a bout the book This textbook for Class XII English course has been developed on the basis of the recommendations made in the National Curriculum Framework . It follows the design of the Class XI textbook, Hornbill , published in . The prose selections aim to provide exposure to a wide variety of genres and themes, and writing from different parts of the world. They take into account the interests of young adults while making them aware of the socio-political issues that they will confront as they step into the world outside school.
The tasks that follow the units provide opportunities for the development of language skills. Three short stories, representative of fiction from different parts of the world - French, Swedish and British, have been included. Alphonse Daudet’s The Last Lesson deals with the theme of language imposition and language loyalty, Selma Lagelerof’s The Rattrap , captures the basic goodness in a human being in the face of material temptations and A.C. Barton’s Going Places explores the theme of adolescent hero-worship and fantasising.
Two of the non-fiction pieces are biographical and two autobiographical. Of the two biographical pieces, Indigo , an excerpt from Louis Fischer’s Life of Mahatma Gandhi portrays Gandhi in action, helping peasants secure legal justice and the excerpt from Anees Jung’s Lost Spring is an account of the lives of street children, a contemporary reality that youngsters need to be made sensitive to. The autobiographical piece by William Douglas, a lawyer who was a close associate of Franklin Roosevelt, deals with his personal experience of overcoming the fear of swimming. The second autobiographical account is by Asokamitran writing in a humorous vein about his years in the Gemini Studios.
The Introduction from The Penguin Book of Interviews edited by Christopher Silvester has been included to introduce pupils to the subject of media writing. This is accompanied by a recent newspaper interview with Umberto Eco by Mukund Padmanabhan. (x) Each Unit is interspersed with ‘Think as you read’ questions to check factual comprehension. This is followed by end-of-unit global questions and text-related issues to be taken up for discussion.
Language work on vocabulary and sentence patterns is followed by writing tasks. Useful vocabulary is presented at the beginning of each unit for learners to notice them in the text and understand their meaning from the context. Annotations are added where necessary. ‘About the unit’ highlights the points of focus in the tasks section following each text.
The poetry section has five poems. A short excerpt from Keats’ Endymion has been chosen to give pupils a taste of classical poetry, lines which have universal appeal and eternal value. Robert Frost’s A Roadside Stand is on the rural-urban economic divide. The other four poems are by reputed contemporary poets including two women, Kamala Das and Adrienne Rich.
While the theme of Das’ poem, My Mother at Sixty-six touches a personal chord of looking objectively at a close relative, Rich’s poem, Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers , gives expression to the voice of women stifled by the institution of marriage. The poems are followed by ‘noticing’ items which indicate the elements that deserve special attention in the classroom. The tasks in the poetry section encourage pupils to enjoy aesthetic writing and evoke subjective responses to the language of poetry.