NCERT Solutions for Class 12 English (Kaleidoscope Non-Fiction) Chapter 2 The Mark on the Wall

Ans : Reality is often a dry and monotonous explanation of things. It lacks the luster of emotions and a description of reality often fails to evoke the feelings that the author wants to convey through his or her work. Reflections, on the other hand, helps people to introspect. By composing characters who can reflect upon the deep hidden truths of life, the true meaning of the work can be conveyed. Woolf believes that true reflections are required to make the character a round character and the depths of that character can be explored through such reflections. While reality can inspire the author, however, only portraying the character’s realist side tends to make it flat and dry devoid of any underlying emotions. Hence, according to the author an account of reflections is more important than a description of reality. 

Ans : The author gives the example of William Shakespeare, one of the most popular Elizabethan dramatists, who perfectly depicts the phantom-like unreality of a bygone era. The image of Shakespeare sitting by the fireside with his hands in his head in quiet solitude while the heavens showered him with ideas and inspirations, seemed extremely unreal and improbable. She does not believe that any such phenomena can take place to provide inspiration. Inspirations come naturally to a person through his/her surroundings. For her, the concepts of Hell and Heaven or Good and Evil or Devil and God, all seem too unreal to exist. 

Ans : Woolf contemplates the life a tree and a fish to depict the idea of the ‘stillness of living, breathing thought’. She says “Wood is a pleasant thing to think about it. It comes from a tree, and trees grow, and we don’t know how they grow”. The phenomena of a tree quietly growing without any external interference describes how nature works in solitude in its own way. She further explains it using the imagery of a fish saying, “I like to think of the fish balanced against the stream like flags blown out” to describe the still nature around us which is often left unseen. 

Ans : The method of narration portrayed in this chapter is the technique of “Stream of consciousness”. The author jumps between narrowly related thoughts in order to solve the mystery behind the mark on the wall. This portrays the workings of the complex human mind and the mental processes. For solving the mere issue of the mark on the wall, she goes into unimaginable depths. The mark on the wall makes her dig into history as far as Shakespeare and consequently provokes her mental process- es to look into the future. Thus, the vast scope of the human mind is portrayed through this story and it uses the technique of ‘stream of consciousness’ to depict the complex workings of the human mind. 

Ans : The story ‘The Mark on the Wall’ decidedly revolves around the mark present on the wall from across the author. Instead of going for the obvious action of getting up from her chair and inspecting the mark, she decidedly delves into several mental processes in order to solve the mystery behind it. Through this process, she reflects upon more philosophical issues. She travels to the past and the future fleeting between thoughts, reflecting upon philosophies and at the same time trying to solve the mystery behind the mark. It is revealed at the end that the mark was made by something as simple as a snail. However, she fails to see the obvious and having a perspective mind, reflected upon a lot of philosophical issues through the entire process.