A Letter to God G L Fuentes

ILLUSTRATION:
[
Sticking an original inland/post card
NEW WORDS:

crest draped plague conscience correspondence

obliged

WORD MEANINGS:
crest top of the hill
harvest crop
downpour heavy rain
intimately closely
draped covered
curtain cover
hailstones ice
plague epidemic
solitary alone
conscience moral sense of being right
amiable kind hearted
continent remark
correspondence exchange
resolution determination
obliged compelled
crook rogue
SYNONYM AND ANTONYM:
SYNONYM ANTONYM
upset worried slightest deepest
career profession frozen melted
charity benefaction boss employee
MAKE SENTENCES:
goodwill They allowed him to keep the extra money as a gesture of goodwill.
crook He demanded an apology from me for calling him a crook.
affix The boy scout needed help to affix his badge to his uniform.
correspondence E-mail correspondence has become extremely important for
modern businesses.
 LITERARY DEVICE:
LITERARY DEVICE MEANING EXAMPLE
METAPHOR Direct Comparison For E.g : new coins silver coins
frozen pearls
ox of a man

APOSTROPHE Speaking directly to someone For Eg : I need 100 pesos in

who is not order to sow my field.
present.
SARCASM uses irony to mock someone For Eg: A plague of locusts
or something or would have left more than
convey contempt. this.

THEME

SUMMARY:
This story is written by G L Fuentes. This is a story about the great faith of a simpleton in the
God. The story begins with Lencho hoping for rains so that his crops would give a better yield.
The rain does come but is followed by a devastating hailstorm. Hailstorm destroys all the
standing crops and leaves Lencho staring into the bleak future ahead. But Lencho is a strong
believer in the God and decides to write a letter to the God; asking for some monetary help.
Lencho also wishes to repay the debt when the next crop would give him enough money. After
seeing Lencho’s letter, the postmaster is deeply touched by the strong faith of Lencho in the
God. The postmaster collects money from his colleagues and sends some money to Lencho.
But the money sent by the postmaster is less than what the Lencho had demanded through
his letter. Lencho once again writes a letter to the God in which he expresses his doubts about
the honesty of post office employees.

MAIN POINTS:
1. Lencho was a farmer.
2. His house was the only house in the valley and on the top of a hill.
3. Lencho’s fields needed rain for a good harvest.
4. He looked expectantly at the sky and it did rain at last.
5. The drops of rain were like the coins for him.
6. But his happiness was short lived as very large hailstones began to fall after the rain.
7. The hailstones destroyed all the leaves on the trees, plants and flowers.
8. There would be no crop that year.
 9. There was a single hope: help from God.
10. On the following Sunday, he wrote a letter to God.
11. He needed a hundred pesos to sow his fields again and to live until the new crop came.
12. He wrote `To God’ on the envelope and put the letter into the mailbox.
13. The postman laughed heartily and took it to the postmaster.
14. The postmaster laughed too but soon he became serious.
15. He decided to reply to the letter and help Lencho.
16. He collected seventy pesos only from his employees and himself contributed a part of his
salary.
17. He put the money in an envelope and posted it to Lencho.
18. Lencho had an unbroken faith in God and he was not surprised when he received the
money.

REFERENCE TO CONTEXT:
Question 1.
The house- the only one in the entire valley- sat on the crest of a low hill. From this height one
could see the river and the field of ripe corn dotted with the flowers that always promised a
good harvest. The only thing the Earth needed was a downpour or at least a shower.
Throughout the morning Lencho who knew his fields intimately had done nothing else but see
the sky towards the North-East. “Now we’re really going to get some water, woman.
” The woman who was preparing supper, replied, “Yes, God willing”.
(a) Where was Lencho’s house located?
(b) What was Lencho’s wife preparing?
(c) Find the word from the passage which means ‘very closely’.
(d) What does ‘Crest’ means?

Question 2.
It was during the meal that, just as Lencho had predicted, big drops of rain began to fall. In the
North-East huge mountains of clouds could be seen approaching. The air was fresh and sweet.
The man went out for no other reason than to have the pleasure of feeling the rain on his
body.
(a) What could be seen approaching in the North-East?
(b) Why did Lencho go out?
(c) Give an antonym of the word Big.
(d) Which word in the passage is a synonym of ‘forecast’.

SHORT QUESTIONS:
Q1. What are the raindrops compared to and why?
Q2. Lencho had only ‘one hope’. What was it?
Q3. Did the letter reach God? Why did the postmaster send a reply to Lencho?
Q4. Lencho describes the post office employees as ‘a bunch of crook
(i) Were they ‘a bunch of crooks’?
(ii) How would you describe them?
LONG QUESTIONS:
Q1.Bring out two ironies from the chapter.
Q2.Bring out two conflicts from the chapter ‘A Letter to God’
Q3.Bring out the character sketch of Lencho in light of his faith in God and on asking God not
to send the money through the mail.
Q4.What are the two things I learnt from this chapter?

EXTRA POLATORY QUESTIONS:

Write a letter as Lencho to your friend and tell him about the destruction of your crops, the
letter you wrote to God and the reply with money you received. Express your irritation about
the post office employees also.

GRAPHIC ORGANIZER:
CHARACTER SKETCH:
1. POST MASTER
2. LENCHO

POST MASTER LENCHO

 . .

.
LENCHO

. .