Name - Mohammad Akif

Class - IX
Section - H
Roll Number - 36
Teacher’s Name - Ms. Sadaf A.
 Acknowledgement
In the present world of competition, there is a race of existence which those who are
having the will to come forward, succeed. With this willing, I am making this wonderful project.
First of all, I would like to thank the supreme power of the Almighty God who is obviously
the one who has always guided me to work on the right path of life. Without His grace, this
project could not become a reality. Next to him are my parents, to whom I am greatly indebted
both in love and the encouragement with which they brought me up in spite of their busy
schedules.
Lastly, I feel highly obliged in taking the opportunity to sincerely thank Mrs. Abha Anant
(The Principal of City Montessori School Gomti Nagar I) and a big, fat thanks to Ms. Sadaf A.
(The Best Literature teacher in the World) who guided me throughout her informative and
sometimes sarcastic classes which ended my days on a good note.
I have no valuable words to express my thanks, but my heart is still full of the favours
received from each and every person.

- Mohammad Akif
 Old Man At The Bridge
- Ernest Hemingway
About the Author :

Ernest Hemingway, in full Ernest Miller Hemingway, (born July 21, 1899, Cicero [now in Oak
Park], Illinois, U.S.—died July 2, 1961, Ketchum, Idaho), American novelist and short-story
writer, awarded the Nobel Prize For Literature in 1954. He was repeatedly rejected for military
service because of a defective eye, but he managed to enter World War I as an ambulance
driver for the American Red Cross. After recuperating at home, Hemingway renewed his efforts
at writing, for a while worked at odd jobs in Chicago. Hemingway’s use of dialogue was similarly
fresh, simple, and natural-sounding. His simple and understated writing was a strong influence
on the twentieth century fiction.

Critical Analysis:

Narrating Style: A first person narrator who tells the story through careful description, reportage
of dialogue and insightful commentary about the old man. The narrator makes the reader see
the old man. His engagement with him suddenly brings the old man into focus, he emerges out
of the faceless, voiceless crowd.

Plot: In the middle of a military action, an army scout encounters an old man at a bridge where
people are crossing to escape the war zone. The scout engages the old man in conversation
and by the end of it, he realizes the old man is not going to move and will probably die at the
bridge.

Setting (Place and Time): The place is a war zone at a pontoon bridge across the Ebro river
during the Spanish Civil War. The time is Easter Sunday 1938.

Characters: A 76 year old man

The Scout
Theme: Old Man at the Bridge demonstrates the power of narrative art. It takes a small, ordinary
detail in a situation and by the art of story-telling transforms it into a powerful story about the
tragedy of war. The old man becomes a symbol of the countless civilian victims of war-- those
"without politics." The old man is going to die at the bridge--displaced, disoriented, alone. He's
not a cat, nor a dove, but a goat--who was "only taking care of animals."
Character Sketch Of The Old Man

The old man, the story’s central character, has fled his hometown to escape the encroaching
violence of the Spanish Civil War. Throughout the story, he is sitting by the side of the road,
exhausted from attempting to travel to safety and feeling that he can no longer go on. When the
narrator (a soldier) stops to try to convince him to move along to a safer place, the old man
reveals that he was reluctant to leave his hometown (the very mention of which is the only thing
in the story that makes him happy) because he was the caretaker for a number of animals who
might not survive without him. While at first he risked his life to stay and care for them, he
evidently valued his own life enough to leave them behind when a captain ordered him to
evacuate because of artillery fire. The old man says that he has no family, doesn’t know anyone
in Barcelona (where the fleeing masses are heading), and has no politics, and therefore no
stake in the war. Without his animals, he has no great reason to live, and he tries and fails to
walk again when the narrator urges him to keep moving towards safety. Feeling that he cannot
help the man, the narrator moves on, concluding that the only luck the old man would ever have
was that his cat, at least, was likely to survive, and that the enemy planes were grounded for the
moment. Presumably, the old man is left to die.

Figures Of Speech

Many symbols and metaphors have been used in the story.

The title: "Old man at the Bridge"--that final Bridge between life and death. Why not old man in
the ditch or on the roadside?
Setting: Easter Sunday. Ironic contrast. The day of the celebration of the resurrection will be the
day another innocent victim is crucified.
The 3 symbolic animals, which have a long history of conveying symbolic meaning.

● The cat with 9 lives - the survivor.

● Birds can fly away from the war; doves--associated with peace, which in this context is
ironic. The doves will fly away.
● The goats--the animals who can't escape. Sacrificial animals. Scapegoats who are
innocent victims.
● The old man is a goat figure--unable to escape, an innocent victim of the civil war.
 Daffodils
-
William Wordsworth
About The Author

● William Wordsworth, (born April 7, 1770, Cockermouth, Cumberland, England—died

April 23, 1850, Rydal Mount, Westmorland), English poet whose Lyrical Ballads (1798),
written with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped launch the English Romantic movement.
He is the greatest of the Romantic poets. He lost his mother when he was 7 and his
father when he was 13, upon which the orphan boys were sent off by guardian uncles to
a grammar school at Hawkshead, a village in the heart of the Lake District. At
Hawkshead Wordsworth received an excellent education in classics, literature, and
mathematics. Wordsworth’s last years were given over partly to “tinkering” his poems, as
the family called his compulsive and persistent habit of revising his earlier poems
through edition after edition. He was a great lover of Nature and this poem was inspired
by his real-life experiences. This well-known poem is a eulogy to the restorative powers
of Nature.
Critical Analysis

'Daffodils' is a famous poem written by William Wordsworth. In this poem, the poet- William
Wordsworth describes one of his real experiences in a beautiful place known for its natural
beauty. Once in that place, he was aimlessly walking alone like a cloud and suddenly
discovered a bunch of golden daffodils which, mesmerized him and kept him gazing at its
wonder. The poet tells that how this simple look was so wonderful for him and what this glance
later meant to him. The poet describes this godly beauty of daffodils in many extraordinary
remarks and comments. He seems the endless view of the golden (gold-coloured) daffodils as a
never-ending line.

After describing the daffodil's beauty, he proceeded on to tell about the beauty of its background
and the nice setting it made on the daffodils. At last, after his long gaze, he suddenly asks
himself that what does all those meant to him and how it will benefit him and then left the place.
But later, he realized how the picture benefitted him and how it made him relaxed when alone.
William Wordsworth was not without his share of loss. In fact, he lost his mother when he was
seven, and his father when he was thirteen. As if that were not enough loss for one person,
three of his children preceded him in death. This background gives this particular poem greater
meaning.

Character Sketch Of The Daffodils

The main characters of this poem are the daffodils. They have been personified throughout the
poem. In the first stanza, the daffodils were fluttering (like birds or butterflies) and dancing (like
human beings). There is also an indication that it was a breezy day. So we get an overall idea of
the landscape which includes the valleys and hills, the lake, the trees, the flowers beneath them
and the breezy atmosphere. In the second stanza, The flowers are compared to the stars. They
stretched in a continuous line just like the stars in a galaxy like the Milky Way. Moreover, the
daffodils were shining (as they were golden in colour) and twinkling (as they were fluttering in
the breeze) as the stars. The flowers were visible as far as the poet could see along the shore-
line of a bay. The poet also says that the daffodils were tossing their heads as if they were
dancing in happiness. In the third stanza, the waves in the bay were dancing and looking gleeful
at the atmosphere. But the flowers outshone the lively waves in their happiness. Having such
cheerful companion like the daffodils, a poet like Wordsworth cannot help being happy. So he
was gazing constantly at the flowers and enjoying their beauty. At that time, he did not think
much about the ‘wealth’ that the flowers had brought to him.This ‘wealth’ is the happiness and
the pleasant memory that he enjoyed for a long time since the day. In the fourth and last stanza,
the sight of the flowers was so important in the poet’s life and whenever he sees the flowers in
his imagination, his heart fills with pleasure and his mind dances with the dancing daffodils.
Figures Of Speech

Alliteration : Repeated use of the same consonant in a sequence of nearby words in a line
Example : Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Explanation : The consonant ‘b’ has been repeated twice in the above line.

Personification : A figure of speech where lifeless objects or abstract ideas have been given life-
like qualities
Example : Fluttering and dancing in the breeze; Tossing their heads in a sprightly dance.
Explanation: The flowers are inanimate but they have been personified and given life like
qualities of dancing and tossing their heads, just as a human would do

Simile : A figure of speech involving the comparison of one thing with another thing of a different
kind, used to make a description more emphatic or vivid.
Example: I wandered lonely as a cloud
Explanation : The poet has compared himself to the inanimate clouds by using the word ‘as’

Imagery : This figure of speech means to use figurative language to represent objects, actions,
and ideas in such a way that it appeals to our physical senses.
Example : They flash upon that inward eye
Explanation : The scene of the beautiful daffodils is seen by the poet. Whenever he is in a sad
mood, the image of the daffodils flashes upon the mind of the poet

Hyperbole : It is a figure of speech in which exaggeration is made to describe something

Example : Ten thousand saw I at a glance
Explanation : The poet uses the expression ‘ten thousand’ for the large number of daffodils
which actually must be much more than the actual daffodils.

Conclusion
Old Man At The Bridge
It is one of the great stories written by Ernest Hemingway. The story is about an old man at the
bridge during the war. It was based on Hemingway"s experience when he was a correspondent
in the war. The old man was the reflection of the war who lost everything in his life as the effect
of the war. Hemingway felt sorry for the old man and the people like him who were mentally
broken by the Civil War. That is why Hemingway portrays the devastating effects of war through
this story.

Daffodils
The main conclusion of this great poem is Wordsworth’s love for nature. He was lonely all alone
but his great image of the daffodils gave him happy company in his bad times. Wordsworth
experiences solitude not loneliness when he sees the daffodils. The daffodils are like a painkiller
to his bad experiences and memories. Wordsworth lost his parents at a very young age. As if
that were not enough loss for one person, three of his children preceded him in death. This
background gives this particular poem greater meaning.

Bibliography
Websites:
https://www.enotes.com/homework-help/
https://englicist.com/
https://www.brighthubeducation.com/homework-help-literature/
https://brainly.in/
https://literarydevices.net/
https://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/wordsworth/section7/
https://penlighten.com/
https://www.litcharts.com/lit/old-man-at-the-bridge/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPfUJm5RhNQ

Books:
ICSE Treasure Trove by Evergreen Publications Revised Edition for 2019