Read the following lines from Sukumar Ray's poem, 'The Power of Music' and answer the questions that follow: When summer comes, we hear the hums Bhisma Lochan Sharma. You catch his strain on hill and plain from Delhi down to Burma.
How can we tell that his singing was not appreciated by the people who heard him?
Topic: The listeners’ reaction
Answer
Every reaction in the poem is one of suffering, not pleasure. The listeners groan and weep; the people beg and plead with him to stop. Buffaloes, cows and bullocks collapse and die, birds fall out of the sky, and the trees themselves are affected. Nobody praises him, nobody asks for more, and when the billy goat finally butts him into silence, everyone is relieved and grateful. The response is universal distress, which is the surest sign that his singing was detested.
Gather the evidence rather than asserting the conclusion: the weeping people, the dying animals, the pleading, and above all the relief at the end. Note that Ray never says outright that the singing is bad — he proves it entirely through its effects, which is the joke of the poem and worth saying in your answer.