Summary of Walt Whitman's O Captain! My Captain!

Walt Whitman is a famous American poet.  He has written many poems on the theme of democracy.  O Captain!  My Captain is an elegy written on the death of Abraham Lincoln, the President of America.  In this poem, Whitman compares Lincoln as captain of a ship that returns after the American Civil war.

The poem opens with the poet addressing the captain, Abraham Lincoln, who is returning to the shore after winning the civil war.  The poet imagines that he is standing among the people on the shore waiting to celebrate the captain’s arrival and victory.  The ship has passed through all hardships and it is grim and daring.  In the deck of the ships, the captain is lying dead and cold.  The hearts of the people are bleeding with drops of red blood.

The poet asks the captain to rise up from death on hearing the bells and bugles.  He wants the captain to wake up and see the flag, bouquets, the wreaths and the shore that is crowded with people.  The people on the shore are waiting eagerly to look at the victorious captain.

The poet addresses the captain as his father and asks him to wake up from death.  It is more like a dream for him to see the captain cold and dead in the ship.  For all the cries and calls, the captain does not open his lips, which has become very pale.  There is no pulse in his arms and the father does not feel the poet’s touch.

The ship reaches the shore and is anchored safely.  The voyage ends with the people after a victorious journey for the sake of the people.  The ship stops after achieving its objectives.  These lines could also be taken metaphorically.  The ship’s voyage represents the life of Abraham Lincoln, which has come to a halt after the strenuous and victorious journey.  The poet and the crowd are at a loss.  They do not know how to respond to this situation.  They came to celebrate the victory of the war and their captain but the captain is dead.  The poet asks them to ring the bells and he walks to the deck to see the captain, who is cold and dead.

Though the poem is an elegy, Whitman uses many figures of speech like extended metaphor, transferred epithet, simile, etc. to convey his grief in an effective way.  The poet, through this poem, expresses his true love and affection of the people of America towards their president.

Summary of William Wordsworth's Tables Turned

 

 

Introduction

            William Wordsworth is a famous English poet.  He has written many poems about nature.  People call him a nature poet.  Tables Turned is a short poem about the goodness of nature.  The poem is n the form a conversation with a friend who supports books.  Wordsworth argues that nature teaches better lessons than books.

Nature – A Better Teacher

            The poet opens the poem by disturbing his friend, who is busy reading a book.  He asks his friends to stand up, go away from the books, so that he does some physical activity, and stay away from becoming fat.  He asks his friend not to toil and trouble with books; instead, he can clear his looks by spending some time with nature.

            Wordsworth describes the world outside the books.  He looks at the tall mountains and the colourful green fields.  He also enjoys the different colours of the evenings.  The outside world offers a colourful life. 

            He advises his friend to listen to the song of the linnet (a small bird).  The song is sweeter and it offers him more wisdom than what a book gives.  Books are dull, compared to nature.  The throstle, a small bird, is better preacher than some moral books.  Nature is always a better teacher.  Nature is full of wealth and health.  It gives happiness to all people who approach it.

            A tree can teach better moral lessons than a sage can.  Learning from nature is always sweet.   It is human beings, who murder nature to understand it.

Conclusion

            The poet concludes the poem by asking his friend to close all the books on science and art.  He confirms that books do not offer any formal education.  He asks his friend and the readers to come to nature with a open heart and to learn by simply watching the happenings nature.

PROCESS OF COMMUNICATION

 

What is Communication?

Communication is an English word that has its origin from Greek word “communicare”, which means to share.  We communicate every second of our life.  We share our emotions and thoughts with others by using many ways.  Communication could be best defined as “everything we do is communication”.  We communicate through speech or writing, which are a set of symbols or lexemes created and used by human beings.  We use words to communicate.  Usually the words, we use in our communication, are compared with the tip of an iceberg.  Tip of an iceberg is seen at the surface of the sea but its foundation is hidden inside the sea.  The foundation is usually very strong and well rooted.  So the words we use is just the tip, very less in amount, and other factors like volume, tone, eye contact, etc convey more than the words we use.  Real communication is reaching out to people in the right way.  It is the message received and not what is said.

 

Process of Communication

 

 

The communication process starts with the formation of ideas by the sender, who then transmits the message through a channel or medium to the receiver. The receiver gives the feedback in the form of a message or appropriate signal in the given time frame to continue the communication cycle.

 

Components of Communication

1.      Context

Context is a broad field.  Every message we communicate has a context.  Context could be the message we are going to communicate and it depends of country, culture, organization and the persons who are involved in the communication.

 

2.      The Message

The message is what a speaker is going to convey or share with his audience.

 

3.      The Speaker/Sender/Encoder

Sender is the person who communicates the idea, information, material, etc.  He/she encodes the message, which he/she is going to convey, in the form of words, gestures, appearance, mime, etc.

 

4.      Medium

Medium is also called as channel.  A medium in communication is by what means a speaker is going to convey his message.  A medium could be telephone, email, message, facebook timeline, etc.

 

5.      The Audience/Receiver/Decoder

The receiver is the person who is going to receive the message is said.  Receiver is called as a decoder because he/she is the person who is going to receive the message and understand it in his/her own terms and respond.

 

Types of Communication

            The following are the different types of communication:

1.      Verbal communication

Communication, which is done by using words, is called as verbal communication.  Verbal communication is divided as oral communication and written communication.  Oral communication is information spoken by mouth or speech.  The following are the kinds of oral communication:

a)      Monologue

Monologue is a speech made by one person expressing his thoughts to the audience.  There will be silent listeners when this person conveys his ideas.  There are two types of monologues.  Exterior monologue is when the speaker speaks aloud to the listener and interior monologue is when the speaker speaks as if to himself.

b)      Soliloquy

Soliloquy is also like interior monologue, wherein a speaker expresses his inner thoughts, when no one is there to listen to him.

c)      Dialogue

Dialogue is a formal exchange of ideas between two persons.

d)     Short conversation

Short conversations are informal spoken exchange between two persons.  Body language plays an important role in short conversations.

e)      Long conversation

Long conversations happen in both formal and informal ways.

Written communication is by means of written symbols.

 

2.      Nonverbal communication

Nonverbal communication takes place through sending and receiving wordless messages.  Messages sent through body language, gestures and postures are nonverbal.  Eye contact with the audience is the simplest thing you can do to establish a relationship.  Eye contact serves the following purposes:

It establishes that the audience is listening

It indicates receptiveness

It is basic expressive form

It fulfills the ego of the audience

 

3.      Formal communication

Formal communications happens through formal channels and usually through written modes like letters, notice, reports, etc.

The following are the advantages of formal communication:

Fixation of responsibility

Maintaining of the authority relationship in an organization

Disadvantages of formal communication:

It is time consuming

Leads to good deal of distortion

 

4.      Informal communication

Communications that take place outside formal communication are called as informal communication.  It is normally done to maintain and build social relationship.  Informal communication does not follow authority and it need not always be in written mode.

 

Barriers in Communication

Barriers to communication make a communication difficult or misunderstood.  The following are the common barriers in communication:

·         Physical Barrier – include large working areas and the distortions caused by the background noise and other acoustics

·         Perceptual Barrier – happens when we communicate with persons from the other world or culture

·         Cultural Barrier – every group has expressions unique to their culture and this could not be understood or misunderstood by the other group.  Idioms are good examples of this barrier.

·         Language Barrier – when a person uses inappropriate words while conversing or a different language that is unknown to us

·         Gender Barrier – there are different speech patterns between a man and a woman

·         Lack of subject knowledge

·         Stress

 

Overcoming Barriers to Communication

·         Orientation to employees

·         Developing proper interpersonal relationships

·         Protective listening

·         Using proper language

·         Communication through actions and deeds

 

Summary of Robert Browning's The Pied Piper of Hamelin

 

Introduction

Robert Browning is a famous British poet.  He has written many poems, which are more dramatic in form.  The Pied Piper of Hamelin is a poem written for child, William Macready, who was ill.  The poem has a subtitle ‘A Child’s Story’, which suits the purpose.  Browning retells the existing legendary story in a very poetic form.

 

Hamelin and its Troubles with Rat

Hamelin is a town in Brunswick.  River Weser runs near the town.  It is a very pleasant town.  Five hundred years ago, the town was plagued by rats.  Rats were found all over the town.  They disturbed everyone in the town.  They fought with dogs, killed cats, bit babies, ate cheese, drank soup, made nest in men’s hat and jumped on women while they had a chat.  People of Hamelin became restless and they warned the mayor to control the rats, if not he would not be elected the next time.  The mayor called his council and ate a lot but could not provide a solution for the rat menace.

 

The Pied Piper and His Demand

A man, the Pied Piper came to the town and said that he would kill the rats and free the people.  The man was wearing a yellow and red coloured cloth.  He was tall and thin, with loose hair and blue eyes.  Everyone admired him.  The pied piper said that he had been to many places and had killed many scorpions and snakes.  He promised that he would kill the rats from Hamelin and they had to pay him 5000 guilders.  The mayor accepts deal.

 

Rat Compared to Julius Caesar

The pied piper went to the street and played his pipe.  People heard noise from all over the town and almost all kinds of rats from the houses came running in the street.  They followed the piper as though they were charmed.  The piped piper played the music and went to the street and went near river Weser.  All the rats followed him and jumped into the river and they died.  Only one rat, which was stout, escaped from the river.  The rat was stout and it is compared with Julius Caesar, who won death.  The rat was believed to narrate it escape story to all other rats in other towns, by maintaining a personal diary.

 

Piper Changes His Fashion

The piper went to the mayor and asked for the money.  The mayor replied that all the rats were killed and the people were happy and they would not pay 5000 guilders, instead they would only 50 guilders.  The piper became angry and changes his fashion.  He took out his pipe and started to play.  Once again more sound was heard and all the children from every house came running to the street and started to walk behind the piper.  The Hamelin people did not believe their eyes.  They waited for a long time, thinking that the piper would stop playing the music.  The piper started climbing a mountain and it opened and closed.

 

The Lame Boy Debarred

            Almost all children vanished with the piper except for a lame boy.  He walked slowly and was left behind.  The boy was angry because he did not go to the new country.  He dreamt of the country, which his friends would enjoy in his absence.  The lame boy imagined that the country would have gushing water, fruit trees, flowers, brighter sparrows, bees without stings, horses with wings and much such fantasy. 

 

Text in “The Pied Piper of Hamelin”

The people of Hamelin stand helpless.  They send people in all direction to find the lost kids.  Nobody finds the lost children.  The people of Hamelin realized that they could have paid the money to the piper which would not have made them loose their children.  The text in the poem refers to a modern proverb that says, “Heaven’s gate opens to the rich at as easy rate”.  This text has two meanings – if they had paid the money they would not lived a life in hell and the second meaning is the lame boy thought that the other children were living in heaven and it was owned by the piper, who is richer.

 

Conclusion

The poem concludes by saying that there is still a street called the Pied Piper’s Street since 22^nd July 1376.  No one is allowed to play music in the street because it is sign of bad omen.

 

Summary of Francis Bacon’s Of Studies

 

Introduction

Francis Bacon is called as the father of English prose.  He was the pioneer of English prose.  He has written many prose pieces on various subjects.  Bacon is known for his short yet poignant language.  He uses less number of words and sentences, yet he delivers great meaning and message to the readers and the society.  Of Studies is a short essay, which gives Bacon’s views on studies and its varieties. 

 Three Purposes of Studies

            Bacon opens his essay in a direct way.  He opens by establishing and listing out three major purpose of studies – delight, ornament ability.  People use studies for delight when they are within their private circle and when they rest and enjoy life.  Studies would help them to be at peace with themselves and with their close ones.  Some people use studies as an ornament in their discourse, either in their speech or when they write.  Some people use studies to prove their ability of judgement and to transact business. 

According to Bacon, expert men can execute a work when they handle a situation one by one.  They cannot handle things that come in groups.  On the other hand, only learned people have the quality and capability to handle things in groups. 

 Negative Impact of Studies

            Bacon talks about the negative impact of studies.  If a person spends too much of time in studies then he would become lazy, a sloth.  If a person uses too much of what he or she has studied for ornamentation, it would affect his personal character and would lead to self pride.  If a person uses too much of studies to make judgement about others, then it would degrade the learner into a mere clown and not a scholar.

 Studies and Nature

            Studies perfect nature.  Studies are perfected by experience.  Studies are like natural plants that needs little caring.  Studies would get a complete shape and will be capable of reaching to others through experience.  Crafty men condemn studies because they are involved in their skills.  Simple men admire studies and wise men use studies to acquire wisdom. 

            Bacon warns the readers not to study to contradict and confute, to believe and take for granted and not to talk but to consider and judge with patience.

 How to Read?

            Bacon also advises on how to read a book, “Some books are to be taste, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested”.  There are a variety of books among which some are to be read only in parts, a few books are meant to be read but not with eagerness and some books, which are really good, should be read as a whole with more concentration.

            While describing the importance of reading books, Bacon says, “Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.”  He also explains that, if a man writes little, he is lacking memory.  If a man talks little, he is lacking wit.  If a man reads little, he will be cunning.  Reading makes a human out of us. 

Cure given by Studies

Bacon establishes his Latin proficiency by quoting “Abeunt studia in mores” which means Studies pass into and influence manners.  Bacon compares studies with that of exercises, which keep the diseases away from our body.  “Bowling is good for the stone and reins; shooting for the lungs and breast; gentle walking for the stomach; riding for the head; and the like.”  Similarly, if a man needs to improve his wit he should study mathematics.  If he is not able to differentiate or distinguish, he should study ‘Schooldmen’ (kind of logics, puzzles and riddles), which would make him split his hair and think.  If someone is not good at proving himself, let him study lawyer’s cases. 

            Bacon concludes the essay saying that every defect of mind could be cured by studies.