UGC NET English 2021 Question Paper & Answers
The official UGC NET English 2021 question paper, with the official answer key. Attempt as a real timed exam (with negative marking) or switch to practice mode for instant per-question answers and explanations.
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Official PYQ
UGC NET English 2021 (December 2020 / June 2021 cycle, Paper 2)
120 Mins 200 Marks
100Questions
200Max Marks
Sample questions from UGC NET English 2021 (December 2020 / June 2021 cycle, Paper 2)
1Read the following passage and answer the questions that follow: What can be the use of a poetry that has no true subject except the poet's own selfhood? The traditional use of poetry in the Western world has been instruction through delight, where teaching has meant the common truths or common deceptions of societal tradition, and where esthetic pleasure has meant a fulfillment of expectations founded upon past joys of the same design. But an individual psyche has its own accidents, which it needs to call truths, and its own necessity for self‐recognition, which requires the pleasures of originality, even if those pleasures depend upon a kind of lying against time, and against the achievements of the past. The use of such poetry demands to be seen in a deidealized way, if it is to be seen more truly. ‐ Harold Bloom, “The Use of Poetry” In the context of the above which is closest to being true?
- A) The poet himself may be the subject.
- B) Poetry can have no true subject.
- C) Man may be the true subject of poetry.
- D) There can be no use of poetry.
Answer: A
2Read the following passage and answer the questions that follow: What can be the use of a poetry that has no true subject except the poet's own selfhood? The traditional use of poetry in the Western world has been instruction through delight, where teaching has meant the common truths or common deceptions of societal tradition, and where esthetic pleasure has meant a fulfillment of expectations founded upon past joys of the same design. But an individual psyche has its own accidents, which it needs to call truths, and its own necessity for self‐recognition, which requires the pleasures of originality, even if those pleasures depend upon a kind of lying against time, and against the achievements of the past. The use of such poetry demands to be seen in a deidealized way, if it is to be seen more truly. ‐ Harold Bloom, “The Use of Poetry” Which option best describes the instructional component of the “traditional use of poetry” in Bloom’s passage?
- A) Promoting serious ideas
- B) Promoting doubtful pleasure
- C) Promoting joyous expectations
- D) Promoting social honesty in life
Answer: A
3Read the following passage and answer the questions that follow: What can be the use of a poetry that has no true subject except the poet's own selfhood? The traditional use of poetry in the Western world has been instruction through delight, where teaching has meant the common truths or common deceptions of societal tradition, and where esthetic pleasure has meant a fulfillment of expectations founded upon past joys of the same design. But an individual psyche has its own accidents, which it needs to call truths, and its own necessity for self‐recognition, which requires the pleasures of originality, even if those pleasures depend upon a kind of lying against time, and against the achievements of the past. The use of such poetry demands to be seen in a deidealized way, if it is to be seen more truly. ‐ Harold Bloom, “The Use of Poetry” According to the passage, the pleasures of originality may depend upon which of the following?
- A) A kind of lying against time and against the achievements of the past.
- B) truth of self‐recognition.
- C) creating ideal pleasures.
- D) re‐living the past joys.
Answer: A
4Read the following poem and answer the questions that follow: No worst, there is none. No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief, More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring. Comforter, where, where is your comforting? Mary, mother of us, where is your relief? My cries heave, herds‐long; huddle in a main, a chief Woe, wórld‐sorrow; on an áge‐old anvil wince and sing— Then lull, then leave off. Fury had shrieked 'No lingering! Let me be fell: force I must be brief."' O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall Frightful, sheer, no‐man‐fathomed. Hold them cheap May who ne'er hung there. Nor does long our small Durance deal with that steep or deep. Here! creep, Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all Life death does end and each day dies with sleep. ‐ Gerard Manley Hopkins In the opening of Hopkins’s poem, how does the line “More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring” develop the representation of grief?
- A) The speaker anticipates further pains that intensify the suffering already experienced.
- B) The speaker announces that suffering has ended permanently.
- C) The speaker predicts that every subsequent pain will be milder than earlier pains.
- D) The speaker denies that earlier suffering has any connection with later suffering.
Answer: A
5Read the following poem and answer the questions that follow: No worst, there is none. No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief, More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring. Comforter, where, where is your comforting? Mary, mother of us, where is your relief? My cries heave, herds‐long; huddle in a main, a chief Woe, wórld‐sorrow; on an áge‐old anvil wince and sing— Then lull, then leave off. Fury had shrieked 'No lingering! Let me be fell: force I must be brief."' O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall Frightful, sheer, no‐man‐fathomed. Hold them cheap May who ne'er hung there. Nor does long our small Durance deal with that steep or deep. Here! creep, Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all Life death does end and each day dies with sleep. ‐ Gerard Manley Hopkins Which option most closely paraphrases the second line, in which further pangs are “schooled at forepangs” and “wilder wring”?
- A) only a new pain more painful.
- B) no grief than being experienced.
- C) only the twisted known pains.
- D) the griefs beyond limits of pain.
Answer: A
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