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NCERT Solutions Poorvi Chapter 2 A Funny Man — Let us discuss

Book page 61 & 62 Updated on2026-09-05

Q1.
Work in pairs. Identify the true statements. Check your answers with the teacher. 1. The poet says that she had never heard such an amusing song. 2. The funny man was quite ill-mannered. 3. The funny man wore two hats on his feet. 4. The funny man hopped on his head to reach home. 5. The funny man gave a rose to the poet. 6. The funny man smiled at the poet.
Answer

The true statements are 1, 3, 4 and 6.

No.StatementTrue / FalseLine from the poem
1She had never heard such an amusing songTrue“He then began to sing a song… You never heard in all your life / Such a funny feeling sound.”
2The funny man was quite ill-manneredFalse“He raised the shoe and smiled at me, / His manners were polite.” He was odd, but courteous.
3He wore two hats on his feetTrue“He wore a shoe upon his head / And hats upon his feet.”
4He hopped on his head to reach homeTrue“He turned the other way about, / And hopped home on his head.”
5He gave a rose to the poetFalseHe offered what he called a rose, but “taking out a currant bun / He held it to my nose.”
6He smiled at the poetTrue“He raised the shoe and smiled at me.”
Tip: Statement 5 is the trap. The poem shows a man announcing a rose and producing a bun — the gap between the two is the joke.
Q2.
Identify the words from the poem based on the meanings given. Share your answers with your classmates and the teacher. 1. a small seedless raisin – C __ R __ __ __ T 2. moved unsteadily – S __ __ G G __ __ __ D
Answer
No.MeaningPatternWord
1a small seedless raisinC _ R _ _ _ TCURRANT
2moved unsteadilyS _ _ G G _ _ _ DSTAGGERED

Both come straight from the poem: “taking out a currant bun” and “I staggered back against the wall.”

Word note: Do not confuse currant (a small dried grape used in cakes and buns) with current (a flow of water, air or electricity). They sound alike but are spelt differently and mean quite different things.
Q3.
Complete the following sentence with a reason. The tone of the poem is ______ because ______.
Answer
The tone of the poem is light-hearted, humorous and playful because the poet describes completely absurd behaviour — a shoe on the head, hats on the feet, a bun offered as a rose — in a calm, polite, matter-of-fact voice, and never once scolds or corrects the funny man.

The clash between the ordinary voice and the extraordinary events is what creates the comic tone. The poet even answers him politely: “I never saw a rose with such / A funny looking smell.”

Other acceptable words for the tone: amusing, comic, whimsical, nonsensical, cheerful. Avoid ‘serious', ‘sad' or ‘angry' — nothing in the poem supports them.
Q4.
Complete the following sentence with a reason. The rhyme scheme of the poem is ______; and it gives a ______ quality to the poem.
Answer
The rhyme scheme of the poem is ABCB; and it gives a musical, song-like (lilting) quality to the poem.

In every stanza only the second and fourth lines rhyme:

StanzaLine endingsScheme
1man / street / head / feetA B C B
2me / polite / before / sightA B C B
3present / rose / bun / noseA B C B
4wall / “Well!” / such / smellA B C B
5song / ground / life / soundA B C B
6hats / said / about / headA B C B
Why it matters: ABCB is the scheme of nursery rhymes and ballads. It makes the poem sound like something chanted or sung, which suits a nonsense poem perfectly — you enjoy the sound and stop demanding sense.
Q5.
Complete the following sentence with a reason. The poet has frequently repeated the word ‘funny' in order to ______.
Answer
The poet has frequently repeated the word ‘funny' in order to keep the comic mood running through every stanza and to stress that everything about the man — his looks, his gift, his sound and his going away — is equally absurd.

The word appears five times: a funny kind of man, a funny sounding sight, a funny looking smell, a funny feeling sound. Each time it is attached to something different, so the strangeness spreads from the man to his gift, to what he sounds like, to what he smells like.

Name the device: This deliberate repeating of a word is repetition. In poetry, repetition works like a drumbeat — it fixes one idea in the reader's mind. Here the one idea is: nothing here is normal, and that is the fun of it.
Q6.
Choose the correct answer from the options given in the brackets. The poem uses vivid imagery to create a ______ (humorous and nonsensical/ confusing but thought-provoking) scene.
Answer

The correct choice is humorous and nonsensical.

The poem uses vivid imagery to create a humorous and nonsensical scene.

The images — a shoe raised in greeting, hats on feet, a bun held to the nose, a man hopping home on his head — are meant to make us laugh, not to make us think hard. There is no hidden problem to solve, so ‘confusing but thought-provoking' does not fit.

Q7.
Choose the correct answer from the options given in the brackets. The structure of the poem is in ______ (monologue/ dialogue) form.
Answer

The correct choice is dialogue.

The structure of the poem is in dialogue form.

Two speakers actually talk to each other, and both sets of words are in quotation marks:

  • The man: “Allow me to present Your Highness with a rose.”
  • The poet: “Well! I never saw a rose with such a funny looking smell.”
  • The poet again: “My friend, why do you wear two hats upon your feet?”
Word note: A monologue is one person speaking alone; a dialogue is an exchange between two or more. Here the exchange is one-sided in a funny way — the man answers the last question not with words but by hopping away on his head.
Q8.
Choose the correct answer from the options given in the brackets. The phrases ‘sounding sight' and ‘hopped home' are examples of ______. (alliteration/simile)
Answer

The correct choice is alliteration.

‘sounding sight' → repeated s sound
‘hopped home' → repeated h sound

Alliteration is the repetition of the same consonant sound at the beginning of words placed close together. A simile would need a comparison using like or as — there is none here.

Try this: Say the two phrases aloud. The repeated sound makes them bounce, which is why they stay in your ear long after you close the book.
Q9.
Rewrite the following line from the poem in the correct order. But never had I seen before / Such a funny sounding sight.
Answer

In normal (prose) word order the lines become:

But I had never seen such a funny sounding sight before.
Poem (inverted)Normal order
But never had I seen before / Such a funny sounding sight.But I had never seen such a funny sounding sight before.
Why the poet inverted it: This is inversion — changing the usual word order to keep the rhythm and to bring the rhyming word (before … sight) to the end of the line. Putting ‘never' first also adds emphasis: it is the surprise that matters most.
Other inversions in the poem: “You never heard in all your life / Such a funny feeling sound” → You never heard such a funny feeling sound in all your life.
Q10.
Why has the poet used phrases like ‘funny sounding sight' and ‘funny feeling sound' with reference to the funny man?
Answer

Because the phrases themselves are as mixed up as the man. The poet deliberately swaps the senses around:

PhraseWhat is wrong with itWhat it should logically be
a funny sounding sightA sight is seen, not hearda funny looking sight
a funny feeling soundA sound is heard, not touched or felta funny sounding noise
a rose with a funny looking smellA smell is smelt, not seena funny smelling rose

The man wears his shoe where his hat should be and his hats where his shoes should be. The poet describes him in language where hearing, seeing and feeling are swapped in exactly the same way — so the words match the man.

Name the device: Mixing up the senses like this is called synaesthesia (in simpler terms, a transferred epithet — the adjective is deliberately attached to the wrong noun). It is a favourite tool of nonsense verse because it makes the reader stumble and then smile.
Q11.
Can you think of any real-world situations where people do similar things for fun, entertainment, or performance? Share with your classmates and the teacher.
Answer

Yes — plenty. Wherever people break the ordinary rules on purpose, in order to make others laugh:

SituationWhat is turned upside down
Circus clownsEnormous shoes, tiny hats, trousers that fall down, a car full of twenty people
Street performers and mime artistsStanding frozen as a statue, walking against an invisible wind
Fancy-dress and mismatch days at schoolOdd socks, clothes worn backwards, hair standing on end
Behrupiyas and folk jesters at Indian fairsOne man changing costume and voice to become a policeman, a sadhu, a bride
Vidushaka in Sanskrit drama; Tenali Rama and Birbal in the courtSpeaking cheeky truth to kings while pretending to be foolish
Holi, Kerala's Pulikali and other festival processionsGrown-ups painted as tigers, dancing in the street
Comedy shows, stand-up and April Fool pranksSerious voice, ridiculous content — exactly the funny man's method
Sample answer: At our village fair last year a behrupiya walked about dressed as a police inspector and “fined” people for laughing. Everyone knew he was not real, and that was the whole joke — like the funny man raising a shoe instead of a hat, he was being perfectly serious about something perfectly absurd.
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