THE MOON
Percy Bysshe Shelley
1. ‘’Like a dying lady lean and pale,
Who totters forth wrapped in a gauzy veil’’
---- Explain ‘lean and pale’, ‘gauzy veil’.
Ans: Here the poet refers to the whitish colour of the moon. It is as if the lady has been suffering long from a serious illness. This has made her look lean and pale.
The expression ‘gauzy veil’ means a piece of transparent cloth used to hide a woman’s face or protect it from the sun, dust etc.
2. What is meant by different birth? 3Marks
Ans: Different birth means different origin. The poet wants to mean that the moon belongs to the solar system which is ruled over by the sun. But the stars have a different origin.
3. ‘’Among the stars that have a different birth’’--- Explain the line. / Explain the scientific truth of this line. 5Marks
Ans: The moon belongs to the solar system which is ruled over by one star--the sun. In fact, the stars are all separate suns. According to Shelley, each of these suns has its own family of planets and satellites. So, the source of the stars and the moon are not the same.
4. ‘’And ever changing, like a joyless eye.’’---Explain the idea in the quoted line.
Ans: By ‘ever-changing’, Shelley, the poet of the poem ‘’The Moon’’, wants to mean that the moon constantly changes its shape and position from the new moon to the full moon. These shapes are compared to the sad eyes of a person. So the moon looks pale and dejected.
5. ‘’Art thou pale for weariness—?’’ --- Explain the cause of the moon’s ‘weariness’.
Ans: The moon is pale. It has lost its brightness. So P.B. Shelley imagines that the moon is pale because, it is weary of climbing to the sky and gazing on the earth. It is also tired of wandering alone in the sky in search of a worthy lover.
6. How is the moon is compared to a dying lady in the first stanza of Shelley’s poem ‘’The Moon’’?
Ans: In the first stanza of Shelley’s poem ‘’The Moon’’, the moon is compared with a dying lady. She is lean and pale. She comes out of her chamber unsteadily. Her face is covered with gauzy veil. Similarly the moon rises slowly in the dark eastern sky. It is also partially covered with a thin layer of clouds.
7. How does the poet describe the rising of the moon in the east?
Ans: At dusk the moon slowly rises in the east. Then the eastern sky is partially covered with a thin layer of the cloud that makes the moon look like a shapeless mass. The rising moon looks pale and lean. It has been compared to a dying lady coming out unsteadily of her chamber, covered with veil.
8. Show how Shelley has created myth out of a natural phenomenon in the poem ‘’The Moon’’.
Ans: Myth is an imaginative piece of work where natural phenomenon is presented as a living being. Shelley, in his poem ‘The Moon’ has presented the moon through different myths. In the first section he presents the pale moon as a dying lady wrapped in a transparent veil. The second section depicts her as a maiden wandering alone in search of a worthy lover.
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