Reading Comprehension Questions and Answers

Answer: C

The Emperor was angry because the tea leaves were not tasty.

The passage says: 'They didn't taste nice at all. The Emperor refused to have them and became angry at the doctor.' The taste caused the anger.

Mud is never mentioned. He did chew the leaves, so 'he couldn't chew them' is wrong, and he did not call them inedible. He disliked the taste.

Answer: D

Both A and B are incorrect.

Statement A says the doctor dropped the tea leaves into the bath water on purpose, but the passage says 'Some of the tea leaves that the doctor was carrying fell into the hot water', which was an accident. Statement B says that the Emperor started feeling sleepy after tasting the tea water, but after the tea he 'stopped feeling sleepy' and was 'fully awake'.

Each of the other options accepts at least one of these false statements.

Answer: C

The doctor gave the Emperor some tea leaves to help him stay awake.

The doctor took 'some dry, dark leaves' from his bag and said 'They are called tea leaves.' The Emperor was tired and sleepy, and the tea made him 'fully awake'.

Neem and giloy leaves are not in the passage. 'Sleepy' is the Emperor's problem and not what the tea was meant to cause, so the last option is the reverse of what happened.

Answer: D

The statement that is not true is 'After drinking it, he started feeling weak and lifeless'.

The passage says that after the tea he stopped feeling sleepy, was fully awake and 'felt youthful and strong again'. So he felt strong, not weak and lifeless.

The other three are true. The servant brought hot water and the Emperor put a few tea leaves in it, he tasted the water, and 'there was a big smile on his face'.

Answer: B

The wings are called sorrowful because the bird is sad as it is caged.

The speaker compares the pretty bird in the gilded cage with a free bird, and says of the caged one 'Your poor bit thing behind its bars is only half alive!' The sorrow belongs to the bird, which is shut in, and the wings that flutter inside the cage show it.

Nothing in the poem says the wings are broken or that the bird is hungry. The statement that a cage-bird cannot sing as the speaker's bird does is a separate point about the lost song, and not the reason for the word 'sorrowful'.

Answer: C

The speaker's bird can do many things because the bird is free.

It is 'free to build and thrive', sings with 'a true wood-note', and can 'wheel and soar with the sunshine on his wings'. Each ability comes from not being in a cage.

The bird is not caged, and 'sorrowful' belongs to the cage-bird. Being talented is not mentioned, and the poem credits freedom for the bird's abilities, not any special talent.

Answer: B

The caged bird is a crippled thing because it is not free to fly and soar.

The poem says 'a bird in a cage is a crippled thing', after speaking of the free bird that can 'wheel and soar'. The cage takes away flight, and that loss is the crippling.

The poem does not say a leg is broken. 'Poor' in the poem means pitiable, not lacking money, and 'wild' describes the speaker's free bird.

Answer: C

The device is a transferred epithet.

'Sorrowful' describes a feeling, and a wing cannot feel sorrow. The adjective is moved from the bird, which is sad, to its wings, which are the part that shows it. Moving an adjective from the person or creature it really describes to a nearby noun is a transferred epithet.

A metaphor would call the wings something else, and a simile would use 'like' or 'as'. Personification gives a human trait to a non-living thing, but the wings belong to a living bird, so the sorrow only moves from the bird to its wings.

Answer: D

The theme is that birds living in the open enjoy their lives.

The poem sets the free bird, which sings and soars, against the caged one, which is 'only half alive'. It argues that freedom is what lets a creature live fully and sing.

The caged bird's life is shown as poor, not fruitful, so the first option reverses the poem. The poem never says birds should be kept in cages, and it does not talk about food.

Answer: B

'But my bird sings!' denotes that my bird is free.

The line closes the poem, where the speaker contrasts the cage-bird, a 'crippled thing', with a bird that is free to soar. Its singing is the proof of that freedom, and the speaker offers it as the answer to the cage.

'Sweetly' is a quality of the song and is not what the line stresses. Nothing says the bird ever lost or regained its voice, and the third option applies to the cage-bird, not the speaker's bird.