(a) Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow : (12 Marks)
(1) The current interest in reality televion throws up some interesting question about the difference between what is real and what is staged. On the face of it, it doesn't seem like much of a question. When we enact a role we dress up in a costume, speak in the voice of somebody else, use language we would not otherwise use and create a make - believe world. In our real lives we act pretty much as we please. We do not dress up, follow scripts, or use unfamiliar language.
(2)
Isn't it the difference between the two? Not really. In any number of areas in our lives, we find ourselves enacting our roles in ways not far removed from theatre. We deliberately distance ourselves from real life and act as actors do, donning costumes and speaking in prescribed ways. Take our courts. The courtroom is like a set with a stage and the judge provides visual symmetry by placing himself in the center. All people are addressed by their role and not their names. They are addressed and referred to as plaintiff, bailiff, defendant, prosecutor, the defence, witnesses and so on. The witnesses take a formal oath and sit in a prescribed place. Everyone dresses up. In some parts of the world judges wear wigs. All conversation is protocol for determining who can say what and when.
(3) The same is true of most professions in uniform. The 'Verdi' creates its own ecology of rules, behavior codes, hierarchy and language. The military creates an elaborate display of martial magnificence. Display of choreographed precision acts out a promise of discipline. Other professions in uniform too have their own ways of acting out their roles. A doctor, particularly in an operation theatre, is the conductor of a medical symphony as each member of the team plays out their appointed role. A school imposes an elaborate code of behavior. Making children dress up and act in a very particular way. Outside the uniform, too, be it in an office or at home, we find ourselves acting deliberately in a way that is not ourselves, using words we so not normally use and doing things that are not scripted by us. In social functions like marriages too we are mounting an elaborate production with its own set of events, decorations, music and little speeches. The girl acts as the bride with her own distinctive make-up just as the boy must play his appointed role and sport some ridiculous headgear that he would not caught dead otherwise.
(4) In a certain sense the only time we are truly ourselves is when we act reflexively, without trying to conform to any role that we might need to be playing. Any act of culture involves some form of role play. One way to understand our current fascination with reality television is that it allows us to enact ourselves in the epic story of our lives. The word act itself describes both the real and the staged. We are required to play roles of many different kinds and we need a way to mark the transition from the person the role. May be, sometimes we need to stage a performance to figure out what is real.
(i) In what respect is acting a role different from real life?
(2 Marks)
(ii) How is the conversation in the court structured in a predefined way as in a theatre?
(2 Marks)
(iii) How does a school make its children behave not as their true selves?
(2 Marks)
(iv) When can we be our true selves? (2 Marks)
(v) When can be the reason for our current fascination with the reality television? (2 Marks)
(vi) How do we act in social functions like marriages? (2 Marks)
(b) Read the given below and answer the question that follows: (8 Marks)
And round me are words, and words and words,
They grow on me like leaves, they never
Seem to stop their slow growing
From within …….But I tell myself words
Are a nuisance, beware of them, they
Can be so many things, a
Chasm where running feet must pause to
Look, a sea with paralyzing waves,
A blast of burning air or
A knife most willing to cut your best
Friend’s throat …… words are a nuisance, but
They grow on me like leaves on a tree,
They never seem to stop their coming.
From a silence, somewhere, deep within………...
(i) What does the poet want to convey in this poem? (2 Marks)
(ii) What is the source of words? (2 Marks)
(iii) How do the words grow? (2 Marks)
(iv) How does the poet use these words? (2 Marks)
