QUIZ 2

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1. What is the meaning of VEDA in
Sanskrit?
2. What Indian Literary Period was the
Mahabharata and the Ramayana were
written?
3. What Indian Literary Period was the
Dhammapada was written?
4. What is Dhammapada?
5. Hindu Literature comparable to the
psalms in the Old Testament.

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6. Dharma (codes of conduct), including the
proper conduct of a king, of a warrior, of a
man living in times of calamity, and of a
person seeking to attain emancipation from
rebirth, are mostly exposed in what Indian
Literature?
7. ____ means ‘perfect speech’ is considered a
sacred language, the language spoken by the
gods and goddesses.
8. _____ dominates every scene in Sanskrit
drama.
9. _____ was seen as the only appropriate
language for the noblest literary works in the
classical literary period in India.
10. Rabindranath Tagore is best known for what?

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1. What is the meaning of VEDA in Sanskrit?
a. Sacred Hymns
b. Sacred Knowledge
c. Sacred Songs
d. Sacred Literature

2. What Indian Literary Period was the

Mahabharata and the Ramayana were
written?
a. Vedic Period
b. Epic and Buddhist Age
c. Classical Period
d. Medieval and Modern Age

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3. What Indian Literary Period was the
Dhammapada was written?
a. Classical Period
b. Vedic Period
c. Epic and Buddhist Age
d. Medieval and Modern Age

4. What is Dhammapada?
a. most ancient layer of text in the Vedas
b. most sacred of all hindu literature
c. most widely read and known Buddhist
scriptures
d. most beautiful of the Hindu scriptures

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5. Hindu Literature comparable to the psalms in the
Old Testament.
a. Bhagavad Gita
b. Rig Veda
c. Dhammapada
d. Mahabharata

6. Dharma (codes of conduct), including the proper

conduct of a king, of a warrior, of a man living in
times of calamity, and of a person seeking to attain
emancipation from rebirth, are mostly exposed in
what Indian Literature?
a. Dhammapada
b. Bhagavad Gita
c. Ramayana
d. Mahabharata

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7. ____ means ‘perfect speech’ is
considered a sacred language, the
language spoken by the gods and
goddesses.
a. Dravidian
b. Hindu
c. Sanskrit
d. Panchatantra
8. _____ dominates every scene in Sanskrit
drama.
a. rama
b. sita
c. rasa
d. dharma
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9. _____ was seen as the only appropriate
language for the noblest literary works in the
classical literary period in India.
a. Dravidian
b. Hindu
c. Sanskrit
d. Panchatantra
10. Rabindranath Tagore is best known for
what?
a. Indian equivalent of Shakespeare
b. First Asian to receive Nobel Prize in
Literature
c. The writer of Panchatantra
d. Ascribed traditionally with Mahabharata
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 (CONTINUATION)

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 Indian Religion
• Indian creativity is evident in religion as
the country is the birthplace of two
important faiths: Hinduism, the dominant
religion, and Buddhism, which ironically
became extinct in India but spread
throughout Asia.

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I. HINDUISM
• Hinduism, literally “the belief of the people
of India,” is the predominant faith of India
and of no other nation.
• The Hindus are deeply absorbed with God
and the creation of the universe.
• In the Hindu religion, PURUSARTHA
defines the goal of human existence.

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 Purusarthas
• Dharma – virtue, righteousness, moral
law;
• Artha – wealth, economic value;
• Kama – love or sensual pleasure.
• Moksha – liberation from the cycle
of reincarnation (Spiritual Perfection)

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• Samsara - the cycle of births and deaths.
• The Hindus believe that all reality is one
and spiritual, and that each individual soul
is identical with this reality and shares its
characteristics: pure being, intelligence,
and bliss. Everything that seems to divide
the soul from this reality is maya or
illusion.

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Life is viewed as an upward development through
four stages of effort called the four asramas

a) Student stage – applies to the rite of

initiation into the study of the Vedas;
b) Householder stage – marries and fulfills the
duties as head of the family where he
begets sons and earns a living;
c) Forest dweller stage – departs from home
and renounces the social world;
d) Ascetic – stops performing any of the rituals
or social duties of life in the world and
devotes time for reflection and meditation.

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Kama
• Kama refers to one of the
proper pursuits of man in
his role as householder,
that of pleasure and love.
• The Kama-sutra is a
classic textbook on erotics
and other forms of
pleasure and love, which is
attributed to the sage
Vatsyayana.

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Kama Sutra
• The Kama Sutra is neither
exclusively nor predominantly
a sex manual on sex positions,
but written as a guide to the "art-
of-living" well, the nature of love,
finding a life partner, maintaining
one's love life, and other
aspects pertaining to pleasure-
oriented faculties of human life.
• The majority of the book is
about the philosophy and theory
of love, what triggers desire,
what sustains it, and how and
when it is good or bad.
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 Purusha
• The Hindus regard Purusha, the Universal
Spirit, as the soul and original source of
the universe.
• As the universal soul, Purusha is the life-
giving principle in all animated beings. As
a personified human being, Purusha's
body is the source of all creation.

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The four Varnas serve as the theoretical
basis for the organization of the Hindu
society. These were thought to have been
created from Purusha’s body:
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• The Brahman (priest) was Purusha’s mouth. Their
duty is to perform sacrifices, to study and to teach the
Vedas, and to guard the rules of dharma. Because of
their sacred work, they are supreme in purity and rank.
• The Ksatriyas (warriors) are the arms. From this class
arose the kings who are the protectors of society.
• The Vaisyas (peasants) are the thighs. They live by
trading, herding, and farming.
• The Sudras (serfs) are the feet. They engage in
handicrafts and manual occupation and they are to
serve meekly the three classes above them. They are
strictly forbidden to mate with persons of a higher
varna

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 UPANISHAD
• The Upanishads are a collection of texts of
religious and philosophical nature, written
in India probably between c. 800 BCE and c.
500 BCE, during a time when Indian society
started to question the traditional Vedic
religious order.
• The name is inspired by the action of sitting
at the feet of an illuminated teacher to
engage in a session of spiritual instructions,
as aspirants still do in India today.
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 Four Categorical Division of Vedas

• Samhitas – mantras and benedictions

• Aranyakas – writings delineating the
symbols and ceremonies concerning
sacrifices
Brahmanas – writings about the rituals
and sacrifices
• Upanishads – discussions about spiritual
knowledge and Hindu philosophy.

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Upanishad’s Basic General Principles

• Samsara - Reincarnation
• Karma - All actions have a
consquence
• Dharma - way of righteousness
• Moksha - release from the cycle
of rebirth

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 UPANISHAD
The most important philosophical doctrine is
the concept of a single supreme being, the
Brahman, and knowledge is directed
toward reunion with it by the human soul,
the Atman or Self.

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II. BUDDHISM
• Originated in India in the 6th
century B.C. This religion is
based on the teachings of
Siddhartha Gautama, called
Buddha, or the ‘Enlightened
One.’
• Much of Buddha’s teaching is
focused on self-awareness
and self-development in order
to attain nirvana or
enlightenment.
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 Dhammapada (Way of Truth)
• The Dhammapada (Way of Truth) is an
anthology of basic Buddhist teaching in a
simple aphoristic style.
• These verses are compared with the
Letters of St. Paul in the Bible or that of
Christ’s Sermon on the Mount.

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Thought
• As a fletcher makes straight his arrow, a wise man makes
straight his trembling and unsteady thought which is difficult to
guard, difficult to hold back.
• As a fish taken from his watery home and thrown on the dry
ground, our thought trembles all over in order to escape the
dominion of Mara, the tempter.
• It is good to tame the mind, which is difficult to hold in and
flighty, rushing wherever it listeth; a tamed mind brings
happiness.
• Let the wise man guard his thoughts, for they are difficult to
perceive, very artful, and they rush wherever they list:
thoughts well guarded bring happiness.
• Those who bridle their mind which travels far, moves about
alone, is without a body, and hides in the chamber of the
heart, will be free from the bonds of Mara, the tempter

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 Literary Devices
• Literary Devices refers to the typical
structures used by writers in their works to
convey his or her message(s) in a simple
manner to his or her readers.
• When employed properly, the different
literary devices help readers to appreciate,
interpret and analyze a literary work.

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Two Kinds of Literary Devices

• Literary Elements
• Literary Techniques

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Literary Elements
• Literary Elements have an inherent
existence in literary piece and are
extensively employed by writers to
develop a literary piece e.g. plot, setting,
narrative structure, characters, mood,
theme, moral etc.
• Writers simply cannot create his desired
work without including Literary Elements in
a thoroughly professional manner.

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Literary Techniques
• Literary Techniques, are structures usually a
word s or phrases in literary texts that writers
employ to achieve not merely artistic ends
but also readers a greater understanding and
appreciation of their literary works.
• Examples are: metaphor, simile, alliteration,
hyperbole, allegory etc.
• In contrast to Literary Elements, Literary
Techniques are not unavoidable aspect of
literary works.
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 Common Literary Elements
1. Plot: It is the logical sequence of events
that develops a story.
2. Setting: It refers to the time and place in
which a story takes place.
3. Protagonist: It is the main character of
story, novel or a play e.g. Hamlet in the
play Hamlet
4. Antagonist: It is the character in conflict
with the Protagonist e.g. Claudius in the
play Hamlet
5. Narrator: A person who tells the story.
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 Common Literary Elements
6. Narrative method: The manner in which a
narrative is presented comprising plot
and setting.
7. Dialogue: Where characters of a
narrative speak to one another.
8. Conflict. It is n issue in a narrative
around which the whole story revolves.
9. Mood: A general atmosphere of a
narrative.
10.Theme: It is central idea or concept of a
story.
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Allegory
• An allegory is a type of narrative that uses
characters and plot to depict abstract ideas
and themes.
• In an allegorical story, things represent more
than they appear to on the surface. Many
children's fables, such as The Tortoise and
the Hare, are simple allegories about morality
— but allegories can also be dark, complex,
and controversial.

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Allegory
Example: Animal Farm by George Orwell.
This dystopian novella is one of modern
literature’s best-known allegories. A
commentary on the events leading up to
Stalin's rise and the formation of the Soviet
Union, the pigs at the heart of the novel
represent figures such as Stalin, Trotsky,
and Molotov.

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Alliteration
• Describes a series of words in quick
succession that all start with the same
letter or sound.
• It lends a pleasing cadence to prose and
poetry both.
• Love’s Labour’s Lost, Sense and
Sensibility, and The Haunting of Hill
House.

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Alliteration
Example:
“Peter Piper picked a pot of pickled
peppers.”

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Allusion
• An allusion is a passing or indirect
descriptive reference to something.
• An object or circumstance from unrelated
context is referred to covertly or indirectly.
It is left to the audience to make the direct
connection.

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Allusion
Example:
“This list of literary devices will turn me into
a bona fide Mark Twain.”

“Don't act like a Romeo in front of her.”

The rise in poverty will unlock the Pandora's

box of crimes.
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Anachronism
• Anachronism is when something
happens or is attributed to a different era
than when it actually existed. This is
usually a mistake, such as an author
writing a period piece and accidentally
using language that’s too modern.
• However, it can also be intentionally used
as a literary device, if the author wants to
comment on a theme like time or society.

AFRO-ASIAN LITERATURE
Anachronism
Example:
Cassius in Julius Caesar says that “the clock
has stricken three," even though mechanical
clocks had not been invented in 44 A.D. Of
course, it’s debatable whether Shakespeare
did this on purpose to signify something else.
Indeed, there are many famous
anachronisms in Shakespeare, such as the
University of Halle-Wittenberg in Hamlet and
the dollar as currency in Macbeth.

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Anaphora
• Anaphora is the repetition of a word or
phrase at the beginning of a series of
clauses or sentences.
• It’s often seen in poetry and speeches,
intended to provoke a emotional response
in its audience.

AFRO-ASIAN LITERATURE
Example: Martin Luther King’s 1963 “I Have A
Dream” speech. “I have a dream that one day
this nation will rise up and live out the true
meaning of its creed … and I have a
dream that one day on the red hills of
Georgia the sons of former slaves and the
sons of former slave owners will be able to sit
together at the table of brotherhood … I have
a dream that little children will one day live in
a nation where they will not be judged by the
color of their skin, but by the content of their
character.”
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Anastrophe
• Anastrophe is a figure of speech wherein
the traditional sentence structure is
reversed.
• So a typical verb-subject-adjective
sentence such as “Are you ready?”
becomes adjective-verb-subject question:
“Ready, are you?” Or a standard adjective-
noun pairing like “tall mountain” becomes
“mountain tall.”

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Anastrophe
Example:
• “Deep into that darkness peering, long I
stood there wondering, fearing.” — The
Raven by Edgar Allan Poe

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Anthropomorphism
• To anthropomorphize is to apply human
traits or qualities to a non-human thing
such as objects, animals, or the weather.
• But unlike personification, in which this is
done through figurative description,
anthropomorphism is literal: a sun with a
smiling face, or talking dogs in a cartoon.

AFRO-ASIAN LITERATURE
Examples:
• In Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, Mrs.
Potts the teapot, Cogsworth the clock,
and Lumière the candlestick are all
household objects that act and behave like
humans (which, of course, they were when
they weren’t under a spell).

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Aphorism
• An aphorism is a universally accepted
truth stated in a concise, to-the-point way.
• Aphorisms are typically witty and
memorable, often becoming adages or
proverbs as people repeat them over and
over.

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• Example: “To err is human, to forgive
divine.” — Alexander Pope

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