Chapter's summary : Text and Summary of Prose and Poem

Tomorrow’s Citizens Knowledge-Sweat-Perseverance           One cannot stop at thinking and asking questions. There is a need to act to solve the problems and that requires hard work and perseverance.        As President and earlier as a scientist, life has taught me the importance of three qualities; knowledge, sweat and perseverance.     O ur country has a very bright future and all of us, especially the children. who will be the leaders of tomorrow have to work hard. The vision of a Developed India will not come on its own. It will not be gifted to us by someone but we have to work and work hard to achieve the goals which we have set for ourselves. It is only through sweat and toil that we will be able to make India stand proudly among the community of developed nations. If India is to become developed by 2020, it will do so only by riding on the shoulders of the young. For Summary of this lesson, Please click the below l...

About the Poet:           Berton Braley (1882 - 1966) was an American poet. He was a prolific writer who wrote about twenty books and most of them were collections of poems. Some of his major works include Sonnets of a Freshman, Sonnets of a Suffragette, Songs of the Workaday World, Things As They Are and The World's One Thousand Best Poems. In 1934, Braley published the autobiographical Pegasus Pulls a Hack Memoirs of a Modern Minstrel. About the Poem:           Start Where You Stand is a motivational poem. The poet believes that we cannot let past events hold us back from achieving what we want today and in future. For the Summary of 'Start Where You Stand', please click the below link >> Summary Start Where You Stand Start where you stand and never mind the past, The past won't help you in beginning new, If you have left it all behind at last Why, that's enough, you're done with it, you're through; This is another ...

O blithe New-comer! I have heard, I hear thee and rejoice. O Cuckoo ! shall I call thee Bird, Or but a wandering Voice? While I am lying on the grass Thy twofold shout I hear; From hill to hill it seems to pass, At once far off, and near. Though babbling only to the Vale Of sunshine and of flowers, Thou bringest unto me a tale Of visionary hours. For the Summary of, "To the Cuckoo", Please click the below link 'Summary' >> Summary Thrice welcome darling of the Spring ! Even yet thou art to me No bird, but an invisible thing, A voice, a mystery; The same whom in my my schools-boys days I listened to; that Cry Which made me look a thousand ways In bush, and tree, and sky. To seek thee did I often rove Through woods and on the green; And thou wert still a hope, a love; Still longed for, never seen. And I can listen to thee yet; Can lie upon the plain And listen, till I do beget That golden time again. O blessed Bird ! the earth we pace Again appears to be An unsubs...

Wordsworth's poems have a nostalgic effect. His attachment will nature is clear in the poem. Through he does not know what a cuckoo really us, he's enthralled by its double fold uncomposed singing beats which he calls the wandering voice. He considers nature as his friend, philosopher and guide. The poet was wandering in the valley. He heard the sweet voice of a Cuckoo. He felt delighted. It was spring season. The valley was full of beautiful flowers. Clear sunshine made the atmosphere in the valley serene and enjoyable. The poet in his extreme gladness addresses the Cuckoo as 'blithe new-comer'. The Cuckoo appears first when spring comes to the earth. It sings happily. The poet was lying on the grassy field when he heard the song of the Cuckoo. The song seemed to him a composition of two shouts such as koo-hoo. Further he heard the song being echoed by hills around him. Although the Cuckoo was singing in the valley, it brought to his mind the memory of his boyhood days...

Young Pele, Soccer Player - Clare and Frank Gault      A small boy danced barefoot out into the street and began kicking at the air as if he were kicking a soccer ball. But there was no ball. Nearby, a group of men and boys huddled around a radio, listening to a local soccer game Bauru (bou roo’) against Sau Carlous (sou kar loos) a neighboring town in southeastern Brazil. The year was 1948.           One of the men smiled as he watched the boy acting like a real scooter player. The boy was eight years old. His name was Edson Arantes do Nacimento (ed’ song u ran’ chas doo na sc men too), but his friend called him Pele(pele’).           Pele kept kicking at the air. He could imagine himself out on the soccer field, dribbling the ball downfield with his feet, passing it to a teammate, then taking a pass in return and kicking a goal.           Suddenly, the radio announcer became excit...

On Ahimsa [October 1916]            -M.K. Gandhi [.  .  .] There seems to be no historical warrant for the belief that an exaggerated practice of ahimsa synchronized with our becoming bereft of many virtues. During the past fifteen hundred years, we have as a nation given ample proof of physical courage, but we have dominated by love of self instead of love of country. We have, that is to say, been swayed by the spirit of irreligion rather than of religion. I do not know how far the charge of unmanliness can be made good against the Jains. I hold no brief for them. By birth I am a Vaishnavite, and was taught ahimsa in my childhood. I have derived much  religious benefit from Jain religious works, as I have from scriptures of the other great faiths of the world. I owe much to the living company of the deceased philosopher Raja Chand Kavi who was a Jain by Birth. Thus though my views on ahimsa are a result of my study of most of the faiths...

Starting from Mile Zero   - Preety Sengupta One of many beautiful images of a place visited comes floating out me - that of the confluence of two rivers.On a hilly edge of the high road there is a small shrine representing Lord Shiva: a lingam, a trishul, and a tapered flag fluttering in the air. A steep flight of narrow steps descends to a slippery landing. The place is Rudraprayag in Garhwal district, the rivers are Mandakini and Alaknanda - one dark, deep, deceptively calm; the other foamy, fair, playful. The two distinctive waters stay separate for some distance, then slowly merge to make a fuller flow. For about two decades my life has concentrated on two things: words and the world. In other words, writing and travelling. Like the two rivers, these two activities are very distinct - one requiring solitude, concentration and being indoors; the other necessitating determination, patience and interactions with strangers all the time. Rather than think of these as impossible oppo...