You Never Can Tell Brief Suggestion
Q.1. What is the subject of the play You Never Can Tell?
Ans. A dentist falls in love and a family accidentally meets the father they have never known.
Q. 2. What is the theme of the play You Never Can Tell?
Ans. None can tell what will happen in the future.
Q.3. What is the setting of the play You Never Can Tell?
Ans. The play is set in an English seaside resort one day in August 1896.
Q.4. Who is Mrs. Clandon?
Ans. She is the mother of Dolly, Philip, and Gloria, and the estranged wife of Mr. Crampton. She is feminist who is the author of a number of modern feminist tracts.
Q.5. Who is Valentine?
Ans. Valentine is the young dentist who falls in love with Gloria and finally marries her.
Q.6.. Who is Dolly?
Ans. Dolly is the daughter of Mrs. Lanfrey Clandon and twin sister of Philip Clandon. She is eighteen years old and has “a rapidly clearing cloud of Spartan obstinacy on her tiny firm set mouth and quaintly squared eyebrows.”
0.7. What is the hire-purchase system?
Ans. Hire-purchase system is the system of buying a thing paying part of the price at the first installment and the rest in the subsequent installments.
0.8. How old is Valentine?
Ans. Valentine is thirty-one years old..
Q.9. What is Dialectical Society?
Ans. It is a philosophical society discussing problems of philosophy, science etc.
Q.10.What is The Origin of the Species?
Ans. The Origin of Species is a work of scientific literature by Charles Darwin which is considered to be the foundation of evolutionary biology..
Q.11. What is the real name of Mrs. Clandon?
Ans. The real name of Mrs. Clandon is Margaret.
Q.12. What is synonymous with life force?
Ans. Nature is synonymous with life force.
Q.13. What is the duel of sex?
Ans. The duel of sex refers to men’s making devices to win the hearts of women and women’s attempt to resist the love by rationality.
Q.14. What is a hedonist?
Ans. A hedonist is a person who believes that pleasure or happiness is the most important goal in life.
Q.15. What was Valentine’s tragedy?
Ans. It was Valentine’s tragedy that he could not stir Gloria’s heart while he himself was stirred to the depth.
Q.16. How does the waiter console Valentine at the end of the drama?
Ans. He consoles him by saying that Gloria may prove an ideal wife to him and their married life may be one of ideal bliss and felicity
More Brief
Q.1. What is the New Drama?
Ans. The New Drama is a type of drama which started at the end of the 19th century and which deals with realistic social issues instead of the idealism of the traditional drama.
Q.2.Who is Walter Boon?
Ans. He is the head waiter at the Marine Hotel. He is the father of “Bohun”, an eminent barrister.
Q.3. What is Fabian Society?
Ans. Fabian Society is socialist society founded in 1884 in London, having as its goal the establishment of a democratic socialist state in Great Britain. The Fabians put their faith in evolutionary socialism rather than in revolution.
Q.4. What kind of drama is ‘You Never Can Tell”?
Aas. The play You Never Can Tell by George Bernard Shaw is set on the coast of Torbay in Devon, England.
Q.5. Who is Mr. Crampton?
Ans. Mr. Fergus Crampton is the long-estranged husband of Mrs. Lanfrey Clandon; he is father to Gloria, Philip and Dolly -Mrs. Clandon’s three children.
Q.6. Where is the dentist’s camber located?
Ans. The dentist’s chamber is situated in a watering place on the coast of Torbay in Devon.
Q.7. Who is Gloria?
Ans. Gloria is the attractive daughter of Mrs. Clandon. She has been raised to be like her mother but unlike her mother she is a passionate girl.
Q.8. What is Mr. Crampton’s view on marriage?
Ans. His view on marriage is: “Marry and be miserable”.
Q.9. Who is the old friend of Mr Crampton?
Ans. McComas
Q.10. What kind of man is Mr. McComas?
Ans. McComas was a forward young man, a disciple of Herbert Spencer, an agnostic in religion and a radical in politics.
Q.11. What is New Theatre?
Ans. It is a theatrical organization which was established in London in 1891 in order to popularize the intellectual dramas of Ibsen and Shaw.
Q.12. Why is valentine called a five shilling dentist?
Ans. Valentine is called a five-shilling dentist because he charges five shillings for everything such as extracting teeth, giving gas etc.
Q.13. What is the message of the drama You Never Can Tell?
Ans. The message of the drama is that young men and women at the point of marrying regard marriage as a source of dread but after all marriages are not so unhappy and uncomfortable as they think.
Desire Under the Elms Brief Suggestion
Q.1. Who is Eben?
Ans. Eben is the third son of Ephraim Cabot by his second wife. He is twenty-five years old and good-looking. He makes love to his stepmother to take revenge on his father.
Q.2. Who is Abbie Putnam?
Ans. Abbie Putnam is a sensual woman of thirty-five. She passionately falls in love with Eben but later on her passion turns into true love.
Q.3. Who is Simeon?
Ans. Simeon is the first son of Cabot by his first wife. He is firty-nine years old, a hard and squat man.
Q.4. Who are the three sons of Cabot? Ans. His three sons are Simeon and Peter by his first wife and Eben by his second wife.
Q.5. What is the name of Simeon’s wife?
Ans. The name of his wife is Jenny.
Q.6. What is meant by the line “No one never killed nobody”?
Ans. By the line Simeon in Desire Under the Elms means that no one ever killed anybody. He means that a killer is always something, not somebody.
Q.7. What is a parlour?
Ans. A parlour is a room in a house which has comfortable chairs and is used for meeting guests.
Q.8. What kind of room is the parlour in Cabot’s house?
Ans. It is a grim, repressed room like a tomb.
Q.9.Why does Abbie fall in love with Eben?
Ans. Abbie falls in love with Eben for two reasons: (i) her passion for him and (ii) she wants to have a son so that she can possess the farm.
Q.10. Who is the biological father of Abbie’s son?
Ans. Eben is the biological father of Abbie’s son.
Q.11. Why does Abbie win our sympathy at the end of the play?
Ans. She wins our sympathy by her firm stand that she must accept the punishment for killing her baby.
Q.12. Why does Eben win our sympathy at the end of the play?
Ans. He wins our sympathy by voluntarily sharing Abbie’s punishment on the grounds that he had a hand in committing the murder.
Q.13. How old is the third wife of Ephraim Cabot?
Ans. She is thirty-five years old.
Q.14. Why does Abbie marry old Cabot?
Ans. She marries old Cabot for financial security.
Q.15. Who is compared to a ripe fruit?
Ans. Cabot is compared to a ripe fruit.
More Brief
Q.1. Who is Maw?
Ans. Maw the deceased of Eben.
Q.2. What does the Sheriff desire?
Ans. The Sheriff wishes that he owned the Cabot farm.
Q.3. How does Abbie kill her little son?
Ans. Abbie kills her little son by suffocating it by putting a pillow over its face.
Q.4. How old is Cabot?
Ans. Cabot was seventy-five years old.
Q.5. What do the elms symbolize in “Desire Under the Els”?
Ans. The elms symbolize the dominance of female characters They are the symbols of maternal forces in the life of some of the characters in the play.
Q.6. Why do Simeon and Peter go to California?
Ans. They want to go to California in order to seek gold, that is, to become rich.
Q:7. Why does Eben fall in love with Abble?
Ans. Eben falls in love with his stepmother, Abbie for two reasons: (i) his passion for her and (ii) his desire to take revenge on his father on his mother’s behalf.
Q.8. Who is Rachel?
Ans. Rachel was the daughter of Laban and the younger sister of Leah, Jacob’s first wife. Jacob fell in love with her and married her but she was unable to conceive. When she prayed to God for a child, she became pregnant and gave birth to a son.
Death of a Salesman Brief Suggestion
Q.1. What are the themes of the play Death of a Salesman?
Ans. The American Dream; abandonment; betrayal
Q.2. Who is Willy Loman?
Ans. Willy Loman is an aging salesman. He suffers from depression and anxiety as a result of his dissipating career, his estranged relationship with his oldest son, Biff, and his guilt over an extramarital affair.
Q.3. Who is Happy Loman?
Ans. Happy Loman is the Lomans’ younger son. He is thirty-two years old. He is a womanizer driven by his sexuality. He works as an assistant but exaggerates his position and his authority.
Q.4. Who is Bernard?
Ans. Bernard is Charley’s son and an important, successful lawyer.
Q.5. Who is Uncle Ben?
Ans. He is Willy’s older brother. He made a fortune in the African jungle by the time he was 21 years old. He once offered Willy a job in Alaska.
Q.6. Who is Howard Wagner?
Ans. He is Willy’s boss. Howard inherited the company from his ther, whom Willy regarded as “a masterful man” and “a prince.”
Ans. New England
Q. 7. What is New England?
Ans. It refers to the five Eastern states of: Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and Maine.
Q.8. What is the American Dream Willy believes in?
Ans. Willy wholeheartedly believes in the American Dream that states a hard working man with personal attractiveness certainly achieves success in life.
Q.9. Why does Willy thank God?
Ans. He thanks God for building his two sons like Adonis, handsome young man in Greek mythology, loved by Venus, the goddess of beauty.
Q.10. What is open sesame?
Ans. It is any unfailing means of gaining admission or achieving some other end; these words were spoken to open the door of the thieves’ den in the story of Ali Baba in The Arabian Nights.
Q.11. What is Casino?
Ans. It is a card game in which eleven points are played, the ten of diamonds counting two and the two spades one.
Q.12. How did Willy try to kill himself? W
Ans. When Willy had his car accident in February, a woman saw that he deliberately smashed into the bridge railing to drive his car into the river to commit suicide. Willy has also tried to use the gas line to kill himself.
Q.13. What does the Woman represent?
Ans. The Woman merely represents Willy’s discontent in life.
Q.14. Who is Dave Singleman?
Ans. Dave Singleman is a mythic salesman whose success inspired Willy to become a salesman.
Q.15. What is the name of Biff’s math teacher?
Ans. Birnbaum
Q.16. What does the stocking symbolize?
Ans. The stockings are a symbol of Willy’s infidelity to his wife, Linda
Q.17. Who is compared to a little boat in Death of a Salesman?
Ans. Linda compares Willy to a little boat which is looking for a harbour.
Q.18. What does gardening symbolize?
Ans. The gardening symbolizes Willy’s success and failure.
More Brief
Q.1. What do the seeds symbolize?
Ans. The seeds symbolize something permanent for his family.
Q.2. What is Willy’s “proposition”?
Ans. His “proposition” refers to his plan to kill himself in order to leave Linda and Biff with $20,000 of insurance money.
Q.3. What does a dime a dozen’ mean?
Ans. The expression ‘dime a dozen’ refers to something available in large quantities. It suggests that the item is not rare and so it is not of great value. So, a dime a dozen means a person who is ordinary, not special or extraordinary.
Q.4. Who convinces Willy to commit suicide?
Ans. Ben convinces Willy to commit suicide.
Q.5. How does Willy kill himself?
Or. How does Willy die?
Ans. Willy kills himself by purposely crashing his car.
Q.6. Who is Willy’s true friend?
Ans. Charley is Willy’s only true friend in Death of a Salesman, and he recognizes Willy’s need for acknowledgment and appreciation. Hoillo
Q.7. Do you justify Willy’s suicide? Why?
Ans. Willy’s suicide cannot be justified because it defies his own intentions. Willy believes his suicide will resolve the disorder in his life. By committing suicide, he will be able to pacify Linda, win Biff’s respect and display his popularity as a salesman and an individual. But what happens after his death is just the opposite.
Q.8. What is an American Dream?
Ans. An American Dream is a set of ideals that are thought to create equal opportunity for prosperity and success for the citizens. It is a sharp contrast to the reality of Willy’s life in Death of a Salesman. In fact, America is not a place for easy opportunity and success.
Q.9. What is the full title of Death of a Salesman?
Ans. The full title is Death of a Salesman: Certain Private . Conversations in Two Acts and a Requiem.
Q.10. What is the amount of Willy’s life-insurance?
Ans. $20,000
Q.11. What is a requiem?
Ans. Requiem is a funeral hymn or dirge for the dead.
Q.12. Who is Linda?
Ans. Linda is Willy Loman’s loyal and loving wife. She has murmured the family through all of Willy’s misguided attempts at success, and her emotional strength and perseverance support Willy until his collapse.
Q.13. What is Happy’s real name?
Ans. His real name is Harold.
Q.14. In what sense is Biff a failure?
Ans. Biff is aimless. He is not able to hold a real job. He hops from job to job after high school and is concerned that he has wasted his life. He has had twenty or thirty different types of jobs since he left home before the war, and everything turns out the same.
Q.15. What are the symbols used in the play Death of a Salesman?
Ans. Seeds, diamonds, Linda’s and The Woman’s stockings, the rubber hose.
Q.16. Why did the Salesman die?
Ass Willy commits suicide to provide his family with financial security and to make Biff succeed in business.
The Glass Menagerie Brief Suggestion
Q.1. What is the original title of The Glass Menagerie?
Ans. The original title of the play was The Gentleman Caller.
Q.2. What type of drama is The Glass Menagerie?
Ans. It is a family drama.
Q.3. Who is Amanda?
Ans. Amanda Wingfield is the mother of Tom and Laura. She spent her youth in the south, and in a way she continues to live there, endlessly telling her children stories of her life back in those days.
Q.4. Who is Tom?
Ans. Tom Wingfield is the narrator of the play The Glass Menagerie as well as a character in it. He is Amanda’s son and Laura’s brother. Tom is a poet, and he feels stifled by his unrewarding job at the warehouse and the tense situation at home.
Q.5. Who is Laura?
Ans. Laura Wingfield is Amanda’s daughter. She is an extremely shy young woman in her early twenties. Following a childhood illness she is crippled, and wears a leg brace.
Q.6. What is a fire escape?
Ans. The fire escape is structure that serves as an entrance to and exit from the Wingfield apartment.
Q.7. What does the fire escape symbolize?
Ans. The fire escape is a physical symbol of being trapped or a method of escape. It represents exactly what its name implies: an escape from the fires of frustration and dysfunction that rage in the Wingfield household. Williams describes life in these tenements as the constant burning of the “slow and implacable fires of human desperation.”
Q.8. Who is the poet in The Glass Menagerie?
Ans. Tom Wingfield is the poet in The Glass Menagerie.
Q.9. What kind of play is The Glass Menagerie?
Ans. The Glass Menagerie is a memory play.
Q.10. What is a memory play?
Ans. A memory play is a kind of play that tells a memory that goes back in time.
Q.11. What is a gentleman caller?
Ans. A gentleman caller is a boyfriend or a marriage partner. It is a person who tries to win a girl’s hand in marriage.
Q.12. Who is the fifth character in The Glass Menagerie?
Ans. Tom’s father, Mr. Wingfield, is the fifth character in the play.
Q.13. Why does Mr. Wingfield abandon his family?
Ans. He abandons his family because of his love of travel and adventure.
Q.14. Why did Jim used to call Laura ‘Blue Roses’?
Ans Jim was Laura’s high school friend. Once she told him that she had been away from school because of her illness with an attack of pleurosis. He heard it as Blue Roses. Since then he began to call her Blue Roses.
Q.15. What was Soldan?
Ans. Soldan is the name of the high school at which Laura studied.
Q.16. What is The Homemaker’s Companion?
Ans. The Homemaker’s Companion is a magazine for women.
Q.17. Does Tom like his job?
Ans.. Tom does not like his job. He continues his job against his will. He hates going to the warehouse. Instead of going to the warehouse he likes his brains to be smashed with a crowbar.
Q.18. Who broke some of Laura’s glass menagerie?
Ans. Tom broke some of Laura’s glass menagerie.
More Brief
Q.1.How is life according to Amanda?
Ans. She tells Tom that life is not easy as he wishes it to be. According to her life should be led like the Spartans who lived a life. of frugality and strict self-discipline.
Q.2. What is “Annunciation”?
Or, What does “Annunciation” suggest?
Ans. “Annunciation” simply means announcement. It also refers to the Catholic celebration of God’s announcement to the Virgin Mary that she is pregnant with Jesus Christ. Jim, in the play, may be seen as a savior for Laura and for the entire family.
Q.3. What is the full name of the gentleman caller?
Ans. His full name is James D. O’Connor. (The D. is for Delaney)
Q.4. Why does Jim nickname Tom “Shakespeare”?
Ans. Jim called Tom “Shakespeare” because of his habit of writing poems in the warehouse bathroom when work was slow..
Q.5. How is Jim different from Laura?
Ans. Jim is a representative from the “world of reality.” Whereas Laura’s life is built around glass, Jim plans to build his life around the “social poise” that consists of knowing how to use words to influence people.
Q.6. What is Laura’s favourite figurine?
Ans. Her favourite figurine is the unicorn.
0.7. How is the horn of the unicorn broken?
Ans. While they dance, Jim accidentally bumps the table on which the glass unicorn rests. The unicorn falls and its horn is broken off.
Q.8. What is Jim’s view of democracy?
Ans. According to Jim, money is the means of gaining power. It is the cycle, he says, on which democracy is built. Thus, he calls money and power the cycle on which democracy is built.
Q.9. “Yes, I know the tyranny of women!”- Who says this?
Ans. Amanda in The Glass Menagerie says this to Jim.
Q.10. What was Tennessee William’s real name?
Ans. His real name is Thomas Lanier Williams.
Q.11. Who was Midas?
Ans. Midas was a legendary King of Phrygia whose touch turned everything to gold.
Q.12. Why does Amanda consider Tom as her right-handed bower?
Ans. She looks upon Tom as her right-hand bower that is the Jack of trumps in a card game called Euchre. In Euchre, Jack is the highest-ranking trump card. By calling Tom ‘right-hand bower”, she refers to him as the main support of her life.
Q.13. What does the broken unicorn symbolize?
Ans. The broken unicorn may be taken as Laura’s broken hopes. We may also say that the broken unicorn is no longer unique like Laura but instead it is ordinary like Jim. It may represent her broken hopes for love and romance, and she gives the symbol of her love to Jim to take away with him since he has broken her as well as her unicorn.
Q.14. What is a Merchant Marine?
Ans. The Merchant Marine is the fleet of ships that carries imports and exports during peacetime and becomes a naval auxiliary during wartime to deliver troops and war materials.
