1

English Society

Robert Lee Frost was a highly regarded American poet. He was well-known for

depicting the rural life in New England during the twentieth century and his

command of American colloquial speech to decipher social phenomena and

philosophy in life. His works were, and still are, greatly praised.

Robert Frost was born in San Francisco, California on 26th

March, 1874. His

mother was Isabelle Moodie, while his father was William Prescott Frost, Jr.

Frost’s family moved to Lawrence, Massachusetts upon his father’s death. Frost

graduated from the Lawrence High school, where he published his first poem in his

high school’s magazine, in 1892. Later, he attended Dartmouth College for a short

period of time and was accepted into the Theta Delta Chi Fraternity.

After that, He returned home to work: helping his mother to teach, delivering newspapers and

changing arclight carbon filament. However, he did not enjoy any of these jobs.

At the age of twenty, Frost sold his first poem, “My butterfly. An elegy” to the New York

Independent. Proud of his own achievement, Frost proposed to Elinor Miriam White, but was rejected as

she wanted to finish school first. After her graduation, on 19th

October, 1985, they married in Lawrence,

Massachusetts.

Frost attended Harvard University during 1897-1899 but he dropped off due to illness. Later, he went

to a farm in Derry Hampshire, bought by his grandfather before his death for Frost and his wife. His

farming was unsuccessful and he rejoined the field of education.

In 1912, Frost and his family sailed to Great Britain and settled in a small town near London named

Beaconsfield. In the following two years, Frost published his first two poetry volumes, A Boy’s Will and

North of Boston.

When World War I broke out, Frost returned to the US and bought a farm in Franconia, New

Hampshire. During the years, Frost had won three Pulitzer Prizes for the book New Hampshire: A Poem

with Notes and Grace Notes in 1924, Collected Poems in 1931, A Further Range in 1937 and A Witness

Tree in 1943.

Although Frost had never graduated from college, he received more than forty honorary degrees

from various universities, including Harvard, Princeton, Cambridge and Oxford. He was also the only

person who received two honorary degrees from Dartmouth College.

In 1960, he received the United States Congressional Gold Medal. Two years later, on 29th

January,

1963, he died in Boston.

Reference: http://www.poemhunter.com/robert-frost/biography/

Writer of the Month Robert Lee Frost

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Selected Poem 5F Hampton Tao

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.

His house is in the village, though;

He gives his harness bells a shake 10

To ask if there is some mistake.

He will not see me stopping here The only other sound’s the sweep

To watch his woods fill up with snow. Of easy wind and downy flake.

My little horse must think it queer 5 The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,

To stop without a farmhouse near But I have promises to keep,

Between the woods and frozen lake And miles to go before I sleep, 15

The darkest evening of the year. And miles to go before I sleep.

Robert Frost

‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’ is one of Robert Frost’s more famous poems. This simple

yet lyrical account of a man stopping by woods on a snowy evening is an deceptively difficult balancing

act: the synthesis of strict rhyme and rhythm, poignant symbols and an oft-celebrated example of

repetition produces a trove of thematic opposites, perhaps the most significant of all the conflict between

the cultured world of social obligations and ‘promises’, and the natural, wild world of the woods that

threatens to culminate in death.

The poem consists of four stanzas which are nearly identical in terms of rhythm and rhyme. Each

line is an iambic tetrameter, with four stressed syllables. Within each stanza, the first, second, and fourth

lines rhyme. The third line does not, but it sets up the rhymes for the next stanza. For example, in the third

stanza, ‘queer’, ‘near’, and ‘year’ all rhyme, while ‘lake’ rhymes with ‘shake’, ‘mistake’, and ‘flake’ in

the following stanza. The only exception is the final stanza, where the sentence ‘Miles to go before I

sleep’ is repeated twice. Such repetition, coupled with the phrase ‘dark and deep’ two lines before that is

read with drawn-out vowels, has a somnolent effect upon the reader. The word ‘sleep’ each time takes on

a different meaning: the first one seems to be a sigh of resignation, while the second ominously hints at

death.

The woods, one of Frost’s preferred images, is not only mysterious in nature, but also stands in stark

contrast with civilisation. Although the last two verses emphasise the speaker's commitment to his

responsibilities, the veiled allure of the woods, coming between the promises the speaker has to keep, is a

temptation of death. The imagery of woods filling with snow in the fourth line is dangerously seductive to

the speaker’s eyes, inviting him to join a winter sleep in an eternal slumber.

Reference: http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/a_f/frost/woods.htm

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Quote Sharing 5E Abeeto Ip

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

And be one traveler, long I stood Oh, I marked the first for another day!

And looked down one as far as I could Yet knowing how way leads on to way

To where it bent in the undergrowth; 5 I doubted if I should ever come back. 15

Then took the other, as just as fair, I shall be telling this with a sigh

And having perhaps the better claim Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Because it was grassy and wanted wear, Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,

Though as for that the passing there I took the one less travelled by,

Had worn them really about the same, 10 And that has made all the difference. 20

Robert Frost

I took the one less travelled by,

And that has made all the difference.

Life is always full of dilemmas and decisions. Have you ever regretted your own decisions then? Read

through one of the most famous poems by Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken, and you may be able to get

some insights.

The quotation shown above is actually the last two lines of the poem and it draws the poem to a very

philosophical end. I find these two lines very meaningful as Frost encourages us to take roads which are not

ordinary or normally chosen, yet no one knows which is the better path. As seen from the quote, neither

does Frost advise nor moralise about choices, yet I believe he is trying to encourage us to try out new things

and to explore different options.

Choices are inevitable in our lives, as no one describes life as a straight road. There is always a chance

that we may come to an intersection, where we have to make a turn. Yet, we can only take “one” road just

as Frost suggests. The quotation also conveys a message that we should think carefully when making

decisions, and even one decision makes all the difference afterwards.

Actually, it is always up to us to make a better choice. Some of these decisions may seem trivial but

these small decisions may make a huge difference. Therefore, it is crucial for us to follow our own hearts

when making each decision, while not being manipulated to take an option. We should all honour our own

decisions made as this is our own choice “that has made all the difference”, rather than mourning or even

yearning for the road not taken.

From now on, do make every one of your own choices count!

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Poetry Appreciation 4F Derrick Ng

Passed On

Before, this box contained my mother.

For months she’d sent me out for index cards,

scribbled with a squirrel concentration

while I’d nag at her, seeing strength

drain, ink-blue, from her finger-ends5

providing for a string of hard winters

I was trying not to understand.

Only after, opening it, I saw

how she’d rendered herself down from flesh

to paper, alphabetical; 10

there for me

in every way she could anticipate

-Acupuncture: conditions suited to

-Books to read by age twenty-one

-Choux pastry: how to make, when to use. 15

The cards looked after me. I’d shuffle them to almost

hear her speak. Then, the world

was box-shaped (or was I playing safe?)

for every doubt or choice, a card that fitted

-Exams: the best revision strategy 20

-Flowers: cut, how to make them last

-Greece: the men, what you need to know.

But then they seemed to shrink. I’d turn them over,

find them blank, the edges furred, mute, 25

whole areas wrong, or missing. Had she known?

The language pointed to what wasn’t said.

I’d add notes of my own, strange beside

her urgent dogmatism, loosening grip

-infinitives never telling love 30

lust single issue politics when

don’t hopeless careful trust.

On the beach I built a hollow cairn,

tipped in the cards. Then I let her go.

The smoke rose thin and clear, slowly blurred. 35

I’ve kept the box for diaries, like this.

Carole Satyamurti

Carole Satyamurti

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Poetry Appreciation 4F Derrick Ng

“Passed On” by Carole Satymurti is a poem about the loss of the speaker’s mother and the process by

which she overcomes her bereavement and learns to stand on her own two feet. Having realised that her mother

wouldn’t be there for her all the time, she had but to accept the harsh reality of her mother’s death. Her internal

strife has eventually brought about her maturity and independence, which can be seen at the end of the poem.

The title of the poem – “Passed On” can be thought of as the death of the speaker’s mother, which is palpable in

the poem, the passing on of her mother’s wisdom to her in the form of cards, and in a deeper sense of meaning,

her moving on with life in the face of hardships. With shifting emotions throughout the poem and a clever use of

symbolism, the poet brings out a touching story of one’s rite of passage and the gradual process of how the one

pulls through, achieving psychological maturity in the long run.

This poem is rather complex in terms of the overall tone, as it follows the speaker’s shifting emotions in

times of her mother’s death, from her unwillingness to face the truth to the emancipation of her soul from grief.

In the first stanza, the speaker is reluctant in accepting her mother’s dying state, which corresponds to the phrase

‘I was trying not to understand’ (line 7). She chooses to run away from reality, as she finds it impossible to

believe that her mother is going to leave her alone in this world. She feels lost, not knowing what to do in this

sea of uncertainties. Later on in the next stanza, when she reads her mother’s cards for her written before death,

she is touched and impressed with her mother’s wisdom and understanding, as if she ‘rendered herself down

from flesh to paper’ (line 9). She finds that her mother is still there for her, the cards having replaced her usual

presence, and they, just like her mother, can guide her through life – ‘there for me, in every way she could

anticipate’ (line 10,11). The cards, therefore, have become her mother’s substitute. Gradually, she has developed

overdependence on the cards, as though they were her only lifeline – ‘the world was box shaped’ (line 17). She

becomes too reliant on the box of cards to the point that the box has become her constraint, ironically,

withholding all her courage to venture out and live by herself. Then all of a sudden realisation dawns upon her.

She knows she can’t just keep carry on living with the cards. She burns away all her mother’s cards, but keeps

the box, thereby creating her own identity, an independent individual who no longer needs to cling to her

mother. This poem is suffused with passion, with the speaker’s whole gamut of feelings –her emotional

development—being portrayed in a successive order. From this painful experience she has outgrown her

pampered, fragile self.

The poem wouldn’t have attained its beauty hadn’t there been the poet’s masterly use of imagery,

symbolism in particular, which plays such an important role in depicting the speaker’s inner feelings throughout

the story. In the first stanza, the phrase ‘index cards scribbled with a squirrel concentration’ can be seen as a

metaphor representing her mother’s attempt, compelled by love, to prepare the index cards, the spiritual

nourishment which she wants to pass on to her daughter, just as a squirrel collecting acorns as food source in

preparation for a long winter hibernation. The use of alliteration also adds to the spoken form of the poem,

giving emphasis and directing the reader’s attention. The lines ‘seeing strength drain, ink-blue, from her

finger-ends’ not only mean that the speaker’s mother is writing on the cards, but the ‘ink-blue’ can be thought of

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her lifeblood as well, slowly draining away, which gives us a picture of her deteriorating health. ‘A string of

winters’ (line 6) also symbolises all the years that the speaker would spend without her beloved mother, as we

know that the mother is already about to die. In hindsight, the ‘box’ which ‘contained my mother’ is in fact not a

coffin, but a symbol of the box which contained the cards – her mother’s substitute. The use of personification in

‘the cards looked after me’ (line 15) also gives us a psychological insight of how she is feeling at the moment –

she yearns for her mother and needs her to guide her in life. The next line – ‘I’d shuffle them to almost hear her

speak’ adds to the fact that she is being nostalgic, sentimentally reminiscing about the times when her mother

was still standing by her. The many representations of the cards as her mother illustrate the speaker’s headstrong

denial of her mother’s death, as truth came very hard for her. In consequence, wanting to get away from reality,

she becomes too dependent on the cards till ‘the world was box-shaped’ (line 16). The box symbolises her

comfort zone, where she has the cards to guide her through ‘for every doubt or choice’ (line 18). Apart from

being her comfort zone, the box has become her constraint in life too, as she is confined to the ‘box’ merely

‘playing safe’.

By contrast, in stanza 3, the cards seem to ‘shrink’ in importance, metaphorically, because of her realisation

that she can no longer carry on in this state any more. The sound imagery – the conflict between speech “hear

her speak” and silence “edges furred, mute” all gives us hints, though implicitly, about her recognition that her

mother is not the cards, but a dead loved one. This epiphany marks the transition point. In the last stanza, she

builds a hollow cairn and burns away her mother’s cards, letting go of the grief as well as her reliance on the

cards. ‘The smoke rose thin and clear, slowly blurred’ (line 33) gives a mental image of how all the pain and

confusion evaporate into thin air, the cremation of the cards a symbolic meaning of the victory of her

independence. The hollow cairn she built also shows that she has overcome her grief and has grown into a tough

individual, like a stack of stones. She keeps the box for her diaries, just for occasions like this, the box

symbolising the love, protection and support from her family members, and also the wisdom and life experience

one has accumulated over one’s entire life.

From another point of view, the structure of the poem actually mirrors the story itself. By and large, the

poem has a free verse form, in light of the irregular pattern of the poem as a whole. The first three stanzas, each

having the same number of lines, reflect the regular, meaningful life the speaker has in the days when she has all

the support from her mother or her substitute. Then the pattern breaks –the fourth stanza has nine lines, marking

the transition point and the slowing down of time, with all the perplexity and distress she faces it must be a hard

time for her. The words in the cards, too, become increasingly nonsensical, which illustrate the deterioration of

her mother’s health and her inevitable death. The missing letter ‘D’ among all the index cards also suggests that

the speaker was denying her mother’s death earlier on, as ‘D’ stands for the inauspicious word ‘death’. Last but

not least, the last stanza has only four lines, which reflects the decisiveness in her actions of putting all bitter

chaos to an end, giving a sense of emotional closure to the poem.

Ultimately, the poem is about the loss and process of finding one’s identity, from the crumpling of the

speaker’s life when her mother dies to her discovery of her own, new identity – a person who came out seasoned

by the vicissitudes of life. We can see that the she, feeble in spirit at first, has matured throughout this rite of

passage experience. This moving poem imbues us with the passion of life, tells us not to be daunted easily by

obstacles. Satymurti’s mastery of the elements of diction, tone, symbolism and structure combine to make

“Passed On” a poignant literary work with great emotional depth and resonance.

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Short Story In the Wink of an Eye By Mark J. Howard

Chapter 1

It hadn’t worked. Tens of thousands of man hours, billions of dollars and trillions of computations

all culminating in a big, fat nothing. Professor Palmer’s senses returned to her slowly, almost

reluctantly. For what felt like a long time her entire awareness had been filled with blackness and one

overriding thought – the project was over.

She was uncomfortable, lying amongst broken glass and twisted debris, and as this discomfort

began to register she tried to rouse herself. A klaxon was howling and she grimaced at its closeness as

she struggled into a sitting position, causing a small avalanche of debris and shards of glass to cascade

off her tattered lab coat. The lights were out and the lab, or what was left of it, shimmered behind a

thick veil of acrid, grey smoke. Coughing and gasping for breath, Palmer reached out for a shattered

computer housing and used it to pull herself to her feet. There was a deep gash on her forehead and

something sharp was embedded in her left shoulder, but apart from that and the headache she was fine.

An involuntary laugh sprang to her throat, where it caught and mutated into a racking cough.

“Hans!” she called out, as soon as she was able. “Hans! Are you there?”

There was no answer from the wreckage, but the klaxon was too loud to hear anything else and the

smoke and darkness made it impossible to see anything but the broadest details. As she called her

colleague’s name out again, she caught sight of the looming bulk of the transmitter in the centre of the

devastation. Half of its outer plating had been blasted away and it seemed like the core had shattered.

She cursed. Radiation. End of story.

Reference: http://youwriteon.com/books/samplechapters.aspx?bookguid=decd1e6c-cbc2-4044-b5b9-209e9f07ab72

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What book are you reading?

1. Mr. Oliver, Lee Richard:

Sweet Tooth – Ian MacEwan

Slow Man – J. M. Coetzee

The Joy Luck Club – Amy Tan

2. Mr. Richard Gerrish

A Dance with Dragons – George R. R. Martin

South! - Sir Ernest Shackleton

3. Mr. Christopher Koay

Fair Stood the Wind for France – H. E. Bates

4. Ms. Jennifer Lo

The Secret Scripture On Canaan’s Side

– Sebastian Barry

The Thirteenth Tale – Diane Setterfield

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Book Review 4F Faith Yeung

The Book Thief

By Mark Zusak

The story of the book thief happened 72 years ago, it all started with a

nine-year-old girl called Liesel. She was torn away from her Mother and planted

into a German family during the war. Although there were bombs, a world war

and poverty around her, she still had her share of love and protection from her

foster parents. It was a calamitous year for Liesel, yet the friendship she made

with the ambitious Germanic boy Rudy, and the bashful Jewish fist fighter Max,

will surely make it the most unforgettable one too.

What do you usually find in a book? A good story and some exceptional characters, I hope. However,

I found a lot more than that in The Book Thief, I discovered that we should show respect for people,

regardless of their skin colour and religion. Most importantly, I learned how to cope in a war that seems to

be destroying everything – hold tight to the ones you love and cherish every single day you get to spend

with them. Then there you have it, no regrets.

In the book, the author gives his own definitions of special phrases; I think that one definition has left

an especially deep impression on my mind: “Not-leaving – an act of trust and love, often deciphered by

children.” The kind of yearning described in this book does not solely apply to children; I believe even

adults show signs of weakness when their senile parents seem to be slowly growing older and start to drift

away from them. However, I admire the father of Liesel the most, because he tries his best to understand

and comfort Liesel, when she suffers from nightmares of the dreadful war. Although many Germans felt

horrified even at the idea of helping a Jew, he risked his life by letting his Jewish friend stay in his house

and shared the scanty provisions his family had with him.

In conclusion, I think we should all remember the fact that knowledge is the best wealth anyone can

have. It was this search that motivated Liesel to take up the title of the book thief, and it was this, that made

Liesel share such a remarkable relationship with her father. Moreover, death is not something we should be

apprehensive about, since it is both the end and the beginning of something. And as it turns out, Death’s

quirky and humorous manner makes it a striking storyteller.

10

Games Corner

Happy Halloween!

1 2

3 4

5 6 7

8 9

10 11

12

Crossword 1

Across

3. A funny costume.

5. What do you wear on your face?

6. _____-or-treat!

8. Scary thing that says boo.

10. Roasted pumpkin _____.

11. Small black animal that can fly.

12. Kids get lots of this.

Down

1. A monster with many bandages.

2. ____-o'-lantern

3. What do you wear on Halloween?

4. A woman with a pointy black hat.

7. A witch's pet.

9. spooky

Name that monster:

A __________ is a monster that

changes shape during the full moon.

A __________ is a monster that is made

from bones.

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Monthly Phrases

Portmanteau ("port-man-TOE")

A word formed by merging the sounds and

meanings of two or more other words.

▪ smog (smoke + fog)

▪ splatter (splash + spatter)

▪ workaholic (work + alcoholic) [slang]

Meiosis ("my-OH-sis")

The official term for understatement, or the opposite of

hyperbole. Examples are:

Use of the word "interesting" when they mean

something much worse

"You know, Einstein was not a bad physicist."

"The pond" as a name for the Atlantic Ocean

Pathetic Fallacy

A type of personification where the viewer projects his/her emotions

onto an object or the environment.

▪ The windy and stormy night when Mr. Earnshaw dies and

when Heathcliff leaves Wuthering Heights after Catherine’s

rejection is in a stormy weather. These significant events

show the readers that the story itself is quite violent and

surrounded by a gloomy atmosphere. (Wuthering Heights)

Anaphora ("uh-NAH-for-uh")

A rhetorical term for the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of

successive clauses.By building toward a climax, anaphora can create a strong

emotional effect.

"I needed a drink, I needed a lot of life insurance, I needed a vacation,

I needed a home in the country. What I had was a coat, a hat and a

gun."(Raymond Chandler, Farewell, My Lovely, 1940)

"It rained on his lousy tombstone, and it rained on the grass on his

stomach. It rained all over the place."(Holden Caulfield in J.D.

Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, 1951)

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Students’ Works Winning Entries of Halloween Creative Writing Competition

Junior Section – 1A Lo Tsing Sum

Have a Nonsensibly Delightful Halloween

A scream rings out.

What’s that about?

A ghost fastens its mouth into a permanent pout.

The clock goes “ting”.

The phone won’t ring.

It’s twelve o’clock at midnight and you can’t see a thing.

It’s Halloween!

The day you’ll be

The scariest thing you’ve ever seen.

A ghostly blob,

a mutated flop,

something horrendous that makes you want to hop;

A jellied eel,

a mummy’s peel,

a big mean cross-eyed angry seal;

A yellow bear,

the devil’s bane,

or just old everyday Plain-Jane.

So what do you think

You want to be?

A lion, a tiger, or a bumblebee?

There are creepier choices yet.

Things that will seriously make you fret.

A tortured host,

a runny nose,

a medicine dose that’s at its most;

A witch’s heel,

that’s full of zeal,

that will make you cry and kneel;

A monkey’s brain’,

a rusty drain,

a teacher’s student-hitting cane.

Would you like

To hear some more

Of the terrible grisly things mentioned before?

What’s that I hear?

A “No, oh dear!”?

Do these strange things fill you with fear?

Well, since you asked

I’ll skip and pass

The last, most terrible, grisly part.

So…

Why don’t we go on to the gay

And happy things I wish to say?

For example-

CANDY!

The wonderful, lovely treats

That fill you up with rhythmic beats!

SWEETS!

The brightly coloured, blissful things,

filled to the brim with sugary ink!

What else?

Bazookas? Noisy tots?

Some kindly deeds, a tender thought?

…

For all these things

Regardless of knots

Or teeming bones and endless dots

In the end

Belong to the day

Of Halloween

In the month of October… or in the month of May?

Senior Section – 5E Michelle Chan

There was once a vampire called Armide

Who worked as a museum tour guide

When she saw a mummy

She said he was yummy

But he said "I have no blood inside!"