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Class 10 English - First Flight Chapter 1. A Letter to God Summary, Explanation, Question Answers (NCERT Solutions)

A Letter To God (1. A Letter to God) CBSE class 10 English - First Flight Chapter 1. A Letter to God summary with detailed explanation of the lesson A Letter To God along with meanings of difficult words. Given here is the complete explanation of the lesson, along with summary, explanation and questions and answers of each topic of lesson 1. A Letter to God.

English - First Flight (Chapter 1. A Letter to God) Solution
 Thinking About Language

IV. Using Negatives for Emphasis

We know that sentences with words such as no, not or nothing show the absence of something, or contradict something. For example:
(a) This year we will have no corn. (Corn will be absent)
(b) The hail has left nothing. (Absence of a crop)
(c) These aren’t raindrops falling from the sky, they are new coins.
(Contradicts the common idea of what the drops of water falling from the sky are)

But sometims negative words are used just to emphasise an idea. Look at these sentences from the story:
(d) Lencho…had done nothing else but see the sky towards the northeast. (He had done only this)
(e) The man went out for no other reason than to have the pleasure of feeling the rain on his body. (He had only this reason)
(f) Lencho showed not the slightest surprise on seeing the money. (He showed no surprise at all)

Now look back at example (c). Notice that the contradiction in fact serves to emphasise the value or usefulness of the rain to the farmer.

Find sentences in the story with negative words, which express the following ideas emphatically.

1. The trees lost all their leaves.
2. The letter was addressed to God himself.
3. The postman saw this address for the first time in his career.

Answer :


1. Not a leaf remained on the trees.
2. It was nothing less than a letter to God.
3. Never in his career as a postman had he seen that address.


All Questions of English - First Flight Chapter 1. A Letter to God
Oral Comprehension Check [Page-5]
1. What did Lencho hope for?
2. Why did Lencho say the raindrops were like 'new coins'?
3. How did the rain change? What happened to Lencho’s fields?
4. What were Lencho’s feelings when the hail stopped?

Oral Comprehension Check [Page-6]
1. Who or what did Lencho have faith in? What did he do?
2. Who read the letter?
3. What did the postmaster do after reading a letter?

Oral Comprehension Check [Page-7]
1. Was Lencho surprised to find a letter for him with money in it?
2. What made Lencho angry?

Thinking About The Text
1. Who does Lencho have complete faith in? Which sentences in the story tell you this?
2. Why does the postmaster send money to Lencho? Why does he sign the letter God?
3. Did Lencho try to find out who had sent the money to him? Why or why not?
4. Who does Lencho think has taken the rest of the money? What is the irony in the situation? (Remember that the irony of a situation is an unexpected aspect of it. An ironic situation is strange or amusing because it is the opposite of what is expected).
5. Are there people like Lencho in the real world? What kind of a person would you say he is? You may select appropriate words from the box to answer the question.
Greedy, Naive, Stupid, Ungrateful, Selfish, Comical, Unquestioning
6. There are two kinds of conflict in the story between humans and nature and between humans themselves. How are these conflicts illustrated?

Thinking About Language
I. Look at the following sentence from the story.
Suddenly a strong wind began to blow and along with the rain very large hailstones began to fall.
'Hailstones' are small balls of ice that fall like rain. A storm in which hailstones fall is a 'hailstorm'. You know that a storm is bad weather with strong winds, rain, thunder and lightning.

There are different names in different parts of the world for storms, depending on their nature. Can you match the names in the box with their descriptions below, and fill in the blanks?

gale, whirlwind, cyclone, hurricane, tornado, typhoon.

1. A violent tropical storm in which strong winds move in a circle _ _ c _ _ _ _.
2. An extremely strong wind _ a _ _.
3. A violent tropical storm with very strong wind _ _ p _ _ _ _.
4. A violent storm whose centre is a cloud in the shape of a funnel _ _ _ n _ _ _.
5. A violent storm with very strong winds, especially in the Western Atlantic Ocean _ _ r _ _ _ _ _ _.
6. A very strong wind that moves very fast in a spinning movement and causes a lot of damage _ _ _ _ l _ _ _ _.
II. Notice how the word 'hope' is used in these sentences from the story:
(a) I hope it (the hailstorm) passes quickly.
(b) There was a single hope: help from God.

In the first example, 'hope' is a verb which means you wish for something to happen. In the second example it is noun meaning a chance for something to happen.

Match the sentences in column A with the meaning of ‘hope’ in column B.

A B
1. Will you get the subjects you want to study in college? I hope so. (a) a feeling that something good will probably happen.
2. I hope you don’t mind my saying this but I don’t like the way you are arguing. (b) thinking that this would happen (it may or may not have happened.)
3. This discovery will give new hope to HIV/AIDS sufferers. (c) stopped believing that this good thing would happen.
4. We were hoping against hope that the judges would not notice our mistakes. (d) wanting something to happen (and thinking it quite possible)
5. I called early in the hope of speaking to her before she went to school. (e) showing concern that what you say should not offend or disturb the other person a way of being polite.
6. Just when everybody had given up hope, the fishermen came back, seven days after the cyclone. (f) wishing for something to happen, although this is very unlikely.
III. Relative Clauses
Look at these sentences
(a) All morning Lencho — who knew his fields intimately — looked at the sky.
(b) The woman, who was preparing supper, replied, “Yes, God willing.’’
The italicised parts of the sentences give us more information about Lencho and the woman. We call them relative clauses. Notice that they begin with a relative pronoun who. Other common relative pronouns are whom, whose, and which.

The relative clauses in (a) and (b) above are called non-defining, because we already know the identity of the person they describe. Lencho is a particular person, and there is a particular woman he speaks to. We don’t need the information in the relative clause to pick these people out from a larger set.

A non-defining relative clause usually has a comma in front of it and a comma after it (some writers use a dash (—) instead, as in the story). If the relative clause comes at the end, we just put a full stop.

Join the sentences given below using who, whom, whose, which, as suggested.


1. I often go to Mumbai. Mumbai is the commercial capital of India. (which)
2. My mother is going to host a TV show on cooking. She cooks very well. (who)
3. These sportspersons are going to meet the President. Their performance has been excellent. (whose)
4. Lencho prayed to God. His eyes see into our minds. (whose)
5. This man cheated me. I trusted him. (whom)

Sometimes the relative pronoun in a relative clause remains ‘hidden’. For example, look at the first sentence of the story:
(a) The house — the only one in the entire valley — sat on the crest of a low hill.

We can rewrite this sentence as:
(b) The house — which was the only one in the entire valley — sat on the crest of a low hill.

In (a), the relative pronoun which and the verb was are not present.
IV. Using Negatives for Emphasis

We know that sentences with words such as no, not or nothing show the absence of something, or contradict something. For example:
(a) This year we will have no corn. (Corn will be absent)
(b) The hail has left nothing. (Absence of a crop)
(c) These aren’t raindrops falling from the sky, they are new coins.
(Contradicts the common idea of what the drops of water falling from the sky are)

But sometims negative words are used just to emphasise an idea. Look at these sentences from the story:
(d) Lencho…had done nothing else but see the sky towards the northeast. (He had done only this)
(e) The man went out for no other reason than to have the pleasure of feeling the rain on his body. (He had only this reason)
(f) Lencho showed not the slightest surprise on seeing the money. (He showed no surprise at all)

Now look back at example (c). Notice that the contradiction in fact serves to emphasise the value or usefulness of the rain to the farmer.

Find sentences in the story with negative words, which express the following ideas emphatically.

1. The trees lost all their leaves.
2. The letter was addressed to God himself.
3. The postman saw this address for the first time in his career.
V. Metaphors

The word metaphor comes from a Greek word meaning ‘transfer’. Metaphors compare two things or ideas: a quality or feature of one thing is transferred to another thing.
Some common metaphors are
• the leg of the table: The leg supports our body. So the object that supports a table is described as a leg.
• the heart of the city: The heart is an important organ in the centre of our body. So this word is used to describe the central area of a city.

In pairs, find metaphors from the story to complete the table below. Try to say what qualities are being compared. One has been done for you.

10-first-flight-ch1-q20

Speaking
Have you ever been in great difficulty, and felt that only a miracle could help you? How was your problem solved? Speak about this in class with your teacher.

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