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| On the Grasshopper and Cricket by John Keats: Summary and Question Answers |
Summary
This poem is a fine piece of Petrarchan sonnet by the famous poet John Keats. He wrote this poem in December 1816. It is inspired by the beauty of nature. Poets usually find beauty and poetry in spring and good weather. But Keats is different as he finds nature beautiful in all seasons including hot summer and cold winter.
The poet symbolises the grasshopper as hot summer and the cricket as a very cold winter. He says that even when the birds stop singing during the hot summers, the Earth still sings. The grasshopper sings tirelessly during this time flying from the hedge. The poet further says that during the cold winter also the Earth keeps expressing pleasure through cricket. A cricket sings through the stones.
On the Grasshopper and Cricket Summary
In the poem ‘On the Grasshopper and Cricket’, the poet John Keats celebrates the music of the Earth. He finds beauty in hot summer as well as in the cold winter. Here, in this poem, the grasshopper is a symbol of hot summer and cricket is a symbol of cold winter. The poet says that the music of nature or earth is always alive whether it is hot summer or cold and bleak winter.
During the hot summer, all the singing birds are tired and take rest under the shady branches of trees. But even if they don’t sing the song of nature goes on. We can still hear the voice of the grasshopper who runs from hedge to hedge. He keeps singing tirelessly and when tired rests beneath some weed.
A grasshopper carries on the duty of singing the everlasting song of nature. During summers, he is a fun-loving and cheerful creature and is never done with his delights.
During the cold winter season also, the birds are silent. There is utter silence on the frosty winter days. But the earth has its own way of expressing pleasure and joys. The song of a cricket can be heard which breaks this silence.
He sings from the stones but not from the trees. His song appears to be increasing the warmth every moment. People are able to hear it sitting in their houses. However, the poet says that to a person who is half-asleep, it may appear to be a grasshopper’s song coming from the grassy hills.
Thus, we can say that the grasshopper and the cricket, two tiny insects, perform a big responsibility. They carry on with nature’s continuous and everlasting music irrespective of the extreme climates. The poet has thus personified them. It is thus a symbolic poem. Here, the grasshopper and the cricket are a symbol of the constant joyous mood of nature.
Conclusion:
The poem teaches us that we shall be joyful and pleasant no matter what are the situations in our life. With this attitude, we can easily overcome all the obstacles in life.
Exercises
1. Why do the grasshopper and the cricket sing in different seasons but have some similarities? Discuss.
It is true that grasshopper and the cricket sing in different seasons but still they have some similarities. Both the insects sing even in the extreme difficulties of the time. They both help nature not to stop its music and poetry in any situation.
2. Why does the grasshopper sing in the summer and the cricket in the winter? Give your reasons.
One reason why grasshopper sings in the summer and cricket in the winter is that because of their natural traits. It is natural that grasshopper becomes active when all other creatures tend to hide from summer and cricket tend to be active when all the other creatures try to protect themselves from the winter. So it is their natural habit of singing in their respective seasons.
3. Interpret the present poem in a paragraph.
The sound or music or the poetry of the nature or earth never changes or stops. We never feel silence on earth no matter which season it is. In the hot summer days when all birds and animals try to hide themselves from the parching sun, the grasshopper comes forward and sings its songs. Similarly in the extreme cold of winter where every bird and animal try to save themselves from cold, the cricket starts singing its song. In this way the sound, music or poetry of the nature or earth never changes or stops.
4. Explain the following lines with reference to the text:
On a lone winter evening, when the frost
Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills
the cricket's song, in warmth, increasing ever,
The following lines say that all winter evening when frost has brought silence and everything seems to be quiet, the cricket starts singing it's song and its sounds doesn't decreases rather it increases more and more.
5. Write the theme of the poem in a sentence.
The theme of the poem is nature, joy, music, season etc.
