ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

Maximum Marks: 40
Time: 1 1/2 Hours

General Instructions

  • Answer to this paper must be written on the paper provided separately.
  • You will not be allowed to write during the first 10 minutes.
  • This time is to be spent in reading the question paper.
  • The time given at the head of this paper is the time allowed for writing the answers.
  • This paper comprises two sections Section A and Section B.
  • Attempt all the questions from Section A.
  • Attempt any four questions from Section B, answering at least one question each from the two books you have studied and any two other questions.
  • The intended marks for questions or parts of questions are given in brackets [ ].

Section – A [10 Marks]
Attempt all questions

Question 1.
Choose the correct answers to the questions from the given options. (Do not copy the question, Write the correct answer only)
(i) What was announced on the loudspeakers before the start of the race in the poem, ‘Nine Gold Medals’?
(a) The nationalities of the runners.
(b) The age of the runners.
(c) The names of the runners.
(d) The gender of the runners.
Answer:
(c) The names of the runners

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

(ii) Which of the following words would best describe Abou Ben Adhem?
(a) Bold and brash
(c) Prayerful and anxious
(b) Devout and compassionate
(d) Dreamy and peaceful
Answer:
(b) Devout and compassionate

(iii) What event were the children in Ray Bradbury’s story, ‘All Summer in a Day’ eagerly awaiting?
(a) Their return to the Earth.
(b) The arrival of the Rocket people.
(c) Their teacher’s return.
(d) The appearance of the sun.
Answer:
(d) The appearance of the sun

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

(iv) How old was Margot when she first arrived on his distant planet?
(a) Five
(b) Seven
(c) Four
(d) Nine
Answer:
(c) Four

(v) What made Jesse Owens one of the best remembered athletes of all time?
(a) His remarkable achievement of winning four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games.
(b) The amazing bond of friendship that he developed with arch rival Luz Long.
(c) His struggle to qualify for the finals of the broad jump at the 1936 Olympic Games.
(d) His anger at the rising nationalistic feelings that characterized the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
Answer:
(a) His remarkable achievement of winning four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games.

(vi) “You should be able to qualify with your eyes closed.” Who said these words and to whom?
(a) Jesses Owens’ coach to Jesse Owens.
(b) Luz Long to Jesse Owens
(c) Jesse Owens to Luz Long
(d) Hitler to Luz Long
Answer:
(b) Luz Long to Jesse Owens

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

(vii) Antonio says that trying to reason with Shylock was like……………..
(a) standing on the beach and ordering the waves to wash away the sands.
(b) reasoning with a ewe which was crying out in distress at the loss of her lamb
(c) trying to soften a rock
(d) commanding the pine trees on the mountain side to remain quiet and motionless when battered by strong winds.
Answer:
Both options (b) and (d) are correct

(viii) Which of the following characters can be described as quick-witted, daring and loyal?
(a) Nerissa
(b) Jessica
(c) Portia
(d) Leah
Answer:
(c) Portia

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

(ix) Name the young lovers whose lives ended tragically because of a misunderstanding caused by the appearance of a lion.
(a) Troilus and Cressida
(c) Dido and Aeneas
(b) Pyramus and Thisbe
(d) Medea and Aeson
Answer:
(b) Pyramus and Thisbe

(x) What special ‘deed of gift’ does Jessica give to Lorenzo at the end of the play?
(a) The news that Shylock had forgiven Jessica and Lorenzo for eloping.
(b) The bond signed by Shylock making Lorenzo heir to all his wealth
(c) The three thousand ducats that Antonio owed to Shylock
(d) The news that Shylock had agreed to become a Christian.
Answer:
The given question is incorrect

Section-B [10 Marks]
DRAMA
(The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare – Acts 4 and 5)

Question 2.
Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:
Portia :The quality of mercy is not strained;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath : it is twice blessed :
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes .
Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown :

(i) Where does this scene take place? Why is Portia here? [2]
Answer:
The scene takes place in the court of justice in Venice. Portia and Nerissa, disguised as lawyer and clerk, were there in the courtroom to defend Antonio against Shylock’s inhuman claim to cut a pound of flesh from Antonio’s body for forfeiting a bond which he had signed as a guarantee for the repayment of a loan of three thousand ducats.

(ii) To what is mercy compared in these lines? [2]
Answer:
Portia compares mercy to the gentle rain from heaven. It blesses the person who shows mercy by way of getting happiness in the generous act, and the one who is at the receiving end, also benefits from the act. Mercy looks better in a king than his crown.

(iii) Why does Portia call mercy ‘twice blessed’?
Explain the lines: ‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes
the throned monarch better than his crown: [3]
Answer:
Portia says that the person who grants mercy is equally blessed as the one who receives it. This is because mercy is a characteristic of God, and the person who grants it is acting with the spirit and majesty of God. Thus, mercy is twice blessed: it blesses the one who gets the merciful treatment and the one who grants it.

(iv) Later in her speech Portia mentions a sceptre. What is a sceptre? How, according to Portia, is mercy
above the ‘sceptred sway’? [3]
Answer:
Sceptre is the insignia of kingship. It represents power. The line “But mercy is above this sceptred sway” means that the king’s sceptre is the emblem of his worldly power. It is the symbol of fear which kingship inspires in others. But mercy is higher and greater than the worldly authority which is symbolized by rod.

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

Question 3.
Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:
GRATIANO: O learned judge! – Mark, Jew: a learned judge!
SHYLOCK: I take this offer, then; pay the bond thrice, And let the Christian go.

(i) Why does Shylock suddenly decide to accept this offer? [2]
Answer:
Shylock suddenly decides to accept the offer that Bassanio had made previously because now he is trapped and his plan of revenge has failed. Now he wants to gain whatever is possible.

(ii) Who has made this offer? Who stops Shylock from accepting this offer? [2]
Answer:
Bassanio has made this offer. Portia stops Bassanio from accepting this offer.

(iii) Shylock decides to leave the court without even receiving the principal amount. What other crime is he accused of? What further punishment does he face for this crime? [3]
Answer:
Besides conspiring a murder against a Venetian citizen being a foreigner, Shylock has also attempted to murder a Christian. By the law of Venice, one half of Shylock’s property will be given to Antonio, and the other half will go to the state’s treasury. Further, Antonio forces him to convert into a Christian.

(iv) Later in this scene, how does the Duke show that he is merciful? What does Shylock say in response to the Duke’s act of mercy? [3]
Answer:
Later in this scene, the Duke pardons Shylock’s life for his crime and reminds him that it was the difference between the Christians and the Jews. The Duke grants his life but confiscates all his property.
To this, Shylock replies that he did him no good by granting him his life because although he has given him a house to live, he has taken away all its pillars. Now he has no means to survive

Section-C [10 Marks]
PROSE – SHORT STORIES
(Treasure Trove – A Collection of ICSE Poems and Short Stories)

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

Question 4.
Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:
He gave her a shove. But she did not move, rather she let herself be moved only by him and nothing else. They edged away from her; they would not look at her. She felt them go away.

(i) Who is ‘she’? On which planet is this story set? [2]
Answer:
‘She’ in the extract is Margot, the protagonist of the story, “All Summer in a Day.” She is a nine-year- old girl who moved from Ohio to planet Venus when she was four years old. Margot longs intensely for the sun, which she remembers vividly from her time on Earth.
The setting of the story is the planet Venus where it keeps on raining for years together.

(ii) Mention any two ways in which life on this planet differs from life on earth. [2]
Answer:
Life on Venus is different from life on this earth. Here it rains for seven years continuously. Secondly, the sun shines for one day for only an hour after every seven years.

(iii) Who are ‘they’? Why did ‘they’ not come to her aid when William shoved her? [3]
Answer:
‘They’ are the other children. They did not come to her aid because they did not like her. They disliked her because she would not play with them. If they tagged her and ran, she stood blinking after them and did not follow. When the class sang songs about happiness and life and games her lips barely moved. Only when they sang about the sun and the summer did her lips move as she watched the drenched windows.
And then, of course, the biggest crime of all was that she had come here only five years ago from Earth, and she remembered the sun and the way the sun was and the sky was when she was four in Ohio. And they had been on Venus all their lives, and they had been only two years old when last the sun came out and had long since forgotten the colour and heat of it and the way it really was. But Margot remembered.

(iv) What do ‘they’ do to her at the end of the story? Why did they behave in this manner? [3]
Answer:
When the sun was about to come out for the first time in seven years, the kids locked Margot in a closet. When the sun came out, the children played in the illumination like wild animals. They played until it began to rain and then in a dawning- like realization, one of them remembered that they had left Margot in the closet. They walked slowly down the hall in the sound of cold rain. They turned through the doorway to the room in the sound of the storm and thunder, lightning on their faces, blue and terrible. They walked over to the closet door slowly and stood by it. Behind the closet door was only silence. They unlocked the door, even more slowly, and let Margot out The children behaved in such a manner at the end of the story because they realised their mistake and felt sorry for their misbehaviour.

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

Question 5.
Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:
An angry athlete is an athlete who will make mistakes, as any coach will tell you. I was no exception. On the first of my three qualifying jumps, I leaped from several inches beyond the take-off board for afoul.

(i) When and where is this narrative set? [2]
Answer:
This story is set in the time of the Berlin Olympic Games of 1936.

(ii) What reason does the narrator Jesse Owens give for the heightened nationalistic feelings at this time? [2]
Answer:
Hitler childishly insisted that his performers were members of a ‘master race.’ This heightened nationalistic feelings at this time .The Nazis believed in the Aryan superiority theory.

(iii) In which event had Owens been confident of winning a gold medal? Why? [3]
Answer:
Jessie Owens had trained, sweated and disciplined himself for six years. He had already made a world record in the long jump in the last year. So, he expected to win the gold medal easily in the Berlin Olympic Games of 1936.

(iv) What had made Owens angry enough to make mistakes? Name Owens’ rival who approached him at this point. [3]
Answer:
At the time of broad- jump trials, Jessie Owens saw a tall boy hitting the pit at almost 26 feet on his practice leaps. Jesse felt angry when he was told that Hitler had kept him under wraps obviously to win the jump against him. If Luz Long won, it would add some new support to the Nazis’ Aryan- superiority theory. Jessie was so disturbed thinking about it that he had made mistakes in his trial jumps.
Luz Long, a German, was Jessie Owens’ rival who approached at this point.

Section-D [10 Marks]
POETRY
(Treasure Trove – A Collection of ICSE Poems and Short Stories)

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

Question 6.
Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,
“What writest thou ? “

(i) To whom did Ben Adhem address these words? Mention the context in which he said this. [2]
Answer:
Ben Adhem addressed these words to the angel. One night Abou woke up from a deep dream of peace. He saw an angel writing something in a golden book. He asked the angel what he wrote. The angel replied that he was writing the names of those who loved God, but Abou’s name was not there.
Abou requested the angel to write his name in the list of those who loved their fellowmen. The next night the angel came again and showed Abou the names of those whom God had blessed. Abou was surprised to see that his name was written on top.

(ii) What was the ‘presence’ doing in Ben Adhem’s room? What did the presence say in response to Ben Adhem’s question? [2]
Answer:
The ‘presence’ was writing the names of those who loved God, in his golden book. Seeing him, Ben Adhem asked him what he was writing in his golden book.
The angel raised his head and looked at Abou in a friendly way. The angel replied that he was writing the names of those who loved God.

(iii) What did Abou ben Adhem say after this exchange? How did the presence respond to his words? [3]
Answer:
Abou requested the angel to write his name in the list of those who loved their fellowmen. After this, the angel wrote something and Vanished.
The next night the angel came -again and showed Abou the names of those whom God had blessed. Abou was surprised to see that his name was written on top.

(iv) Describe the events of the following night. [3]
Answer:
The poem “Abou Ben Adhem” depicts the heavenly feelings of Abou Adhem, a strong believer in God who believes that not only loving God, but also loving people who believe in God is great. The poem describes an event in the life of Adhem. One night, he woke up from his deep peaceful sleep and saw a beautiful angel, in the moonlight that lit his room, writing something in a golden book. He looked at the angel with wonder.

The peaceful ambience of the room encouraged him to question the angel what he was writing. The angel raised its head and with sweetness, answered Adhem that it was writing the names of all those who loved God. On hearing this, Abou enquired about his name in the list. But the angel’s reply was negative which made Abou a little sad but still he cheerfully requested the angel to write his name in the list of people who loved God’s fellowmen. The angel wrote something in the book and disappeared. The next night the angel appeared again with a great bright light that roused Adhem from his sleep. It showed Adhem the names of those people whom God had blessed and to great surprise, Abou’s name was at the top of the list.

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Sample Question Paper 1 with Answers

Question 7.
Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:
All round the field spectators were gathered
Cheering on all the young women and men
Then the final event of the day was approaching
The last race about to begin.
– Nine Gold Medals, David Roth

(i) Where had the ‘young women and men’ come from? What had brought them together?[2]
Answer:
The ‘young women and men’ had come from different countries to participate in various sports events. They were fired with the longing to win the gold medal. As the international event is very prestigious, every participant had put in a lot of preparation and practice. No one wanted to spare any pain for winning a medal – gold, silver or bronze.

(ii) What was the last event of the day? How many athletes were participating in this event? [2]
Answer:
The last event of the day was the hundred-metre race. Nine young athletes were participating in this event. They were well-poised, waiting for the pistol shot as a starting signal of the special Olympics.

(iii) What happened to the youngest athlete half way through the race? How did he deal with the situation? [3]
Answer:
Half way through the race the youngest athlete stumbled and fell down on the tracks. He was distressed and gave out a cry in frustration because his hard work had come to nothing.

(iv) Describe the manner in which the race ends. [3]
Answer:
Nine Gold Medals’ by David Lee Roth is a poem about compassion and brotherhood. The poem presents how a collaborative mindset is the need of the hour in this world of ruthless competition. According to the poet, when the competitive world holds one back, others should not restrain themselves from helping. Life is not about winning the race. The most important thing is how one ends the race of life with a smile and holding hands with others.

Through the text, David Roth tried to spread this message of universal brotherhood. ‘Nine Gold Medals’ by David Roth talks about nine athletes who had come from different countries to run the hundred metres race in the Special Olympics. They trained hard for the event and eventually, the day arrived. Spectators filled the blocks, and they observed those nine athletes warming up for the race. With the sound of the gun, the race began.

But, one of them stumbled and fell. Interestingly, the contestants came forward to help the youngest of them all. In the end, they held hands and completed the race with the spirit of togetherness. Above them, the banner of “Special Olympics” fluttered and the smiling faces below said much more than the words could convey. The poem celebrates the spirit of compassion and cooperation over competition.

ICSE Class 10 English Literature Question Papers with Answers

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