Short Answer Type Questions: No Men are Foreign | English Class 9 PDF Download

Q1: What should we remember about men?
Ans. We should remember that no men are strange.

Q2: What should we remember about countries?
Ans. We should remember that no countries are foreign.

Q3: Where do we all walk upon?
Ans. We all walk on the same earth.

Q4: Where shall we all lie in the end?
Ans. In the end, we all shall lie on the earth.

Q5: What are all men fed by?
Ans. All men are fed by peaceful harvests.

Q6: What do you mean by a peaceful harvest?
Ans. By peaceful harvests, we mean the crops grown during the period of peace.

Q7: What do you mean ‘wars’ long winter?
Ans. It means the painful days of the war when we are kept indoors.

Q8: What are we doing to the human earth?
Ans. We are polluting the earth.

Q9: Why should we not hate others?
Ans. We should not hate others because they all are our brothers.

Q10: What do you mean by ‘hells of fire and dust’?
Ans. ‘Hells of fire and dust’ means the wars that cause a lot of destruction.

Q11: “Beneath all uniforms…” What uniforms do you think the poet is speaking about?
Ans. 

• The poet is speaking about the dresses or uniforms that armies of different countries wear. Though these ‘uniforms’ are absolutely different in appearance the bodies under them are the same. 
• The poet tries to convey that the differences among the people of different countries are superficial. Essentially, all human beings are the same.

Q12: Whom does the poet refer to as ‘our brothers’ and why?
Ans. 

• The poet refers to the people living in other countries as ‘our brothers’. He says so because the superficial dissimilarities of complexion, language, dress, culture and nationality do not, and must not, segregate us as human beings. 
• Human wants, human needs, human hopes, human emotions are the same anywhere in the world.

Q13: How does the poet suggest (in the first stanza) that all people on earth are the same?
Ans. 

• In the first stanza, the poet suggests that no human being is strange or different. Beneath the superficial surface of our bodies, we all have similar hearts, minds and souls. We all breathe and live in a similar manner. 
• The earth is our common asset and one day we all shall die and be buried in the same way.

Q14: What does the poet mean when he says, ‘in which we all shall lie’?
Ans. 

• The poet means that we all shall lie under the same earth. Here ‘lie’ means to be buried after death. 
• This is to highlight that all of us have to meet the same fate, sooner or later, hence there is no point in hating each other.

Q15: In stanza 1, find five ways in which we are alike. Pick out the words phrases suggesting these similarities.
Ans. 
Following are the five phrases that suggest that we are all alike:

• No men are strange.
• No countries are foreign. 
• A single body breathes like ours. 
• The land our brothers walk upon is earth like this.
• In which we all shall lie.

Q16: Why does the poet call harvests ‘peaceful’ and war as ‘winter’?
Ans. 

• Harvests are called ‘peaceful’ because they bring abundance and prosperity and they thrive in peaceful times only. 
• War, on the other hand, is like the severe and harsh ‘winter’ that ruins the crops and starves people. 
• It is only the peaceful times that bring harmony and contentment. War destroys everything and forces people to face hunger, poverty, disease and death.

Q17: ”…whenever we are told to hate our brothers….” When do you think this happens and why?
Ans. 

• Whenever their own importance or existence is in danger, politicians and religious leaders make us believe that our existence and our interests are in danger and provoke us to hate our fellow human beings. 
• This happens when we allow our reason to be swayed by our fears and hatred.

Q18: In one of the stanzas, the poet finds similarity in human hands. What is it?
Ans. 

• The poet feels that people of all countries have to work hard in a similar fashion to earn their livelihood. 
• This is done by them with the help of their hands. It is the hands that do all the work in the world and it is the hands that are a source of all creativity.

Q19: Who tells us ‘to hate our brothers’? Should we do as we are told at such times? What does the poet say?
Ans. 

• The politically motivated and power-hungry people tell us to hate our brothers during wartime. 
• The poet says that we should not get swayed by such provocation. If we do so, it will result in our own dispossession, betrayal, and condemnation.

Q20: Why does the poet say that people of the world should live in peace and not go to war?
Ans. 

• The poet advocates living in peace because peace brings progress, prosperity, and cheer in this world. 
• He advises mankind to shun wars because wars bring death, exploitation, want, poverty and starvation. 
• They also defile the earth and pollute the very air we all breathe.

Q21: How does the poet propose to win over other countries?
Ans. 

• The poet proposes to win over other countries through the divine force of love. It is a universal fact that this world responds positively to love and kindness. 
• So the poet plans to use it to end all hatred and war and create peaceful heaven on earth.

Q22: Who, according to you, is the speaker in this poem?
Ans. The speaker in this poem is the poet himself who stands for the goodness of the human heart that propagates love, peace, and universal brotherhood. He is a champion of love, peace and joy.

Q23: In four stanzas out of five, the poet uses the word “Remember”. Why do you think he has repeated this word so many times?
Ans. 

• By repeating the word ‘remember’, the poet wishes us never to forget that our ideas, emotions, and experiences are similar to that of the people we conventionally think of as ‘strange’ or ‘foreign’. 
• He wants to emphasize that all human beings are identical in nature and phases of human life are the same anywhere in the world.

Q24: What is the central idea of the poem?
Ans. 

• The central idea of the poem is that all human beings are similar and equal. Hence, we should love one another and live in peace and harmony. 
• Universal brotherhood and harmonious co-existence will not only unite us but will also save our mother earth from getting polluted and damaged.

Q25: Why do countries engage in wars and to what effect?
Ans. 

• Vested interests of the power-hungry people instigate the common man to hate fellow-beings living in different parts of the world. 
• This narrow approach leads to wars and results in bloodshed and irreparable loss of innocent lives.

Q26: How does the title sums up the theme of the poem “No Men are Foreign”?
Ans. 

• Right through the poem, the poet talks about the concept of universal brotherhood and peaceful co-existence, without any place for any kind of prejudice. 
• He emphasizes the fact that all human beings are inherently the same and divisions based on nation, caste, colour, creed, or religion are baseless. 
• James Kirkup, the poet, has beautifully conveyed these ideas through the title of the poem “No Men Are Foreign”.

Q27: “No Men are Foreign” is an anti-war poem. Comment.
Ans.

• “No Men Are Foreign” is a peace poem that propagates the idea of human brotherhood and peaceful co-existence by annihilating all war and hatred. 
• War harms both the suppressed and the suppressor. It brings about death, destruction, deprivation’ starvation, and pollution. Hence, wars should be shunned forever.

Q28: When do we defile the earth?
Ans. When we take up arms against each other, we defile the earth. Wars cause enormous suffering without yielding any result.

Q29: How do we defile and outrage the ‘human earth’ that is ours?
Ans. 

• Hate breeds hatred. Narrow ideas pollute and defile this earth which belongs to all mankind. ‘Hells of fire and dust’ are our own creations. 
• They pollute and outrage the ‘innocence of air that is our own’. We should remember that mother earth belongs to all lands and all people.

Q30:  What is the air full of? How is it polluted?
Ans. The air is full of innocence. It is polluted by wars and hatred and it also controls the innocent minds of people. Thus, wars and hatred are not good for us.