CLASS: VIII SUBJECT: ENGLISH TOPIC: ON THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE CRICKET

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

John Keats was born in London on 31 October 1795, the eldest of
Thomas and Frances Jennings Keats’s four children. Although he
died at the age of twenty-five, Keats had perhaps the most
remarkable career of any English poet. He published only fifty-
four poems, in three slim volumes and a few magazines. But over
his short development, he took on the challenges of a wide range
of poetic forms from the sonnet to the Spenserian romance, to the
Miltonic epic, defining anew their possibilities with his own
distinctive fusion of earnest energy, control of conflicting
perspectives and forces, poetic self-consciousness, and,
occasionally, dry ironic wit.
SUMMARY
‘On the Grasshopper and Cricket’ is a fourteen-line poem or a sonnet in which the poet
expresses his view that nature is always inspiring a poet to compose poetry through its
various aspects. For Keats, seasons may change, but nature would never cease to inspire the
poet and sing its songs. During the extreme heat of the hot summer, when the birds stop
singing, the earth continues to sing. The birds hide under the shade of the trees and fall silent.
A voice runs from hedge to hedge, taking the lead in the extreme weather and sings
delightfully. That is the voice of the grasshopper. He sings endlessly, but when tired it rests
under some pleasant weed. During extreme winter, too, the birds stop singing. There is a
death-like silence in which nature seems to have got enveloped. Frost spreads its blanket over
all elements of nature. Despite that, a shrill sound comes from under the stones, it’s the
cricket singing. Cricket’s song restores the warmth that had gotten lost. People hear the song
and to many, it seems as if the grasshopper was singing from the grassy hills.

MESSAGE OF THE POEM

POEM AT A GLANCE

The resilience and beauty of nature is elucidated in the poem. Nature always finds a
way to express itself and be joyous. Nothing in nature is insignificant and even
small insects like the grasshopper and the cricket continue the song of nature.
POETIC DEVICES:
Personification: In the poem, the poet uses ‘he’ for the Grasshopper. One more example is
“the frost has wrought a silence” Frost is symbolised as something living.
Metaphor: In the poem, the poet compares earth’s poetry with the singing of a grasshopper
and also compares the singing of a grasshopper with that of cricket.
Oxymoron: It is a figure of speech in which two contradictory terms are combined. e.g.
“pleasant weed”. Weed is an unnecessary thing. However, the poet calls in pleasant because
it is a part of nature.
Enjambment: It is the continuation of a sentence without a pause, beyond the end of a line,
couplet, or stanza. e.g. “when the frost has wrought a silence”, “from the stove there shrills
the cricket’s song” etc.
Alliteration: “a voice will run”, “from hedge to hedge”, “…winter evening, when…”.
Inversion: it is the inverting of the normal word order in a sentence or phrase. e.g. “Poetry of
earth is ceasing never“, “And seems to one is drowsiness half lost“.

SOLVED QUESTIONS
Qi. What is the meaning of the line: ‘The poetry of earth is never dead’?
Ans. The poet wanted to say that poetry of nature is never going to end. No matter what the
season is, whether it is the sweltering summer or the harsh cold winter, the music and the
poetry of nature are never dead.
Q ii. What is the main theme of the poem?
Ans.
TheThe main
earth theme
is full of the poem is that poetry and music in nature do not perish.
of poetry
Q iii. Where do birds take rest on a hot summer day?
Ans. The birds took rest under shady trees to save themselves from the scorching heat of the
During summers, all the birds take refuge in trees.
sun.
Q iv. Discuss with your partner the following definition of a poem.
A The
poem is made of can
grasshopper words arranged
be heard in ahot
in the beautiful
summerorder.
sun. These words, when read aloud with
feelings, have a music and meaning of their own.
ANS: It is true that poetry is made of words arranged in a beautiful order.
Hewords
The takes delight even in
create music the
and summer
produce season.rhythm because of various
a certain
poetic elements such as rhythm, rhyme and meter, fused harmoniously into
one another.
The poetry of earth always continues.
ASSIGNMENT

1.Even
Readinthe
desolate winter
following season,
extract the shrill
and answer thesound of thethat
questions cricket is heard.
follow:
The poetry of earth is never dead:
When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,
Thehide
And person who is trees,
in cooling not fully alertwill
a voice mayrun
think that the cricket's sound as
that of the grasshopper
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead.

i. How long does the poetry of the earth live?

ii. Where do the birds hide during the hot sun?
iii. Where will the voice run?
2. The poetry of earth is not made of words. What is it made of, as suggested in the poem?
3. The poetry of the earth continues around the year through a cycle of two
seasons. Mention each with its representative voice.

EXTRAPOLATORY QUESTION
Imagine you are the poet from the poem ‘On the Grasshopper and Cricket’. How did you
enjoy nature? Write your feelings in the form of a diary entry.