MP Board Solutions for 12th English Chapter 11 My Father Travels Questions and Answers aids you to prepare all the topics in it effectively. You need not worry about the accuracy of the Madhya Pradesh Board Solutions for 12th English as they are given adhering to the latest exam pattern and syllabus guidelines.

You Can Download MP Board Class 12th English Solutions Questions and Answers Notes, Summary, Lessons: Pronunciation, Translation, Word Meanings, Textual Exercises. Enhance your subject knowledge by preparing from the Chapterwise MP Board Solutions for 12th English and clarify your doubts on the corresponding topics.

MP Board Class 12th English A Voyage Solutions Chapter 11 My Father Travels (Dilip Chitre)

Kick start your preparation by using our online resource MP Board Solutions for 12th English Chapter 11 My Father Travels Questions and Answers. You can even download the Madhya Pradesh Board Class 12th English Solutions Questions and Answers for free of cost through the direct links available on our page. Clear your queries and understand the concept behind them in a simple manner. Simply tap on the concept you wish to prepare in the chapter and go through it.

My Father Travels Textbook Exercises

Word Power

A. Give antonyms of the following words:
late, evening, silent, soggy, stale, sullen, static (adj.), narrow
Answer:

  • Late — Early
  • Evening — Morning
  • Silent — Noisy
  • Soggy — Dry Pleasant
  • Stale — Fresh
  • Sullen — Obedient
  • Static — Dynamic
  • Narrow — Wide

B. There are some phrasai yen’s used in the poem. A phrasai verb is a verb followed by an adverb or preposition, or sometimes by both for give a new meaning. For example,

  • (all apart (to be in a very bad condition): The strategy fell apart in the absence of a proper back-up.
  • get off (to be lucky to escape unhurt): He got off with minor injuries in the accident.
  • hurry on (to continue without giving anyone time to interrupt): Unmindful of the opposition, the leader hurried on with his speech.

Look up a dictionary and find the meanings of other phrasai verbs with ‘fall’, get’ and ‘hurry’.
Answer:
Some other phrasai verbs with ‘fall’, ‘get’ and ‘hurry’ are the following:
Fall —

  • fall away — to become gradually fewer or smaller
  • fall down — to be shown to be not true
  • fall in — to agree with
  • fall on — to attack or take hold of somebody/something

Get —

  • get ahead — to make progress
  • get away — to have a holiday
  • get back — to return
  • get down – to leave

Hurry —

  • hurry up – to do quickly

C. Match the words in column A with their meanings in column B:

Column A Column B
(i) commuters (a) a way through the mountains
(ii) estrangement (b) warm and damp
(iii) humid (c) think deeply
(iv) contemplate (d) alienation
(v) pass (noun) (e) daily passengers

Answer:
(i) e, (ii) d, (iii) b, (iv) c, (v) a.

Comprehension

A. Answer in one sentence:

My Father Travel On The Late Evening Train MP Board Class 12th English Question 1.
Who Is the narrator in the poem?
Answer:
The poet himself is the narrator in the poem.

My Father Travels Question Answer MP Board Class 12th English Question 2.
‘Suburbs slide past his unseeing eyes’. What is implied by ‘unseeing eyes’ in this line?
Answer:
‘Unseeing eyes’ implies that the father is in deep thought. unaware of what is passing through.

My Father Travels Poem MP Board Class 12th English Question 3.
What does the poet mean by ‘a word dropped from a long sentence’?
Answer:
The poet means that the father during travel was a part of the train but now he is detached from it after getting down from it.

My Father Travels Summary In Hindi MP Board Class 12th English Question 4.
What does the father contemplate on in the toilet?
Answer:
The father contemplates over the degradation of social values and relationships.

My Father Travels Summary MP Board Class 12th English Question 5.
What does the father dream of in sleep?
Answer:
The father dreams of his ancestors, his grand children and thinks about nomads in his sleep.

B. Answer in about 60 words each:

My Father Travels On The Late Evening Train MP Board Class 12th English Question 1.
What does ‘yellow’ stand for in the line ‘Standing among silent commuters in the yellow light’?
Answer:
‘Yellow’ stand for ‘fright’ and ‘fear’ here. The poet here focuses on the sense of insecurity developing among our old generations who are being ignored and neglected by their youngsters. Today, in the fast running way of life, we do not take care of our old guards who once protected us. We do not pay respect to them. We do not bother to share their woes or feelings. Hence, they are scared of their life. They are alone in their journey of life, completely secluded and detached.

Class 12 English Mp Board Solution MP Board Class 12th English Question 2.
Why does father hurry on?
Answer:
The father in this poem represents the old values. He travels alone in the train, standing among the old aged daily passengers with a fearful look and depressed lot of humanity. He has a sense of attachment with the family. He hurries back home to have some time with his family. He feels overburdened with the feeling of values that he represents. He is tired and secluded. But the whole idea of ‘Home’ makes him hurried on.

Father Returning Home Poem Questions And Answers MP Board Class 12th English Question 3.
Why does the father tremble at the sink? (M.P. Board 2009)
Answer:
The father comes back home. He eats stale chapatis and drinks weak tea. Nobody cares about his presence. He is alone in the house as no one bothers for him. He is ignored by his grandchildren. Nobody shares his woes. He goes to toilet in order to ease himself. It also symbolises a feeling of detachment from the worldly burden of relationship. So, he trembles at the sink out of weakness which is physical but also he shivers, thinking where the new society is led to.

Father Returning Home Central Idea MP Board Class 12th English Question 4.
Why does the poet call the children sullen? (M.P. Board 2015)
Answer:
The poet calls the children sullen because they are different from the previous generation. They feel differently and do accordingly. They do not bother for the old generation. They have their own way of living. They have no time to care or even look at their grandparents. They lack affinity and feeling. It is the trend of modern civilization. Moral values are vanishing fast. Children are growing indisciplined. They are becoming self-centred.

Question 5.
What does the poet suggest through the line ‘A few droplets cling the greying hair on his wrists’?
Answer:
The poet here focuses on the degrading moral values. In the modem civilization we ignore our old generations. We do not bother to care for them. They don’t get any proper care and regard. They feel scorned and ignored. They are growing weak with the feeling of alienated and aloof. The droplets clinging the greying hair on his wrists symbolise their unmindfulness of any sense of care. The droplets provide care and togetherness which the old man has been refused by his children.

Question 6.
Explain the following lines:
Home again, I see him drinking weak tea,
Eating a stale chapati, reading a book.
Answer:
This poem highlights the ironies of modern civilisation. It captures the predicament of an aged man in a dehumanised urban world. These lines focus on the real status of the old and aged people in our family. He comes back home, drinks weak tea and eats stale chapatis. Nobody cares to share his feelings. He is treated like these stale chapatis which he eats as his destinies. He spends his times in reading books.

C. Answer in about 75 words each:

Question 1.
Give the central idea of the poem.
Answer:
My Father Travels is a poem on the dehumanising growth of the modern civilization. It captures the predicament of an aged man in this dehumanised urban world. He feels depressed at the crumbling traditional value system and human relationships. The younger generation lacks sincerity and regard for their old generation.

They don’t bother to honour the traditional values and ways of life. They imitate the fast changing world pattern where there is no place for the old and the aged, for them, the old is not gold but stale and outdated. This is the negative aspect of the modernisation.

Question 2.
Comment on the mood in the poem.
Answer:
The poem is written in a mood of deep concern for the changing world where we are losing our values. The poet is pensive. He through a father ‘s travel, puts his ideas about how the modernisation affects us negatively. We are being detached from old values, our tradition, and our ancestors. The new generation has its own views and values. The old and the aged are ignored and overrated. They are subjected to negligence. The poet grows so depressed that he even thinks of the nomads. It means that the present world is not even better than the nomadic period.

Question 3.
Why does the poet refer to the Father ‘thinking of nomads entering a subcontinent through a narrow pass’?
Answer:
My Father Travels is a poem which highlights the ironies of modern civilisation. The poem also calls for concern for the older generation and also for the age old values in meeting the demands of modern times according to our cultural priorities. The modem society is ruthless and indisciplined. It has no feeling, no concern, no care, no honour, no regard, and nothing for the old generation. It appears to be so cruel that the poet even thinks about nomads who were even better than today’s people.

Question 4.
What light does the poem throw on the decline of social values?
Answer:
See ‘Summary in English’ of the poem.

Speaking Activity

A. (i) Find the stress-pattern in the first stanza of the poem as part of the group work or pair work. (Look up an English pronunciation dictionary)
Answer:
The stress pattern is not regular.

(ii) Is the metre regular here? Do you find run-on lines?
Answer:
The metre is not regular. Yes, there are run-on lines throughout the poem.

B. ‘Material progress is not meaningful without cultural and social values’. Speak for, or against the motion.
Answer:
Attempt yourself at class level.

Writing Activity

Expand the idea contained in the following lines:

Question 1.
He goes to contemplate man’s estrangement from a man-made world.
Answer:
As the modem generation has left the old and aged people uncared and ignored they feel secluded and aloof. They are cut off from the real world. Nobody cares for them nor shares their woes.

Question 2.
His sullen children have often refused to share jokes and secrets with him.
Answer:
Here the poet means to say that the present generation has no sympathy for the old and aged. They disobey them. They are indisciplined in their behaviour. Also there is a gap in communication. The happy and cost hours are not shared with the old man.

Think It Over

A. Do you think the theme of the poem speaks of social responsibility towards the elderly people?
Answer:
See ‘Summary in English’ of the poem.

B. ‘ Is our value-system threatened by the materialist ethos of modern civilization?
Answer:
See ‘Summary in English’ of the poem.

Things to Do

Read the following extract from the poem, ‘Gerontion’ by T.S. Eliot having the same theme and answer the questions that follow:

Here I am, an old man in a dry month,
Being read to by a boy, waiting for rain.
I was neither at the hot gates
Nor fought in the warm rain
Nor knee deep in the salt marsh, hearing a cutlass,
Bitten by files, fought.
My house is a decayed house,
And the jew squats on the window sill, the owner,
Spawned in some estaminet of Antwerp,
Blistered in Brussels, patched and peeled in London.
The goat coughs at night in the field overhead;
Rocks, moss, stonecrop, iron, merds.
The woman keeps the kitchen, makes tea,
Sneezes at evening, poking the peevish gutter.
I am an old man,
A dull head among windy spaces.

Questions:
(i) Who is the narrator in the poem? ,
(ii) What does the image, ‘My house is a decayed house’ suggest?
(iii) Bring out the similarities of the poetic technique in the poems-‘Gerontion’ and ‘My Father Travels’.
Answers:
(i) The poet is the narrator.
(ii) It suggests that the present system has been corrupted by the modern civilization.
There is no value.
(iii) Both the poems delineate the dehumanising effect of the modern civilization where we don’t care for the traditional and value-based things.

My Father Travels by Dilip Chitre Introduction

This poem highlights the ironies of modern civilisation It focuses on the crumbling traditional value system and human relationship Here through the activities of a father the representative of old generation Me poet highlights his views

My Father Travels Summary in English

The narrator says that his father travels on a late evening train standing among silent commuters in the yellow light. He is wearing wet and soft shirt and pant and his black raincoat is stained with mud. His bag which is stuffed with books falls apart. He gets off the train and hurries across the platform to reach home. His slippers are sticky with mud. He eats stale chapati, drinks weak tea, and reads book. He goes into the toilet to relieve himself from the burden. It symbolises the detachment from the worldly burden. Coming out, he trembles at the sink, but none of his children shares his woes. They ignore him. They don’t feel any delight in his jokes or secrets. He finally goes to bed, listening to radio and dreaming of his own ancestors and grandchildren. A vision of nomads also comes through his mind.

My Father Travels Summary in Hindi

प्रस्तुत कविता आधुनिक सभ्यता की त्रासदी को उजागर करती है। यह टूटते हुए पारम्परिक मूल्यों की प्रक्रिया और मानवीय रिश्तों पर केन्द्रित है। यहाँ एक पिता-जो पुरातन पीढ़ी का प्रतिनिधि है-के द्वारा कवि अपने विचारों को प्रस्तुत करता है।

कवि कहता है कि उसके पिता देर शामवाली ट्रेन में नियमित यात्रियों के बीच एक भयभीत साये की तरह चुपचाप खडे हए सफर करते हैं। वह एक भीगा मलायम शर्ट-पैंट पहने हैं और उनका काला रेनकोट कीचड से सना है। उनका किताबों से भरा बैग खल जाता है। वह ट्रेन से उतरते हैं और तेजी से प्लेटफार्म पार कर घर की ओर भागते हैं। उनकी चप्पलें कीचड़ से लथपथ हैं। वह बासी चपाती खाते हैं और हल्की चाय पीते हैं और किताबें पढ़ते हैं। वह अपने आपको हल्का करने के लिए टॉयलेट जाते हैं। यह दुनिया के बोझ से छुटकारा पाने का प्रतीक है। बाहर आते हुए वे लड़खड़ाते हैं, चक्कर खाते हैं परन्तु उनका कोई भी बच्चा उनके दुःखों को नहीं बाँटता। वे उनकी उपेक्षा करते हैं। वे उनके चुटकुलों और रहस्यों में कोई आनन्द नहीं लेते। अन्त में वे रेडियो सुनते हुए और अपने पूर्वजों और पोतों के सपने देखते हुए विछावन पर सोने चले जाते हैं। उनके मन में प्राचीनकाल के घुमन्तू मानव की तस्वीर की झलक भी उभरती है।

My Father Travels Word Meaning

MP Board Class 12th English A Voyage Solutions Chapter 11 My Father Travels img 1

My Father Travels Important Pronunciations

MP Board Class 12th English A Voyage Solutions Chapter 11 My Father Travels img 2

My Father Travels Stanzas for Comprehension

Read the following stanzas carefully and answer the questions that follow:

1. My father travels on the late evening train
Standing among silent commuters in the yellow light.
Suburbs slide past his unseeing eyes.
His shirt and pants are soggy, and his black raincoat
Is stained with mud, his bag stuffed with books
Is falling apart. (Page 78)

Questions:
(i) What look does ‘yellow light’ reflects?
(ii) ……… slide past his unseeing eyes.
(iii) Find a word similar in meaning to ‘patched’.
(iv) Where is the father’s bag of books?
Answers:
(i) ‘Yellow light’ reflects a ‘frightening look’.
(ii) Suburbs.
(iii) ‘Stained’ is similar in meaning ‘patched’.
(iv) The father’s bag of books is falling apart.

2. His sullen children have often refused to share
Jokes and secrets with him. He will now go to sleep
Listening to the static on the radio, dreaming
Of his ancestors and grandchildren, thinking
Of nomads entering a subcontinent through a narrow pass. (Page 79)

Questions:
(i) What position of the father does the first line refer to?
(ii) ………entering a subcontinent through a narrow pass.
(iii) Find a word opposite in meaning to ‘Successors’.
(iv) What does the father finally do?
Answers:
(f) The father’s position is neglected in the family.
(ii) Of nomads.
(iii) Ancestors’ has opposite meaning to ‘successors’.
(iv) The father finally goes to bed listening to the static radio and dreaming of his ancestors and grand-children.

We believe the information shared regarding MP Board Solutions for 12th English Chapter 11 My Father Travels Questions and Answers as far as our knowledge is concerned is true and reliable. In case of any queries or suggestions do leave us your feedback and our team will guide you at the soonest possibility. Bookmark our site to avail latest updates on several state board Solutions at your fingertips.