Model Semester End Question Paper

I B. Tech. I Semester Regular Examinations February, 2014

Course Code: 13HE 1101                                 Subject:  English: Reading and Writing skills 

Common to CSE/EEE/IT/Chemical Engineering Branches

Time: 3 hours                                                                                                 Max. Marks: 70

                                                            

MODEL PAPER

1.      Answer ONE QUESTION from each unit.

2.      Each question carries 14 marks.

3.      All parts of a question must be answered in one place, otherwise they will not be valued

                                                                               UNIT-I

1.      a)  Read the following passage and answer the following questions : (4X2 =  8Marks)(CO1)

           Culture is a very powerful in our lives. It determines many of the experiences we have and the meanings we give to them. But what exactly is culture? To the sociologist, culture is everything that we are socialized to do, think, use and make.  Much of what humans think and do is learned from the society they live in. Because humans live in groups and communicate with each other, they pass on what they know and believe to their children and to each other.

They pass on , for example ideas about what they believe is important or not important in life, what they see as normal and abnormal behavior; and what they believe to be right or wrong, All these ideas form the culture of the particular society they live in , and guide the behavior of the members of that society.

1.  What is culture from sociological perspective?
2.   How do people acquire their learning?
3.   Write synonyms of the words:  normal , particular
4.   Write antonyms of the words : communicate, believe   
   
   b)  Critically appreciate the following lines:      (CO 4)                                     (6 marks)

“The Lunatic, the lover and the poet have

In common, the power of imagination”

2.       a) Read the following passage and answer the following questions :(4X2 = 8 Marks) (CO 1)

Crowds are one example of what sociologists call collective behavior. Collective behavior is social behavior that is relatively unorganized, spontaneous, and unpredictable. It contrasts with institutional behavior, which occurs in a well-organized, rather predictable way. Institutional behavior is frequent and regular. Every week day, masses of people hurry to work. On every campus, groups of students walk to classes. These predictable patterns are controlled by social norms and are essential for social order. We could not survive without them. Collective behavior, however, is predictable and operates outside these norms. Fashion, public opinion, social movements, and revolutions are other examples of collective behavior.

1)      What is the contrast between institutional and collective behavior?

2)      Why we do need social norms? 
3)      Write synonyms of the words: collective, frequent 
4)      Write antonyms of the words:  unorganized, survive    

       b)  Critically appreciate the following lines:                  (6 marks) (CO 4)

        “thousands at His bidding speed

         and post over land ocean without rest;

        They also serve who serve who only stand and wait.”

UNIT - II

3. a) How  do parents treat their  boys and  girls ? What are the social expectations of parents from their children?                               (6 m) (CO 3)

   

                  b)  Correct the following:   (3M) (CO 5)

             

1.  I am reading the Hindu daily.

2.  I just completed reading this novel.

3.  Let us attend the  meeting and discuss about the issues.

4.  The students entered into the library for borrowing books.

5.  The committee has differed in their opinions.

6.  One of the fruits have become rotten.

             c) Write One-word substitutes for the following:  (3 m) (CO 2)

           

1. One who advocates peace in all circumstances.

2. One who loves books

3. One hates mankind

             d) Fill in the blanks with apt words.       (2 m) (CO 2)

           

1. It’s not ______ (fare/fair)to blame me for everything.

2. The airline’s symbol was painted on the aircraft’s ______ (tale/tail)

 4. a) Which two aspects of the freedom movement  does Kalam  highlight?    (6m) (CO 3)

     b) Correct the following:  (3m) (CO 5)

1. He is attending the classes regularly.

2.  I took my breakfast ten minutes ago. 

3.  He is standing besides her in the photograph.

4. The manager is angry at him.

5. One of the students were awarded the medal.

6. Politics as well as economics are social sciences.

c) Fill in the blanks with appropriate prefixes/suffixes. (4x ½ = 2 m) (CO2)

1.--- reverent: lacking the expected respect for official, important or holy things

2.----precedented: never having happened or existed in the past

3. All children want the ------ (approve) of their parents.

4. He died in a ---- (mystery) plane crash that no one ever discovered the cause of.

d) Fill in the blanks with apt phrasal verbs. (2 m) (CO2)

1. You can always count ____ (on/in/up)Martin to help you if you have problems.

2. He was so angry it took me half an hour to calm him _____ (out/up/down).

                                                            

UNIT-III

5. a) How does Wordsworth describe Lucy  in terms of nature. (8m) (CO 3)

    b)“Advertising is a very common feature of media.”Substantiate. (6m)   (CO3) 

                                 

                   

6. a) The sensationalism by media is unhealthy  (8m) (CO 3) 

   b) Describe a technical device of your choice (6m) (CO 3)                                                         

                                                              

UNIT-IV

7. a) Write about   the  lesson  you have  learnt from “A Special kind of Blessing”?  (8m) (CO5)

   b) Write about any programme you regularly watch on the TV.   (6m)       (CO 3)

                                                      

8. a) Write a letter  to the General Manager of a company asking for  more time to join 

         the job.(8m) (CO 5)

 

    b) Write a précis of the following passage: (CO 5)                                                  (6m)

When you smile a real smile, two things happen to your face: your lips move up towards your cheeks, and your cheeks themselves go up and gather in the skin around the eyes. And a real smile will usually only last for up to four seconds. False smiles are seen on the faces of politicians who have just lost an election, people who are pretending they’re pleased to see you, and door-to-door salesmen. False smiles usually appear slightly too eagerly or too late, and they tend to go on for too long. But if you really want to know if a smile is real or false, look at the eyes. In a false smile these don’t change – however much the person has practised smiling. Eyes are important in other ways, too. When you feel good, your pupils get larger; when you feel bad, they become small. Ancient Chinese traders always looked their customers straight in the eyes. If the pupils become big, the person was interested, and they could ask for more money.

UNIT - V

9. a) Write an essay on the topic, “Does migration to other planets solve the problem of

        overpopulation?”  (8m)     (CO 5) 

    

     b) Describe the series of dreams envisaged by  Martin Luther King Jr. (6m)    (CO 3, CO 4) 

10. a) Write  an  essay on the  topic, “The future of the society with robots.”   (8m) (CO 5)

       b) Make notes out of the following passage  (6m)   (CO 5)

At the recently concluded UN climate change talk in Durban, the world agreed to a new global climate change regime by 2020 to bring down emissions to save the planet. But cutting carbon emissions will be a tough task for India in the years to come as the country needs to balance its development trajectory with transition to a low carbon economy. Transition to a low carbon economy means huge investment in clean technology, switching from coal and oil to low-carbon fuels for power generation and transport. And the most important part of this low carbon growth will need changes in behaviour and lifestyle of the people. Manufacturers and retailers will also play an important role in selectively editing out products that lead to more carbon footprint while promoting energy efficient and energy conservation products to consumers.

India has to look for new ways to cut emissions and pay big-time for these. The transition to green energy calls for investing big-time in solar, biomass or off-shore wind energy but despite that India will still not be able to substantially reduce dependence on coal.

"India really needs to focus on how it will meet the power demand post 2020. It is a warning bell to start looking of low carbon power sources that reduce dependence on coal and oil," a senior environment ministry official said. "We know protests over nuclear energy and we cannot meet the power demand by only harnessing solar, wind and hydel energy. This means we will face acute power shortage in years to come," he said. The big question emerging out of the Durban outcome is whether India is rich enough to pay for the cost of transition to a low-carbon economy?                        

Critical Appreciation: La belle Dame sans Merci- John Keats.

La Belle Dame sans Merci, one of John Keats last works, is a ballad which tells the story of a knight who fell in love with a mystical creature, and now suffers the aftermath of a broken heart.

The poem starts with the poet finding a solitary knight stumbling around the countryside. The scene of autumn is described: No grass grows on the river banks, the chirping birds are absent, squirrels and other animals have hoarded food to sustain them throughout winter, and the harvest season is over.

The poet wonders what sickness has gripped the knight, making him look so exhausted and miserable. He seems to be in a terrible condition: the color is fast fading from his cheeks and his forehead glistens with sweat, contrasting with his increasing pallor. An aura of mystery surrounds the scene, and one cannot help but wonder what a knight, a man used to action and surviving in harsh conditions, is doing walking aimlessly around the moor, and what is it that has befallen him to reduce him to such a pitiful state.

With the fourth stanza the knight starts to tell his tale: He had met a beautiful maiden in the meadows. She was the most beautiful thing he had cast eyes upon, with long flowing hair and a soft unearthly grace which led him to believe that she must be a fairy treading the earth. Her eyes however had struck him as sad and doleful as if she was mourning something.

He tells the poet how she joined him on his horse and they rode together. He had eyes only for her and did not notice anything else, for she was receptive of his attentions and sang to him sweetly. He tried to woo her by making garlands and bracelets out of flowers and she gazed at him lovingly, giving him delectable things to eat such as sweet roots and wild honey. She spoke in a different dialect yet he was sure that she told him that she loved him with all her heart.

The sense of suspense and mystery is further elevated in the reader by now: although one had expected a lady to feature prominently in the Knight’s endeavors, it was not common practice for upper class ladies to be wandering around the countryside without an escort, and be as forthcoming and immodest as to sing and moan to a stranger whom she has just met. Who is this woman and where did she come from?

Some questions are answered when the knight mentions that the lady then took him to her elfin grot, and the reader realizes that the lady is an actual fairy, a supernatural being that the knight has fallen in love with. The knight remembers that she looked at him sadly as he kissed her wild troubled eyes to sleep. As they slept together on the hill side, the knight had a dream: he saw the deathly visions of kings, princes and warriors, with gnarled lips and ghastly figures. They all cried out to him, warning him that the lady has no mercy and he is in her trap now as well. That is when he awoke and found himself alone and on the verge of death, without any sign on his lover in sight. He has been wandering the land ever since, hoping either for his lady to return or for death to embrace him.

Thus the knight’s story comes to an end and his state of depression and sickness is explained: he has fallen victim to a lover’s betrayal and abandonment. But the lady remains still an enigma, both to the poet and the reader. Though on first look, the woman appears to be the classic example of the attention seeking selfish lady who mercilessly leads unwary young men to believe that she loves them and then deserts them, alone in their grief. But on deeper study it’s found that there’s a lot more to her character: her eyes are sad and wild, her sighs sorrowful and her gaze mournful. Could it be that she is as unfortunate as her victims, bound by fate to travel the earth and fall in love with mortals again and again only to have to desert them as they could not be her match? The beauty of the story is that this question remains forever unanswered; one can derive one’s own analysis about her, but never know for sure who she really was.

Other than the constant creation of suspense and the thick aura of mystery which drapes the ballad and its characters, Keats has also used other figures of speech to further intensify the exquisiteness of his poems. In relating the sickness of the knight he compared he metaphorically describes his pale complexion as a ‘lily on his brow’ and his fading color as a ‘fast withering rose.’ The first few stanzas are also rich with imagery as the poet draws the autumn scene of the desolate and lonely moors and the solitary knight in the reader’s head.

The most basic ‘moral’ of this story of woe is the dangers of heady, passionate love in which one can get carried away and the imminent heart break which follows every such transient affair. The knight was too impulsive in falling head over heels for a strange woman, and he had to pay the price for his impetuosity.

However, one could also argue that Keats wrote this poem as a dedicated tribute to absolute beauty. The knight had no desire to live on after once finding and losing the epitome of beauty in the lovely enchantress. Materialistic beauty is captivating yet ephemeral, and every being that strives to find it, has to be prepared for losing it too, that is the revenge of time. Those who fail to realize that soon find out that no meaning remains in anything else afterwards.

Another quite somber interpretation of the poem is that it shows the outcome of every idealist romantic who believes in true and eternal love, casting a harsh light on the fact, that love is, no matter how pure, never immortal. It cannot last forever and has to eventually bow down before either time or death.

This poem is, not unlike most of Keats’s work, a personal favorite both for being gorgeous in its language and story, and thought provoking in its poetical philosophy.

La Belle Dame Sans Merci Summary Line by Line

The speaker of the poem comes across a "knight at arms" alone, and apparently dying, in a field somewhere. He asks him what's going on, and the knight's answer takes up the rest of the poem. The knight says that he met a beautiful fairy lady in the fields. He started hanging out with her, making flower garlands for her, letting her ride on his horse, and generally flirting like knights do. Finally, she invited him back to her fairy cave. Sweet, thought the knight. But after they were through smooching, she "lulled" him to sleep, and he had a nightmare about all the knights and kings and princes that the woman had previously seduced – they were all dead. And then he woke up, alone, on the side of a hill somewhere.

Stanza 1, Lines 1-4

"O WHAT can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing.

• The poem opens with a question: an unnamed speaker asks a "knight at arms" what's wrong, or what's "ail[ing]" him.
• Something is clearly wrong with the knight – he's "loitering" by himself around the edge of a lake, and he's "pale."
• The speaker says that the "sedge," or marsh plants, have all died out from around the lake, and "no birds sing." So we're guessing that it's autumn or even early winter since all the birds have migrated, and the plants have "withered."
• The presence of the "knight at arms" reminds us of medieval fairy tales with knights and ladies in towers. We think that this is the response Keats intended

Stanza 2, Lines 5-8

"O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done.

• The first part of the stanza echoes the first line of the poem word-for-word. Apparently the knight doesn't answer immediately, so the unnamed speaker has to repeat the question.
• This time, we get two more adjectives to describe the knight: he's "haggard," or worn-out and tired-looking, and "woe-begone." The knight is obviously both sick and depressed.
• The last two lines of the stanza do more to set the scene: the squirrels have finished filling up their "granary," or storage of food for the winter, and the crops have already been harvested.
• We can now safely assume that it's late autumn.

Stanza 3, Lines 9-12

"I see a lily on thy brow
With anguish moist and fever-dew.
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
Fast withereth too."

• The speaker continues to address this sick, depressed "knight at arms." He asks about the "lily" on the knight's "brow," suggesting that the knight's face is pale like a lily.
• The knight's forehead is sweaty with "anguish" and with "fever," so he's obviously sick.
• The last two lines of the stanza describe how the healthy color is rapidly "fading" from the knight's cheeks.

Stanza 4, Lines 13-16

"I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful – a faery's child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.

• This stanza changes point of view.
• All of a sudden, the knight answers the unnamed speaker's questions. So now the "I" is the knight, rather than the original speaker.
• The knight says that he met a beautiful, fairy-like "lady" in the "meads," or fields.
• She had long hair, was graceful, and had "wild" eyes. (We're not sure what "wild" eyes would look like, but apparently the knight thought it was attractive.)

Stanza 5, Lines 17-20

"I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She look'd at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan.

• The knight made a flower wreath, or "garland," for the lady, along with flower "bracelets."
• The "fragrant zone" is a belt made of flowers.
• We get the idea that the knight decks out the maiden with flowers.
• "Fragrant zone" could also be a reference to her lady parts, which would make sense, given where the next two lines go.
• And where do the next two lines go? Well, the lady is "look[ing]" at the knight while "lov[ing]" and "moan[ing]," so we think that they two are having sex.

Stanza 6, Lines 21-24

"I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long;
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
A faery's song.

• The knight puts the lady on his horse (his "pacing steed") to take a ride. Yes, there might be sexy connotations to this line, too.
• The knight is so absorbed with his erotic encounter with this fairy lady that he doesn't notice anything else "all day long."
• The lady leans "sidelong," or sideways off of the horse and sings "fairy songs" to the knight.

Stanza 7, Lines 25-28

"She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild and manna-dew;
And sure in language strange she said,
'I love thee true.'

• The knight says that the fairy lady found him tasty roots, honey, and manna to eat ("of relish sweet").
• "Manna" is the food that the Jewish scriptures say that the Israelites ate when they were wandering around the desert after Moses freed them from slavery in Egypt. It's supposed to be food from heaven, so this word makes the fairy lady seem supernatural, if not actually divine.
• Alternatively, the association could be with the slavery from which the Israelites had just been freed. After all, the knight does become enslaved to the beautiful fairy lady. This allusion becomes even more potent when it's associated with the "honey wild" that the fairy lady fed the knight. (The Israelites were trying to find the Promised Land, which would flow with "milk and honey.")
• The fairy lady tells the knight that she loves him, but she says it "in language strange."
• He doesn't say what language it is, or how he's able to understand her. Maybe he's just hearing what he wants to hear, or maybe her magical influence has enabled him to understand her "language strange."

Stanza 8, Lines 29-32

"She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she wept and sigh'd full sore;
And there I shut her wild, wild eyes
With kisses four.

• The fairy lady takes the knight to her "elfin grot." "Elfin" just means having to do with elves, as any Tolkien fans probably figured. And a "grot" is a grotto, or cave.
• Once they're back at her fairy cave, she cries and sighs loudly. The knight doesn't say why she's crying, and we never find out – it's left to our imagination.
• The knight kisses her weepy eyes four times. (Why "four" kisses? Isn't "three" usually the magic number in fairy tales? )
• Again, her eyes are described as "wild," and this time it's repeated twice.

Stanza 9, Lines 33-36

"And there she lullèd me asleep,
And there I dream'd – ah! woe betide!
The latest dream I ever dream'd
On the cold hill's side.

• The fairy lady "lulls" the knight to sleep like a baby in her cave, and he starts to dream something.
• He interrupts himself with a dash – in line 34, and exclaims "Ah! woe betide!" because even the memory of the dream is horrible as he repeats it to the unnamed speaker.
• "Woe betide!" is an archaic exclamation used to express extreme grief or suffering. It was old-fashioned even when Keats was writing.
• The knight's use of this expression emphasizes the medieval romance setting.
• The knight's dream in the fairy cave is the "latest," or last, dream he'll ever have.

Stanza 10, Lines 37-40

"I saw pale kings and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all:
They cried, 'La belle Dame sans Merci
Hath thee in thrall!'

• The knight describes the dream he had: he saw "kings," "princes," and "warriors, and they were all "death pale." In fact, he repeats the word "pale" three times in two lines.
• This procession of "pale" men could be an allusion to the fourth horseman of the Apocalypse that gets described in the Book of Revelation in the Christian bible. The fourth horseman is Death, and he rides on a pale horse.
• The pale warriors, princes, and kings all cry out in unison that "La belle dame sans merci" has the knight "in thrall," or in bondage.
• Line 39 has the title of the poem in it, so it's time to translate it. The title is French and it translates to "the beautiful woman without mercy."

Stanza 11, Lines 41-44

"I saw their starved lips in the gloam
With horrid warning gapèd wide
And I awoke and found me here
On the cold hill's side.

• The knight continues to describe the pale warriors from his dream – in the "gloam," or dusk, all he can make out are their "lips."
• Their mouths are "starv'd" and hungry-looking, and their mouths are all open as they cry out their warning to the knight.
• The word "gloam" just means dusk or twilight, but it's no accident that Keats uses it – after all, "gloam" sounds a lot like "gloom."
• The knight wakes up from the dream alone and cold on the side of a hill.

Stanza 12, Lines 45-48

"And this is why I sojourn here
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing."

• The knight has finished his story. He tells the original, unnamed speaker, that this is why he's hanging out ("sojourn[ing]" and "loitering") by himself, even though it's so dismal outside.
• The knight repeats the unnamed speaker's words from the first stanza, so that the poem ends with almost exactly the same stanza with which it began.

"La Belle Dame Sans Merci" by John Keats

"La Belle Dame Sans Merci" by Frank Bernard Dicksee.

One of the most famous poems by John Keats is "La Belle Dame Sans Merci" (meaning "the beautiful woman without mercy" in old French). It is not exactly a short poem, but twelve stanzas is not exactly that long, either.

Original version of La Belle Dame Sans Merci, 1819
Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
    Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
    And no birds sing.

Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
    So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full,
    And the harvest's done.

I see a lily on thy brow,
    With anguish moist and fever-dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
    Fast withereth too.

I met a lady in the meads,
    Full beautiful - a faery's child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
    And her eyes were wild.

I made a garland for her head,
    And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
    And made sweet moan.

I set her on my pacing steed,
    And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
    A faery's song.

She found me roots of relish sweet,
    And honey wild, and manna-dew,
And sure in language strange she said -
    'I love thee true'.

She took me to her elfin grot,
    And there she wept and sighed full sore,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
    With kisses four.

And there she lulled me asleep
    And there I dreamed - Ah! woe betide! -
The latest dream I ever dreamt
    On the cold hill side.

I saw pale kings and princes too,
    Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried - 'La Belle Dame sans Merci
    Hath thee in thrall!'

I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
    With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
    On the cold hill's side.

And this is why I sojourn here
    Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
    And no birds sing.

"La Belle Dame Sans Merci" by Robert Anning Bell

“La Belle Dame sans Merci,” written in 1819 and published the next year in a form slightly different from the one here, depicts a knight-at-arms who has been seduced and abandoned by a capricious fairy. Told in the form of a dialogue, the poem recounts the experience of loving dangerously and fully, of remaining loyal to that love despite warnings to the contrary, and of suffering the living death of one who has glimpsed immortality," (enotes, 2011). 

This poem could be interpreted in a myriad of ways. There are some people who think that the fairy exists only in the imagination and others who believe her to be equitable to a siren, luring men into become her emotional slaves. One analysis takes a different route:

"The references to "faery" and "elfin" suggest enchantment or imagination. Her "sweet moan" and "song" represent art inspired by imagination. The lady, symbolizing imagination, takes him to an ideal world. The knight becomes enraptured by or totally absorbed in the pleasures of the imagination--the delicious foods, her song, her beauty, her love or favor ("and nothing else saw all day long"). But the imagination or visionary experience is fleeting; the human being cannot live in this realm, a fact which the dreamer chooses to ignore. The knight's refusal to let go of the joys of the imagination destroys his life in the real world," (Melani, 2010). 

In poetry analysis, it may be hard to differ opinion from objective analysis. While searching articles and websites online, I was struck by how similar they all sound. After reading a number of them, I was able to tell them apart more easily. Here is one example of an opinion about Keats' poem:  

"La Belle Dame Sans Merci" by Arthur Hugues.

“La Belle Dame sans Merci” is one of Keats’s most beloved poems and one of the few important works that seems to evade the kind of critical argumentation invoked by the odes and long poems. Typical of critics’ magnanimity toward the ballad is T. Hall Caine’s 1882 assessment of the poem as the “loveliest [Keats] gave us.” He writes that the ballad is “wholly simple and direct, and informed throughout by a reposeful strength. In all the qualities that rule and shape poetry into unity of form, this little work strides, perhaps, leagues in advance of ‘Endymion,’”  (enotes, 2011). 

One can tell that it is an opinion because of the use of words like "beloved" and "important". The author believes the poem to be a beloved and important work, and that is all based on the author's own opinions. This opinion offers little in the way of new information or analysis. 

'Because I could not stop for Death' Poem & Summary

Introduction:

If you know anything about Emily Dickinson, it's probably that she was a reclusive poet from small-town Massachusetts who wrote tons and tons of poetry in the 1800s that wasn't published much until after her death. Oh, and that death and dying were among her favorite subjects.

We can add "Because I could not stop for Death," first published in 1862, to the list of Dickinson poems obsessed with the idea of death. In this particular poem, the speaker encounters death, yet the tale is delivered rather calmly. As a result, the poem raises tons of questions: Is the speaker content to die? Is this poem really about death or does the idea of death stands in for something else? Fear of marriage perhaps? Is this a poem about faith? The doors for interpretation are wide open.

There probably isn't one person among us who hasn't considered what will happen after we die. This poem explores that curiosity by creating a death scene that's familiar to the living – something we can all imagine, whether we'd like to or not.

There's something very cinematic about this poem. The ending feels especially reminiscent of the flashback trick used in movies, or the ending that turns the whole movie on its head – "and what you thought was taking place right now actually happened centuries ago and, surprise, I'm dead!"  Even if you're not as death-obsessed as Emily Dickinson, you've got to admit that you're at least a little curious about what goes on during and after death. How do you picture death and the afterlife? In "Because I could not stop for Death," Dickinson imagines that maybe a handsome gentleman comes to take us on a pleasant ride through our former town and death is just one stop along the way. It's a little creepy, we'll admit, but not so horrifying either.

Because I could not stop for Death: Text of the Poem

The poem

Because I could not stop for Death –
He kindly stopped for me –
The Carriage held but just Ourselves –
And Immortality.

We slowly drove – He knew no haste
And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For His Civility –

We passed the School, where Children strove
At Recess – in the Ring –
We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –
We passed the Setting Sun –

Or rather – He passed us –
The Dews drew quivering and chill –
For only Gossamer, my Gown –
My Tippet – only Tulle –

We paused before a House that seemed
A Swelling of the Ground –
The Roof was scarcely visible –
The Cornice – in the Ground –

Since then – 'tis Centuries – and yet
Feels shorter than the Day
I first surmised the Horses' Heads
Were toward Eternity –

Summary:

Because I could not stop for Death Summary

Death, in the form of a gentleman suitor, stops to pick up the speaker and take her on a ride in his horse-drawn carriage.

They move along at a pretty relaxed pace and the speaker seems completely at ease with the gentleman. As they pass through the town, she sees children at play, fields of grain, and the setting sun. Pretty peaceful, right?

As dusk sets in our speaker gets a little chilly, as she is completely under-dressed – only wearing a thin silk shawl for a coat. She was unprepared for her impromptu date with Death when she got dressed that morning.

They stop at what will be her burial ground, marked with a small headstone.

In the final stanza, we find out the speaker's ride with Death took place centuries ago (so she's been dead for a long time). But it seems like just yesterday when she first got the feeling that horse heads (like those of the horses that drew the "death carriage") pointed toward "Eternity"; or, in other words, signaled the passage from life to death to an afterlife.