Crack IBPS PO :English Comprehension – Day 1

D.1 – 10 ): Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it.

It’s a chronicle of a time so eerily foretold that it’s impossible to read Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and not be shaken with what is happening in the U.S.—or world—right now. In Atwood’s famous dystopian novel, which has never been out of print since it was first published in 1985—gaining even more popularity after Donald Trump came to power and a new adaptation on television—the liberal democracy of America is replaced by a theocratic dictatorship.

The Republic of Gilead has instead puritanical 17th century roots with a Secret Service that watches over the people, a ‘Red Center’ which is a confessional. The majority religion is snuffing out the minority religions. Power is in the hands of a few and society has to live by what they dictate. The population is at risk of perishing, because there is a sharp decline in fertility, and the powerful have “handmaids” assigned to them to bear children. The historical precedent can be traced right back to the Bible, to Jacob and his two wives, Rachel and Leah, and their handmaids, who are mothers with no rights.

The handmaids in Atwood’s tale set in Cambridge, Massachusetts (with a history of burning witches) too have no rights and, in parallels with present-day realities in some parts of the world, they are forced to wear “long and concealing” clothes, “to keep us from seeing, but also from being seen”. The controlling Aunts wield unbelievable power over the girls and their minds. As Aunt Lydia says: “There is more than one kind of freedom. Freedom to and freedom from. In the days of anarchy, it was freedom to. Now you are being given freedom from. Don’t underrate it….. We were a society dying of too much choice.”

Even songs with the word ‘free’ are not sung in public ever. It’s a man’s world where women have no control over their lives—they are divided into classes, each assigned a different colour according to the work they do. So it’s green for Marthas or houseworkers, blue for wives, red for handmaids, brown for Aunts. The story is told through Offred, not her real name, a handmaid in the household of Fred, a Commander. Her claustrophobic, bleak life is offset by her memories of another life, when she had a husband and daughter. And yet that was a time she lived with her family “by ignoring. Ignoring isn’t the same as ignorance, you have to work at it… There were stories in the newspapers, of course, corpses in ditches or the woods… the newspaper stories were like dreams to us, bad dreams… We lived in the gaps between the stories.”

The Handmaid’s Tale won the first Arthur C. Clark Prize for science fiction in 1987, but Atwood has often said that it doesn’t really fit that genre. But then does a label matter when a book still touches readers, three decades after it was published?

1. Which of the following is true regarding the given passage ?

(a) The Utopian novel gained more popularity.

(b) The book won the first Arthur C.Clark Prize for science fiction.

(c) Every song with the word “free” are allowed to be sung.

(d) The authoritative example can be track precedented back to the bible.

(e) The aunts have supreme power over the girls in the story.

(a) All (B) , (C) & (D)

(b) All (B) , (D) & (E)

(c) Only (c)

(d) Both (A) & (c)

(e) All of the given options

2. Choose a word which is SIMILAR in meaning to the word PURITANICAL

(a) Perverted

(b) Degraded

(c) Prudish

(d) Permissive

(e) None of the given options

3. Choose a word which is OPPOSITE in meaning to the word SNUFFING

(a) Assassinate

(b) Liquidate

(c) Resuscitate

(d) Extinguish

(e) None of the given options

4. Who is the protagonist of the story according to the author / as well as the book ?

(a) Aunt Lydia

(b) Rachel

(c) Offrd

(d) Fred

(e) Margret Atwood

5. According to the author “Why is the novel gaining more popularity in the recent times?”

(a) After the power transfered from Obama to Donald trump

(b) After the election of the French President

(c) New adaption on Television

(d) Since the Formed government resemble a Utopian government

(e) Both (A) & (C)

6. What does the author tries to convey to the readers with the word ” Claustrophobic” in the given passage ?

(a) Fear of being in a religious place

(b) Fear of being in Open places

(c) A type of phobia which relates to precaution

(d) Dread of being in closed or narrow spaces

(e) Fear of Descent

7. The story actually takes place in which country ?

(a) Canada

(b) Republic of Gilead

(c) Cambridge , Massachusetts

(d) Democracy of America

(e) None of these

8. What do you infer from “each assigned a different colour according to the work they do”

(a) The women are allowed to wear only the predefined colour dress

(b) The male chauvinistic society imposed white colour to all women

(c) The Red centre didn’t monitor the women

(d) Both (A) & (C)

(e) Only (A)

9. What is so special about the Handmaid’s Tale ?

(A) It has never been out of print after it has been published.

(B) The Utopian novel is easy to read.

(C) Gaining more popularity after Trump’s election.

(D) It’s a chronicle of time.

(E) The story is based on the 17th century happenings.

(a) All of the given options

(b) Only (A) and (E)

(c) Only (A) , (E) and (B)

(d) Both (D) and (E)

(e) Only (A) , (C) and (E)

10. What are the handmaids assigned to do ?

(a) To bear the children

(b) To oversee the Republic of Gidlean

(c) Minister the overall functions

(d) Snuffing out minority religions

(e) None of the given options