Class 12 Semester 4 English Question Paper with Solution PDF 2025-26 | উচ্চমাধ্যমিক চতুর্থ সেমিস্টার ইংরেজি প্রশ্নপত্র উত্তর সহ

Answer: She was simply too tall. While the key successfully unlocked the door, the frame was only around fifteen inches tall, making it physically impossible for her to fit inside without shrinking first.

Answer: Alice found a small cake on the table. It had the words “EAT ME” written on it with raisins.

Answer: The ‘right’ of the hawk refers to its absolute authority and power as an apex predator to kill and dominate other creatures at its will. No arguments or justifications are needed for this right because the hawk operates purely on natural instinct and raw power, completely free from human moral rules, reason, or deceit (“sophistry”). Its dominance is an unquestionable law of nature.

Answer: The ‘yellow leaves’ represent autumn, which symbolizes old age, physical decay, and the final stage of life before death. Just as leaves turn yellow and fall off trees in late autumn, the speaker feels his youth fading as he nears the end of his life.

Answer: Sonnet 73 follows the traditional Shakespearean (English) sonnet structure, divided into four stanzas: three quatrains (4 lines each), where each quatrain presents a distinct metaphor for aging—autumn, twilight, and a dying fire—and one final couplet (2 lines), which summarizes the core message, urging the reader to love deeply before life ends. The rhyme scheme is ABAB CDCD EFEF GG.

Answer: According to Carl Dennis in his poem “The Greenhouse Effect,” the Plain States will turn into giant dust bowls due to ongoing climate change and global warming. Because the rising temperatures will make the land infertile and impossible to cultivate, these regions will ultimately be abandoned by their inhabitants.

Answer: He praised Sima because she wrote a letter that contained the truth.

Answer: 1. Arjun heard the noise. 2. He got startled.

Answer: The teacher asked her why she had not attended the class the previous day.

Answer: Yesterday, I went to the market near my house. I bought an apple and a loaf of bread. On my way back, I saw a cat sitting on the wall, looking very curious.

Answer:

In J. M. Synge’s one-act tragedy Riders to the Sea, the sea plays a pivotal role—not merely as a background setting, but as an invisible, living antagonist that controls the lives and destinies of the Aran Islanders.

Preserver and Destroyer (Dual Role): The sea is the sole source of livelihood, food, and trade for the islanders, but it also acts as a ruthless, destructive force that claims the lives of male family members one after another.

Symbol of Antagonist and Fate: The sea functions like an inescapable element of fate or Nemesis. It pitilessly takes away Maurya’s father-in-law, husband, and all six of her sons, ending with Bartley, who is knocked into the sea by his horse.

Symbol of Spiritual Resignation: After Bartley’s death, Maurya experiences a tragic release, realizing that “there isn’t anything more the sea can do to me,” transforming her fear into ultimate stoic acceptance.

Thus, the sea is the central force in the play that drives the human struggle, shaping both the physical hardships and the ultimate spiritual catharsis of the characters.

Answer:

J. M. Synge’s Riders to the Sea is widely regarded as a masterpiece of twentieth-century one-act tragedy. A standard one-act play demands extreme economy of construction, a focused plot, a small cast, strict adherence to dramatic unities, and intense emotional concentration. Synge fulfills each of these requirements effectively.

Adherence to Classical Unities:

Unity of Place: The entire action takes place in a single setting—the kitchen of Maurya’s cottage on the Aran Islands.

Unity of Time: The events unfold continuously within a very short span of real-time, matching the actual duration of the stage performance.

Unity of Action: The plot focuses strictly on a single central thread—the fatal power of the sea claiming the lives of Maurya’s remaining sons, Michael and Bartley. There are no subplots or minor distractions.

Economy of Characters and Setting: Synge uses a minimal cast—primarily Maurya, the grieving mother, her daughters Cathleen and Nora, and her son Bartley. Secondary characters, like the priest, remain off-stage. The stage setup relies on everyday, symbolic props such as the red belt, bread, and white boards for a coffin to drive the plot quickly toward its climax.

Singleness of Atmosphere and Emotional Intensity: From the very opening scene, where Cathleen and Nora secretly inspect a bundle of clothes from a drowned man, to the closing lament over Bartley’s corpse, the play maintains an unbroken mood of suspense, tragic grief, and fatalism. There is no comic relief to disrupt the emotional momentum.

Poetic and Direct Dialogue: Synge uses rich, rhythmic Hiberno-English dialect. Every line of dialogue either advances the action, heightens the fatalistic tone, or reveals character, making the brief text remarkably impactful.

By condensing the universal conflict between humanity and nature into a single unbroken scene, Synge delivers a tragic experience that makes Riders to the Sea a definitive specimen of the one-act play.

Answer:

Alice’s fall down the rabbit hole in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is a surreal, slow-motion descent into a world of pure dream-logic. Rather than plummeting rapidly, she falls so slowly that she has plenty of time to look around and process her bizarre surroundings.

Physical Experience: Alice tumbles down what seems to be a deep well lined with bookshelves, cupboards, maps, and pictures hanging from pegs. As she floats downward, she even manages to take a jar labeled “ORANGE MARMALADE” from a shelf. Finding it empty, she carefully places it into another cupboard on her way down so as not to drop it on anyone below.

Thoughts during the Fall: Alice wonders how many miles she has fallen and speculates about reaching the center of the Earth. She tries to recall geography facts like “latitude” and “longitude,” and imagines falling right through the Earth to meet people walking with their heads down. As the long fall continues, her thoughts turn to home. She wonders if her family will remember to feed her pet cat, Dinah, and muses over curious, nonsensical questions like whether cats eat bats or bats eat cats.

Feelings during the Fall: Amazingly, Alice feels very little panic or terror during the plunge. Instead, she experiences a calm, childlike sense of wonder and amusement at the strange situation. Because the fall lasts so long, her curiosity gradually gives way to tiredness. She begins dozing off mid-air, dreaming that she is walking with Dinah, until she lands softly with a “thump” upon a pile of dry leaves and sticks, unharmed.

Answer:

In Leo Tolstoy’s short story The Three Questions, a king seeks the answers to three fundamental questions to ensure he never fails in anything he undertakes.

The Three Questions:

1. What is the right time to begin everything?
2. Who are the most necessary people to listen to?
3. What is the most important thing to do?

The Hermit’s Answers (Learned Through Experience):

1. The most important time is NOW. The present is the only time over which we have any control or power to act.
2. The most important person is the ONE YOU ARE WITH. No one knows whether they will ever have dealings with anyone else in the future.
3. The most important thing to do is TO DO GOOD FOR THAT PERSON. For that purpose alone was human life created.

Answer:

In Ted Hughes’ dramatic monologue Hawk Roosting, violence and brutality are not presented as evil or malicious acts, but as the core essence of nature’s raw, unvarnished power. Hughes illustrates these elements through several key structural and thematic techniques.

Lethal Physical Adaptations: The bird’s physical structure is designed solely for predation. Its “hooked head” and “hooked feet” emphasize a body built specifically to seize, tear, and destroy prey. Even in sleep, the hawk practices its violent purpose, rehearsing “perfect kills”.

Shocking Imagery of Decapitation: The hawk describes its lethal actions with shocking, nonchalant imagery. It bluntly states, “My manners are tearing off heads”, redefining “manners” or social etiquette into an act of immediate, brutal decapitation.

A Direct Flight Path of Destruction: The hawk’s attack method is devoid of hesitation or negotiation. It asserts that its flight path goes “straight through the bodies of the living”, reducing living creatures to mere obstacles to be torn apart for its survival.

Amoral Justification (“No Sophistry”): The poem portrays violence beyond human morality. The line “There is no sophistry in my body” underlines that the hawk feels no guilt, regret, or need to rationalize its acts. It inflicts death simply because it holds total authority: “I kill where I please because it is all mine”.

The Monopoly on Death: The hawk views its existence as an executioner’s duty, remarking that its sole function is “the allotment of death”.

Conclusion: Through the hawk’s cold, totalitarian tone, Hughes depicts violence not as a moral crime, but as the supreme, unyielding law of nature where the strong reign without mercy.

Answer:

In William Shakespeare’s Sonnet 73, the speaker reflects on his aging body and impending death using three interconnected metaphors: autumn, twilight, and a glowing fire. Together, these images show a gradual acceleration of time, illustrating his deep awareness of mortality.

Autumn and Mortality (Quatrain 1):
The speaker compares himself to late autumn, a time when “yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang / Upon those boughs which shake against the cold.” The bare branches are described as “bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang,” symbolizing his declining vitality, loss of youth, and fading creative capacity.

Progression of Metaphors (Autumn vs. Twilight vs. Fire): The poem uses a shrinking timescale across the three quatrains to heighten the urgency of aging.

Autumn (Yearly Scale): Represents the broader, seasonal decline of life—slowly transitioning from warmth to barren cold.

Twilight (Daily Scale): Accelerates the passage of time to a single day. The fading sunset in the west is gradually consumed by “black night,” which Shakespeare calls “Death’s second self.”

Dying Fire (Hourly/Momentary Scale): Further narrows the time span to mere moments. The speaker compares himself to glowing embers resting on ashes—the remnants of his youthful passion—which will soon be choked by the very substance that once nourished them.

Conclusion: Through this sequence of shrinking images—from a year (autumn) to a day (twilight) to a matter of moments (glowing ashes)—Shakespeare vividly portrays how life rapidly slips away, urging the listener to love more intensely before everything vanishes.

Answer:

In his poem The Greenhouse Effect, Carl Dennis addresses the severe environmental consequences of global warming and climate change. Rather than using abstract scientific terms, Dennis expresses ecological concerns by presenting a dystopian projection of how human-induced environmental degradation will alter the Earth’s geography, ecosystems, and human civilization.

Disruption of Agricultural Ecosystems: The primary ecological warning is the irreversible shift in global climate zones. Rising temperatures cause the fertile “grain belts” to move away from traditional agricultural regions toward the poles, turning once-fertile Plains States into uncultivable, barren dust bowls.

Extreme Climate Shifts at the Poles: Dennis highlights the alarming melting of polar ice caps and rising temperatures in cold regions. Lands like Greenland and Antarctica lose their icy identity, transforming into warm, arable lands—symbolizing a total disruption of the planet’s ecological equilibrium.

Resource Scarcity and Survival Agriculture: The poem emphasizes the severe shortage of tillable land and food. Nature is so deeply strained that human spaces must adapt strictly for survival: residential lawns are replaced by vegetable patches, decorative trees like elms and oaks are swapped for food-producing nut trees, and suburban areas are turned into farmland.

Human Indifference to Environmental Warnings: Dennis raises an urgent concern regarding society’s complacency. People tend to ignore continuous “Arctic warnings” and scientific cautions, choosing temporary comfort while environmental decay threatens public infrastructure and civilizational collapse.

Conclusion: Carl Dennis presents the greenhouse effect not merely as a weather change, but as an existential threat that destroys ecosystems, forces drastic lifestyle changes, and threatens civilization if environmental warnings remain unheeded.

Answer:

Impact of Social Media on the Youth

In the modern digital era, social media has transformed into an indispensable part of young people’s lives. It acts as a double-edged sword, bringing both remarkable opportunities and significant challenges for the youth.

On the positive side, social media has revolutionized global connectivity and socialization. Young individuals can easily form communities, maintain friendships, and interact across geographical boundaries. Platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and digital forums offer boundless avenues for self-expression and creativity, encouraging teenagers to showcase their talents and explore artistic hobbies. Furthermore, these platforms serve as rich sources of information and education, providing instant access to study materials, current events, and collaborative online learning groups.

Conversely, the dark side of social media presents alarming risks. The relentless influx of notifications frequently triggers digital addiction and severe distraction, pulling students away from their academic duties and outdoor activities. Excessive screen time harms physical and mental health, causing sleep deprivation, eye strain, and anxiety fueled by unrealistic online comparisons.

In conclusion, social media is a powerful tool whose outcome depends on its application. To maximize its educational and creative benefits while safeguarding their health, the youth must practice disciplined digital management and maintain a healthy balance between virtual life and reality.

Answer:

Importance of Vocational Education

Vocational education refers to a specialized form of learning that equips students with practical, job-oriented skills and technical expertise in specific trades, such as carpentry, computer hardware, graphic design, and healthcare support. Unlike traditional academic education—which focuses heavily on theoretical knowledge—vocational training emphasizes hands-on experience and real-world application.

In the current educational system, the importance of vocational learning cannot be overstated. Traditional degrees often struggle to bridge the gap between classroom theory and industry demands, leading to widespread educated unemployment. Vocational courses directly address this issue by aligning their curriculum with industry needs, thereby significantly expanding the scope for employment. Graduates acquire job-ready skills, allowing them to gain immediate employment or even start their own entrepreneurial ventures.

Recognizing its potential to drive economic growth, the government has actively provided strong encouragement for vocational education through major initiatives such as the Skill India Mission and the National Education Policy (NEP). These policies integrate vocational training into school curricula from an early age, breaking the stigma around manual and technical work.

In conclusion, vocational education is essential for building a skilled workforce. By transforming students into self-reliant professionals, it plays a vital role in national development and youth empowerment.

Answer:
Subject: Request to Register New Address and Contact Details

Respected Sir/Madam,

I am writing to formally request an update to my contact information in the official school database. My family has recently relocated, and I would be grateful if you could register our new residential address and primary contact details for all future academic and administrative correspondence.

Updated Information:
New Address: Flat 402, Sunshine Apartments, M.G. Road, Sector 15, New Delhi – 110001
Contact Number: +91 98765 43210
Emergency Contact: +91 91234 56789

Kindly update these records in your system at your earliest convenience to ensure seamless communication. Thank you very much for your prompt time and assistance.

Yours sincerely,
Aarav Sharma
Class XII – A (Roll No. 14)

Answer:
Subject: Invitation as Guest Speaker – Annual Cultural Programme 2026

Respected Ma’am/Sir,

On behalf of the students and faculty of St. Xavier’s School, it is our privilege to invite you as the Distinguished Guest Speaker at our upcoming Annual Cultural Programme.

Our theme this year focuses on youth empowerment and future innovation. Given your remarkable contributions to the field, your insights would immensely inspire our graduating Class 12 students as they prepare for higher education.

Event Details:
Date: September 25, 2026
Time: 10:00 AM – 1:00 PM
Venue: School Main Auditorium

We would be deeply honored by your presence. Kindly confirm your availability by September 10 so we may make the necessary arrangements.

Yours sincerely,
Aarav Sharma
Cultural Student Secretary
St. Xavier’s School

Answer:
Title: Fighting the Rising Air Pollution in Our Neighborhood

Over the past few months, the air quality in our locality has taken an alarming turn for the worse. Morning walks are now marred by a thick blanket of gray smog, and residents frequently complain of throat irritation, severe coughing, and burning eyes.

This rapid decline in air quality is driven by unrestricted construction dust, excessive vehicle emissions during peak traffic hours, and the open burning of garbage in open fields.

We cannot wait for a crisis to act. To protect our community’s health, local authorities must immediately enforce strict dust-control measures and improve waste management. As residents, we can contribute by choosing public transport, planting trees, and reporting illegal burning. Clean air is a necessity—let us act today to breathe easier tomorrow!

Answer:
Title: Breaking Barriers: Women Empowerment in Indian Sports

In recent years, Indian sports have witnessed a historic transformation driven by extraordinary female athletes. From the boxing ring to the cricket pitch, Indian women are dismantling age-old patriarchal stereotypes and proving that athletics is no longer a male-dominated domain.

Trailblazers like Mary Kom, P.V. Sindhu, and Saina Nehwal have not only brought international glory to the nation but have also reshaped public perception. Participation in sports instills essential life skills in young girls—fostering confidence, leadership, physical strength, and financial independence.

Government initiatives like Khelo India further encourage grassroots participation among women. Empowering women through sports goes beyond winning medals; it inspires millions of young girls across India to dream big, assert their rights, and redefine their place in society.