Ans: The author has seen his grandmother for the last 20 years. She was always wrinkled with white hair. So when people say that she was young and pretty in her youth, the writer could not believe it.
2. How did the grandfather appear in his portrait?
Ans: In the portrait, the grandfather appeared to be a beard man with a big turban, loose-fitting clothes. He seemed to a hundred years old.
3. What sort of a person did he look in his portrait?
Ans: In his portrait he looked as if he would only have lots and lots of grandchildren.
4. How does the author portray his grandmother?
Ans: The writer's grandmother was short, fat and slightly bent. Her face had wrinkles. She had grown older and had stayed at the same age for twenty years.
5. Why does he say "the thought was almost revolting"?
Ans: The writer's grandfather appeared to be more than hundred years who could have lots of grandchildren. His grandmother appeared old, but pretty and a bit younger. He could not think that such a pretty lady could be the wife of such on oldman.
6. The grandmother had a divine beauty. How does the author bring this out?
Ans: The grandmother always told the beads of rosary. Her lips constantly moved in inaudible prayer. Yet she was like an expanse of pure white serenity breathing peace and contentment.
Unit - 2
1. What was the grandmother's routine in the village?
Ans: The grandmother used to wake up the writer every morning and got him ready for school. She bathed and dressed him and took him to school.
2. How did the grandmother take care of the writer during his childhood? Was she a good companion of the writer in the village?
Ans: The grandmother woke him up every morning, bathed and dressed him, fed him and carried him to school. She was a good companion of the writer in the village, staying with him at every moment.
3. What lessons did the writer learn from the village priest?
Ans: The writer learnt the alphabet and morning prayer from the priest.
4. How did the grandmother spend her time at the temple?
Ans: Grandmother sat inside the temple and was reading the scriptures when the writer was studying near the priest.
5. Was she a religious person? How?
Ans: Grandmother was a religious person. She said her morning prayer in a monotonous sing-song. She used to read the scriptures in the temple.
Unit - 3
1. Why didn't the grandmother accompany the writer to school in the city?
Ans: The writer went to school by bus. So the grandmother did not accompany him to school.
2. Why could not the grandmother help the writer with his lesson at the city school?
Ans: The writer was reading western science, law of gravity, Archimedes' principle, the world being round. Grandmother did not know it. So she couldn't help him in his lessons.
3. Why did the lessons at the English school distress grandmother?
Ans: Grandmother was an old fashioned lady. To her reading scriptures was real education. As the English school taught western science instead of scriptures she thought it distressing.
4. Why was she disturbed about music lessons at the English school?
Ans: Grandmother looked disturbed when she heard that music lessons were taught at the English school, because to her, music had leud association. It was the monopoly of harlots and beggars, not for the gentle folk.
5. What were the three ways in which the grandmother spent her days when the author went to university?
Ans: When the writer went to university, the grandmother felt lonely. She spent time sitting by spinning wheel, reciting prayers and feeding the sparrows.
6. What was the happiest time of the day for her?
Ans: In the afternoon, grandmother fed the hundreds of sparrows that gathered around her demanding bread. While feeding them she felt that the time was the happiest day for her.
7. How did she accept her seclusion?
Ans. When the relationship from the writer was cut off, grandmother did not complain, rather accepted it with resignation.
Unit - 4
1. How did the grandmother see the author off at the railway station?
Ans: When the writer decided to go abroad, grandmother came to see him off at the railway station. She kissed his forehead and saw him off.
2. How did she receive him when he came back home from abroad?
Ans: When the writer came back home from abroad, grandmother came to the station to receive him. She clasped him in her arms.
3. What were her happiest moments on the first day of his arrival?
Ans: On the first day of his arrival, her happiest moments were with her sparrows whom she fed longer and with frivolous rebukes.
4. How did she celebrate return in the evening? Does her behaviour appear odd to you?
Ans: In the evening, she collected some women of the neighbourhood, played drum, sang of the home coming of warriors.
5. How did she pass away?
Ans: She lay peacefully in bed praying and telling her beads. Gradually her lips stopped moving and her rosary fell from her lifeless fingers. She died a peaceful death.
6. How did the sparrows react when the author's grandmother died?
Ans: When the author's grandmother died, the sparrows sat scattered on the floor, around the dead body without chirruping. They did not take away food.
7. "Next morning the sweeper swept the bread crumbs into the dustbin. "What does this line imply?
Ans: Mother offered few pieces of bread to the sparrows sitting around the corpse of grandmother. They did not receive it. So the next morning the sweeper swept the bread crumbs into the dustbin to clear the room.
Additional Question and Answer
1. What kind of a person did the grandfather appear in his portrait?
Ans: The grandfather's appearance in the portrait creates the impression that he was hundred years old, too old to have wife or children. He rather looked like a very very old grandfather having lots and lots of children.
2. What was 'absurd and undignified' about the grandmother?
Ans: The writer's grandmother had already passed the stages of childhood and youth. As a child she used to play certain games which the present generation children do not play. So the grandmother's tale of her childhood games and youthful prettiness seems absurd and undignified today.
3. "...that was hard to believe." What was hard to believe?
Ans: The writer heard people's remark that his grandmother had been very pretty in her youth and had a husband. The writer did not find these two things with her at present. So, it was very hard to believe the people's remark.
4. What was the grandmother doing in the temple when the village priest was teaching the writer?
Ans: The grandmother accompanied her grandson to his school. While the priest was teaching him morning prayer and the alphabet, the grandmother spent her time reading the holy scriptures inside the temple.
5. What made the grandmother say her morning prayer in a monotonous sing-song?
Ans: The grandmother was in the habit of saying her morning prayer in a monotonous sing-song while she was bathing or dressing her grandson. Her sole intention behind it was that he would listen and learn it by heart.
6. What did the grandmother carry with her for the village dogs and why?
Ans: The kind and generous grandmother used to carry several stale chapattis with her while she accompanied her grandson to school in order to feed the village dogs.
7. Who accompanied the writer to the village school and what did the writer carry with him to school?
Ans: The writer's grandmother accompanied him to the village school. The writer used to carry all the study materials used for his study. Those were a wooden slate property washed and plastered with yellow chalk, a tiny earthen ink pot and a reed pen.
8. When did both the grandmother and the writer leave for their city-house?
Ans; After the narrator's parents got themselves properly settled in the city, both the writer and the grandmother left for the city.
9. What was the turning point in the friendship between the grandmother and the writer?
Ans: Shifting to the city was a turning point for both the grandmother and the writer. It was because the grandmother couldn't accompany the writer to his school, though both of them shared the same room.
10. Were the city house and country house different from each other? If so, how?
Ans: The city house was quite different from the country house. There were no dogs in the street whom the grandmother would feed with stale chapattis everyday. Life was all together a change for the grandmother in the city.
11. What did the author think will happen to his grandmother after he leaves for abroad?
Ans: When it was decided, the author should leave for abroad for higher study and stay there for five years, he thought that his long absence would upset his grandmother.
12. What happened to the grandmother the day after the late-night celebration?
Ans: The day after the writer's return, the grandmother fell ill. It was a mild fever and the doctor said that it would go soon. But the grandmother told the family that her end had come.
13. Why did not the grandmother talk to the members of the family?
Ans: The grandmother refused, to talk to the family because she didn't want to waste time on talking. She began to pray to God for a few hours before she closed her eyes.
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