Amanda! important Questions and Answers
Very Short Answer Questions
1. What does the speaker ask Amanda not to do to her nails?
Answer: The speaker asks Amanda not to bite her nails.
2. What should Amanda not to do to her soldiers?
Answer: She should not hunch her soldiers.
3. How should Amanda sit?
Answer: She should sit straight.
4. What does Amanda wish to do in the sea?
Answer: She wishes to drift blissfully with the soft-moving waves of the sea.
5. What was Amanda to finish?
Answer: She was to finish her homework.
6. Has Amanda cleaned her shoes?
Answer: No, she has not cleaned her shoes.
7. If Amanda is an orphan, what will she do?
Answer: She will roam about in the streets.
8. How is silence described?
Answer: Silence is described as golden.
9. What is Amanda prohibited to eat?
Answer: She is prohibited to eat chocolate.
10. Why should Amanda not eat chocolate?
Answer: She should not eat chocolate as it causes acne.
11. Who was Rapunzel?
Answer: Rapunzel was fair with very long hair.
12.What did Rapunzel do with her long hair?
Answer: She let her hair fall down from the castle for her lover to climb upholding them.
13. Who is the mermaid in ‘Amanda’, what does ‘she’ wish to do?
Answer: The mermaid is Amanda herself; as imagined by Amanda. She wishes to drift blissfully on a dreamy, emerald sea, without anyone else accompanying her.
14. What is the theme of the poem — ‘Amanda’?
Answer: Too many instructions and too much control are resented by children. They get bored and fed up. Then, they listen to their parents half-heartedly and indulge in daydreaming.
15. Don’t eat that chocolate, Amanda!
Remember your acne, Amanda!
Why is Amanda asked not to eat chocolate?
Answer: Amanda already suffers from acne, a skin disease. If she eats chocolate it will aggravate her problem further. That is why she is asked not to eat chocolate.
Short Answer Type Questions
1. What is the role/ importance of punctuation marks in language? Why has the poet used the exclamation mark after Amanda? Comment on the title of the poem.
Answer: (i) Punctuation is an important part of grammar. It is used to create sense, clarity and stress in sentences. It is used to structure and organise our writing.
(ii) The exclamation mark is used after Amanda! to show the mother’s surprise on seeing Amanda. Amanda is a sulky and moody girl which upsets the mother.
2. Is the purpose of someone constantly giving instructions to Amanda being fulfilled? Explain.
Answer: No, Amanda sulks and becomes moody when her mother gives her too many instructions. She does not listen to her mother and didn’t care to follow them but she can’t dare to ignore them either so, she sulks. Parents in their endeavour to make their children well-behaved, give them too many instructions.
3. Amanda imagines herself to be Rapunzel, yet would not like to do what all she did. Identify and state the reasons for her decision.
Answer: Amanda wants to be Rapunzel to live a peaceful life in a tower, where no one gives any instruction and she doesn’t have to do any work. But she doesn’t want to escape with a prince like Rapunzel. She never wants to escape and leave such a peaceful atmosphere, with no instruction and no work to do.
4. What message does the poet want to give through the poem — ‘Amanda’?
Answer: The poet wants to convey that parents in their endeavour to make their children well-behaved, mannerly having good habits, give them too many instructions or nag (always finding fault) them. They should adopt positive measures, acceptable to children. Otherwise, they will stop listening to them and indulge in daydreaming as Amanda did.
5. Who was Amanda? What idea do you form her through the poem?
Answer: Amanda was a little school going, girl. She seems to love fairy tales, stories like Rapunzel and mermaids. She does not like too many instructions or nagging which make her sulk and become moody. Then she does not listen to her mother attentively and starts daydreaming.
6. Why does she dream to be an orphan?
Answer: She thinks orphans lead a carefree life. There is no one to pester them with instructions. They can wander in a street and make patterns in the soft dust with their bare feet. They don’t have to clean the shoes or room or do the homework.
7. Amanda imagines herself to be Rapunzel, yet would not like to do what all she did. Identify and state the reasons for her decision.
Answer: Amanda says it. In the story, Rapunzel lets down her long, beautiful hair to escape with the prince. But Amanda is fascinated by Rapunzel’s life in the tower. She never wants to escape and leave such a peaceful atmosphere, with no instruction and no work to do.
8. What made Amanda sulk and become moody?
Answer: Amanda sulks and becomes moody when her mother gives her too many instructions. She does not want to follow them but she can’t dare to ignore them either, so she sulks.
9. How does Amanda is seen behaving when the poem starts? What does the speaker ask her not to do?
Answer: When the poem beings, we find that Amanda is biting her nails. She is hunching her shoulders. She is sitting in a slouching posture. That is why the speaker asks her to behave normally. He asks her not to bite her nails and hunch her shoulders. She should sit up straight.
10. In her day-dreaming, Amanda reaches the sea. What does she imagine herself to be?
Answer: Amanda finds that the sea is relaxed and peaceful. She is the only creature in the sea. She imagines herself to be a mermaid. She is happy. She is drifting on the waves blissfully.
11. What three things the speaker ask Amanda to do which she has not done?
Answer: The speaker asks Amanda to finish her homework. Then he asks her if she has cleaned up her room. Finally, he finds that her shoes are not clean even though he had asked her to clean them.
12. How does Amanda describe her life as an orphan?
Answer: Amanda says that she is an orphan. She is free and roams the street. There is soft dust in the street under her feet. She walks silently and creates patterns on the soft dust with her bare feet. She thinks that silence is golden and freedom is sweet.
13. Why is Amanda forbidden to eat chocolate? How does Amanda behave when she is addressed by the speaker?
Answer: The speaker asks Amanda not to eat chocolate. It is because she has had acne already. Eating chocolate might create more pimples. Amanda listens to the speaker without raising her face.
14. What does Amanda say, ‘I am Rapunzel’? What does she promise not to do?
Answer: Rapunzel was a beautiful girl with long hair. She was locked up in a tower by a witch. In her imagination, Amanda thinks herself to be like Rapunzel who led a peaceful life. She promises never to let down her bright hair.
15. What does the speaker tell Amanda in the end? What is the speaker afraid of?
Answer: The speaker thinks that Amanda is sulking and moody. He thinks that Amanda is always moody. He asks her not to sulk because he is afraid that people will think that he is nagging Amanda.
16. What is the central idea of the poem?
Answer: The central idea of the poem is that children love freedom. They do not want any restrictions on their activities. Secondly, they have a dream world of their own. They like to spend most of their time in that dream world. But the elders are always destroying that dream world by ordering them around.
17. Do you think that Amanda doesn’t like to be controlled and instructed not to do one thing or the other? Give a reasoned answer.
Answer: Amanda loves her freedom. She doesn’t want it to be curtailed. She wants to lead her own kind of life. If she is asked what to do and what not, she feels that her freedom is curtailed. She doesn’t bother to answer her mother when she goes on instructing her what to do and what not.
18. List the things which Amanda’s mother doesn’t want her to do.
Answer: Her mother doesn’t want her to hunch her shoulders and bend her body down. She stops her from eating chocolates as it would not be good for her pimpled face. She wants her to stop sulking as others would think that she is being nagged by her mother.
19. Why does Amanda want to be a mermaid?
Answer: Amanda is an escapist. She imagines herself to be a mermaid. She wants to live on an island where she is the only inhabitant. She loves freedom. She loves drifting blissfully like a mermaid on that lonely island.
20. Why does Amanda want to be an orphan?
Answer: Amanda values freedom more than anything in her life. She feels suffocated at home as she is constantly nagged by her mother there. She wants to be an orphan. Like an orphan, she likes to wander about the streets freely with bare feet.
21. Why does Amanda want to be Rapunzel?
Answer: Amanda is an escapist. She imagines herself as a fairy-like Rapunzel. She wants to live happily in her lonely tower far from the maddening crowd of the world. Like Rapunzel, she wants to take care of her beautiful golden hair.
22. Why does Amanda’s mother ask her to stop sulking?
Answer: Amanda’s mother thinks that she is moody as her mood is always shifting. If she puts on an unhappy appearance, others will blame her mother. They will think that she is being constantly nagged by her mother.
23. What could Amanda do if she were a mermaid?
Answer: Amanda is a little girl. She, in fact, is a symbol of every child who is instructed by the parents to do or not to do this or that. If she were a mermaid she would blissfully drift in the sea.
24. What does Amanda yearn for?
Answer: Amanda is a little girl. She is asked to do or not to do this and that. She is nagged at by her parents. So Amanda yearns for freedom. She wants to lead a life without any restrictions.
25. What is the fear of the speaker that is explained in the last stanza?
Answer: In the last stanza, the speaker advises Amanda not to remain moody and sulking. The reason behind this is that she does not want to expose it before others. Otherwise, people will think that she was teased by the speaker. It was her fear.
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