Beauty - By John Masefield

Beauty

By John Masefield

I have seen dawn and sunset on moors and windy hills
Coming in solemn beauty like slow old tunes of Spain:

I have seen the lady April bringing in the daffodils,
Bringing the springing grass and the soft warm April rain.

I have heard the song of the blossoms and the old chant of the sea,
And seen strange lands from under the arched white sails of ships;

But the loveliest things of beauty God ever has showed to me
Are her voice, and her hair, and eyes, and the dear red curve of her lips.

         In the poem, Beauty is presented in various things of the world. In the first stanza, poet has presented beauty of nature by describing the beauty of 'dawn' and 'sunset'. For the poet both are beautiful dawn also and the sunset also. The poet has seen 'moors' as well as 'windy hills', for him both are beautiful. In this stanza, the poet has presented the beauty in opposite elements of nature. In the next line, the poet has compared the beauty of nature with human beauty by saying, 'old tunes of Spain'. The poet has employed a simile in,

"Coming in solemn beauty like slow old tunes of Spain"

This also suggests the coming of beloved person.

        In the third and fourth lines, the poet has presented personification by saying

"I have seen the lady April bringing in the daffodils"

       By this personification the poet compares beauty of human with the nature. A lady April (spring season) has brought a beauty in the nature with rains and greenery.

       In the next stanza, the poet has presented the natural elements with their specific sounds and their beauty. As per poet, he has heard songs of blossoms (flowers), chants of sea (sound of waves) and he has also encountered the strange lands which he has seen from the sea-shore. The poet has seen the lands from the ships which he found beautiful. At last after admiring the beauty of nature and music created by human, the poet has admired his beloved. 

      There are two characters in the poem, one is poet himself, and another is his beloved. At last after observing all the beauties of world, the poet admires and confesses that his beloved is the loveliest beauty in this world.

     The poem can be considered as love and romantic poem. The poet has presented various kinds of beauties including nature's beauty, beauty created by humans and at last the beauty of love (his beloved).

Edmund Spenser - 1552 - 1599

Edmund Spenser - 1552 - 1599

 

         The life and works of Spenser are influenced by Cambridge - where he became famous with classics and Italian poets; London - where he experienced disappointment of court life and Ireland- where he experienced beauty and imagery of old Celtic poetry, and there he has written his masterpiece.

Life:

         He was born in London and was poor. He studied in Cambridge University. In Cambridge he read Classics, made familiarity with great Italian poets, and also wrote numberless poems of his own. Then he went to North of London  and started working on Shepherd's Calendar. After that he came to London with his poems, and finished his Shepherd's Calendar. The court was full of intrigues and he has explained his own uncomfortable position in "Mother Hubbard's Tale".

"To lose good days, that might be better spent;

To waste long nights in pensive discontent"

        In 1580, he became queen's deputy in Ireland. After sixteen years of residence he wrote his "View of the State of Ireland" (1596) which is his only prose work.

In Kilcolman, surrounded by great natural beauty, Spenser finished the first three books of the Faery Queen. These books got instant success when published and still known as the greatest work in the English Language. A yearly pension of fifty pounds was conferred by Elizabeth to him. He came back to Ireland and fell in love with beautiful Elizabeth and wrote "Amoretti" in her honour and after that represented her in "Fairy Queen". In 1594, he married to Elizabeth and wrote "Epithalamion" which is wedding hymn.

       In 1595 he wrote "Astrophel" - an elegy on the death of Sidney and also written three more books of the Faery Queen. Because of Tyrone's Rebellion Spenser has to escape with wife and two  children and some unfinished parts of Faery Queen has were burnt in the castle.

      This was the heart breaking incident in the life of Spenser and he has never recovered from this experience. He returned to England and in 1599 he died. According to Ben Jonson he died "for want of bread." He was buried beside his master Chaucer in Westminster Abbey.

The Faery Queen:

      This is the most important work of Spenser. The original plan was of twenty-four books, which includes adventure and triumph of a knight who represented a moral virtue.

       In all the books, a knight is fighting his opposing Vice, and the poem tells the story of the conflicts, it also represents life as the struggle between good and evil. Spenser completed only six books, celebrating Holiness, Temperance, Chastity, Friendship, Justice, and Courtesy. There is also a seventh fragment, Constancy. 

Works Cited

Long, W. J. "English Literature." Long, W. J. English Literature. n.d.

Common Faults of Listening - BCA - SY

Common Faults of Listening:

  

       Research studies shows that our listening efficiency is no better than 25-30 per cent. This clearly means that the considerable information is lost in the listening process.

Here are some reasons:

1. Prejudice against the speaker:

       It may happen that the listener has some conflicts in his mind about the speaker. Because of this reason a listener don’t listen to the speaker properly.

2. Rehearsing:

      An attention of listener is on the designing his own next comment. He looks interested but his mind is preparing his comment and he misses some important points. He is thinking about what to say next.  Some people rehearse whole chain of responses: I’ll say, and then he’ll say, and so on.

3. Judging negatively:

       Labeling people can be extremely limiting. If you prejudge somebody as incompetent or uninformed, you don’t pay much attention to what that person says. A basic rule of listening is that judgments should only be made after you have heard and evaluated the content of the message.

4. Advising:

       People do not hear more than a few sentences before they searching for the right advice. However, while they are coming up with suggestions and convincing someone to just try it; they may miss what is most important.

5. Sparring:

       This block most of the time happens because of arguing and debating with people who will never feel heard because the listener is too quick to disagree. In fact the main focus of listener is finding things to disagree with.

6. Being right:

       Being right suggests that the listener will go to great lengths to avoid being wrong (twist the facts,, start shouting, make excuses or call up past sins).  It represents the attitude of listener that, ‘you can’t listen to criticism, you can’t be corrected, and you can’t take suggestions to change.

7. Derailing:

       This listen blocks involves suddenly changing the subject. You derail the train of conversation when you get uncomfortable or bored with the topic. Another way of derailing is to joking.

8. Placating:

       This block suggests that the listener wants to present himself as the nice person so he agrees with everything what the speaker says by saying,

‘Right, absolutely, I know, of course you are, incredible, really?’

9. Dreaming:

       When a listener dream, he pretends to listen, but actually the listener has tune the speaker out and he is lost in himself. When as a listener we don’t think that the subject is interesting, we turn the channel to a more entertaining subject.

10. Thinking speed:

       Most of the times people speak between 60-180 words per minute and the capacity to think is 500-800 words per minute. This difference leaves us with the great deal of mental spare time. While it is possible to use this time to explore the speaker’s ideas, but we most often let our mind wander to other matters.

11. Premature evaluation:

      It often happens that we interrupt the speakers before they complete their thoughts or finish their ideas sentence or state their conclusion. Sometime because of this, the conclusion of listener is totally different with what the speaker intended.

12. Semantic stereotypes:

     The way certain kinds of people bother us, so does certain words. When those words are repeated time and again, they cause annoyance in the mind and effective listening is impaired.

13. Delivery:

      A monotonous delivery of speaker can put listeners to sleep or cause them to lose interest.

14. External distractions:

     The entire physical environment affects the listening. Among the negative factors are noisy fans, poor and glaring lights, distracting background music, overheated or cold rooms and conversation going on nearby. 

Reference book: - Business Communication. Sathya Swaroop Debasish & Bhagaban Das. PHI Learning Private Limited. New Delhi.  

Five kinds of workers - E. F. Row and P. C. Wren - BCA - FY

Five kinds of workers

- E. F. Row and P. C. Wren

     

       In the essay, Row and Wren have explained the importance and meaning of 'Five' kinds of workers. There is a step by step description of each kind of workers.

Here I have described the five kinds of workers:

1. Growing things - Growers

       In this kind of workers, the writer has included cultivators, shepherds, and gardeners. All these are connected with lands. They are busy with land in growing the things. They plough, dig, and sow the seeds and also take care of animals, as the writer says

"without them there would be no wheat to make into flour, no hay to feed horse on, no rice and dal, no bajri no jawari, no vegetables, no tea to drink, no milk and ghee, and no cotton for our cloths"

       Generally people do not consider farmers as 'growers' but the helps plant and animals to grow and then help them to provide things that humans need.

2. Digging things - Diggers:

 

        There is another group of people who are bust with soil but they do not spend their time in growing the things, but in digging the things. They are the,

"miners - who dig out the coal and iron, and precious stones, gold silver, tin, copper, lead, mica, and other minerals"

        The quarrymen are also the part of diggers who dig out stones for buildings and roads. Others dig up clay to make bricks and earthenware.

3. Making things - makers:

 

       This kind of workers cannot do their work until the other two sets of worker have done theirs. Things must be grown or dig up before anything can be made out of it. These workers need grown things such as wood, cotton, and linen and things that have been dug up like iron, copper and tin. This kind of workers needs the first two kinds to provide them with materials before they can begin to work.

4. Moving things - movers:

 

      The things we need cannot come to us by themselves, and it is awkward if you had to fetch them all. Things have to be brought from the place where they are made, grown, or dug up, to the place where they are wanted. There are many workers who move the things.

"Sailors and railwaymen and cart drivers and motor drivers and so on"

5. Helpers:

 

    

  There are some workers who do not grow the things, dig the things, make the things and move the things but though they are workers. And those workers are,

"Teachers, and the doctor and dentist, and policemen and soldiers, lawyers and priests"

       Without all these workers we cannot live our life, because they do the things for us which we cannot do for our self. They help us when we need them.

       Further Row and Wren explained that there are also other kinds of writers including shop keeper who do not move things but though we can include them in movers. Further there is a statement that

"The labourer is worthy of his hire"

which is very true and acceptable. The writer also ask questions that

"Why there are so many kinds of workers?

Why does not man make the things he wants for himself?"

         Further there is an explanation that if a man is doing the same work for many days, he can achieve mastery in that work. This is the reason of the divisions of different works among all people. This plan is called "division of labour".

 Reference:

Five kinds of workers  - E. F. Row and P. C. Wren