below:
(i) because the father had changed
(ii) because the father wanted to do what others were doing
(iii) because the father was deeply concerned
Ans: (iii) because the father was deeply concerned.
Q. 2. Why did the mother feel relieved?
Ans: The mother felt relieved because the scorpion bit her and spared her children.
