When Great Trees Fall

Maya Angelou
When great trees fa ,
rocks on distant hi s shudder,
lions hunker down
in ta grasses,
and even elephants
lumber a er safety.

Q1. What happens when great trees fall?

Ans. When great trees fall, rocks on the distant hills feel the impact of the crash
and quake in terror. Ferocious lions — animals that are known for their for their
indomitable strength and bravery — hunch or crouch down below in fear. Even
elephants, intimidated by the explosive fall of the tree, walk slowly and heavily
seeking a safe haven.

When great trees fa

in forests,
sma things recoil into silence,
their senses
eroded beyond fear.

Q2. What happens to small things when great trees fall in forests?
Ans. When grey trees fall in forests, small things recoil or inch back in fear and
horror, and become absolutely silent. Their senses are eroded or devoured by the
shock that renders them too benumbed to even be scared.

Q3. What does the fall of the great trees symbolise?

Ans. The fall of the great trees symbolises the deaths of great personages. When a
great soul departs, the e ect is felt far and near by people of all sorts and from all
walks of life. The sudden disappearance of the person leaves them feeling anxious,
helpless and endangered in some speci c way.

When great souls die,

the air around us becomes
light, rare, sterile.
We breathe, brie y.
Our eyes, brie y,
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see with
a hurtful clarity.
Our memory, suddenly sharpened,
examines,
gnaws on kind words
unsaid,
promised walks
never taken.

Q4. How does the death of a great person a ect the people around him?
Ans. Great personalities are in uential people, for they inspire and a ect the lives
of many around them, be it their loved ones or those in their community or even
those beyond that. As such, their death has a great impact on these people who
suddenly nd it di cult to breathe, as if the air has become ‘light, rare, sterile’,
that is, too thin to support life. This seeming dearth of breathable air leaves them
gasping for breath. For a moment their eyes perceive with a hurtful clarity, which
means that they have a painful epiphany or revelation about, the true value of the
person that is lost as well as the implications of the loss. People’s memories
suddenly become more keen and precise and they keep beating themselves up
about the nice words they forgot to say while this person was still alive and the
walks they had promised to go on together but never did.

Q5. How does the air around us seem to change in great souls die?
Ans. The death of great souls seems to make the air around us impacts ‘light, rare,
sterile’, that is, too thin to support life. That it, it impacts us in such a way that we
suddenly nd it di cult to breathe, as if there is a sudden dearth of breathable air
around us and this leaves us gasping for breath.

Q6. What does the death of a great soul help us see?

Ans. When a great soul dies, for a moment our eyes perceive with a hurtful clarity,
which means that they have a painful epiphany or revelation about, the true value
of the person that is lost as well as the implications of the loss.

Q7. How does the death of great souls a ect our memory?
Ans. After a great soul dies, people’s memories suddenly become more keen and
precise and they keep beating themselves up about the nice words they forgot to
say while this person was still alive and the walks they had promised to go on
together but never did.
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 Great souls die and
our reality, bound to
them, takes leave of us.
Our souls,
dependent upon their
nurture,
now shrink, wizened.
Our minds, formed
and informed by their
radiance,
fa away.
We are not so much maddened
as reduced to the unutterable ignorance
of dark, cold
caves.

Q8. How does our reality get a ected when great souls die?
Ans. When great souls die, our reality departs from us, that is, we suddenly lose
touch with reality. This is because we cannot imagine our real world without them,
considering the fact that they were inextricably tied to our existence. It seems that
with their departure, the bond between us and our reality has also been snapped
and the world as we know it has taken its leave too.

Q9. How does the death of great people a ect our souls and minds?
Ans. When exceptional people die, our souls that relied heavily on their gentle
care and guidance seem to wither, as if they have suddenly shrivelled and wrinkled
with age. We lose our grip on our minds, which their brilliance had shaped and
enlightened. It is not that we lose our sanity; it is more that our minds are
diminished, returned to the unspeakable crudeness of the time when people lived
in the dark and cold caves — the stone ages. What the poet means to say here is
that when a person of immense cultural importance dies, it is not just that this
person is gone; it is as if their vision for the world has gone with them, leaving the
world dark and cold.

And when great souls die,

a er a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregularly. Spaces
with a kind of
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soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whisper to us.
They existed. They existed.
We can be. Be and be
better. For they existed.

Q10. What is the tone in the last stanza of the poem?

Ans. In the last stanza of the poem, the tone is rather hopeful, for the poetess
talks about our eventual recovery from the seemingly insurmountable pain that
the demise of great souls left in our minds and hearts. We begin to heal and feel a
sense of peace though it does not come all of a sudden or all at once, but rather
slowly and intermittently.

Q11. What does Angelou compare peace to? What is the gure of speech?
Ans. Angelou compares peace to a ower that blooms in ts and starts after a long
period of complete and utter barrenness.

The gure of speech is metaphor.

Q12. What spaces is the poet referring to? What happens to these spaces?
Ans. The poet is referring to the empty space created in the lives of people after
the death of a great soul who was an irreplaceable pat of their existence.

These spaces eventually seems to ll up with a kind of soothing electric vibration,

that is, a sort of charged, comforting hum.

Q13. Explain: ‘Our senses, restored, never

to be the same, whisper to us.”
Ans. The quoted words are taken from Maya Angelou’s celebrated poem ‘When
Great Trees Fall’. Here the poetess wants to say that when a considerable period of
time has passed after the loss of a great person, the numbness fades and and our
senses begin to function again so that once again we start feeling the sensations
that remained absent from our lives for a long time. It is as if our senses are nally
whispering to us and their messages are at long last registering in our minds. The
poet uses personi cation to describe how our senses communicate with us. We are
able to perceive the world again, though we will never experience things as we did
before the loss.
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 Q14. In what thought do we begin to take comfort and how?
Ans. We begin to take comfort in the mere fact that this person whom we lost
some time ago was not an illusion but someone who truly existed. This teaches us
too to exist, to go on living rather than remain mere shadows of our former selves,
and in fact, to live better, that is, to live our life more meaningfully and more
ercely and more passionately, because this person lived.

Additional Questions
Q1. What is the signi cance of rocks, lions and elephants in the rst
stanza?
Ans. Maya Angelou says that when giant trees come crashing down, the impact is
felt far and wide. Rocks on distant hills feel the vibrations and ‘shudder’,
suggesting that the landscape itself trembles with fear. Likewise, lions crouch
below and even elephants trudge o in search of safety. All these things—rocks,
lions, elephants—are linked with steadfastness and strength. Large rocks are heavy
and immobile; lions are fearsome predators, the kings of the jungle; and elephants
are enormous, slow-moving creatures. Yet all these gures react to the falling tree
with fear. The falling of great trees thus shakes up everything around them.

Q2. What is the signi cance of the poem’s form?

Ans."When Great Trees Fall" contains forty-nine lines of free verse, split
into ve stanzas of varying lengths. The poem moves freely and unpredictably,
not bound by any rigid structure. This allows the poem to feel natural and
conversational rather than overly formal or rigid. The language is simple and clear
and the lines are generally short, creating a long, narrow layout on the page that
subtly resembles the trunk of a tall tree. The use of so many short lines also adds
to the poem's thoughtful, deliberate pacing. The result is a vivid, highly accessible
poem.

Q3. Give the background information of the poem.

Ans. Maya Angelou wrote "When Great Trees Fall" in response to the death of her
friend, the renowned writer and civil rights activist James Baldwin. The poem's
speaker compares the loss of "great souls" such as Baldwin to the fall of "great
trees," the impact of which can be felt in every direction.

Q4. Elaborate on the theme of loss, grief and acceptance in the poem
‘When Great Trees Fall’.
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Ans. The poem's speaker compares the loss of great souls such to the fall of great
trees, the impact of which can be felt in every direction. After a death like this, the
poem implies, it can be hard for people to carry on; they may feel they have lost
not only an important person, but everything this person stood for as well. They
might lose touch with reality and for a period of time become mere shadows of
themselves, their once enlightened minds reduced to the unspeakable crudeness of
the time when people lived in the stone ages. Yet, the empty spaces such people
leave behind won't stay empty forever, and the poem suggests that the living
ultimately nd comfort in remembering how these great souls managed to
improve the world. Though the poem was written speci cally for Baldwin, it
speaks more generally to the experience of losing someone important and the ways
in which even the most poignant grief eventually gives way to acceptance.

Q5. Who is the speaker of the poem? OR Comment on the signi cance of
‘we’ in the poem.
Ans. ‘When Great Trees Fall’ does not have a speci c speaker. That is, the reader
isn't given any identifying information about their background, age, gender, race,
etc. In fact, the speaker never even refers to themselves in the singular! Instead,
they act as a spokesperson for a collective "we"—giving voice to the di culties
faced by those who survive the loss of someone “great." The speaker can also be
interpreted as Angelou herself, seeing as she wrote this poem about her late friend
and fellow writer and activist, James Baldwin. By making the speaker an
anonymous member of a grieving collective, however, Angelou acknowledges that
Baldwin's death didn't just a ect her alone, or even just those who knew Baldwin
personally. Instead, the poem suggests that when people who are as culturally
signi cant and beloved as Baldwin die, the loss isn't simply personal—it's a blow to
society as a whole.

Q6. How does the poem explore the impact of an individual upon
society?
Ans. Maya Angelou wrote "When Great Trees Fall" in response to the death of her
friend, the renowned writer and civil rights activist James Baldwin. The poem
explores the way a single person can create massive cultural change. The poem
implies that "great souls"—the most impressive or talented people in a given
community—have an outsized impact on the world around them. Both in life and
death, they reshape their entire culture, just as the ourishing or toppling of a
huge tree can nurture or shake up an entire landscape. So when such an individual
dies, the whole ecosystem that grew up around them seems to collapse; even the
"reality" they helped de ne seems to disappear. The speaker says that the death of
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 someone great can cause people's very senses to be eroded or worn away by fear. It
is not just that this person is gone, it is as if their vision for the world has gone
with them, leaving the world dark and cold. After a time, it becomes clear that the
contributions of these heroic souls do not just disappear, for their ideas live on
and make the world a better place. In other words, even in death, great individuals
have the power to change the world.

Q7. How apt is the symbol of trees in the poem?

Ans. In ‘When Great Trees Fall’, the great trees symbolise great souls — larger-
than-life individuals who nurture the world around them and whose deaths a ect
everything in their orbit.The poem depicts the individual deaths of "great" people
as having a profound collective impact. Just as other plants and animals may be
dependent on the nurturing presence of a giant tree, communities thrive under the
leadership of exceptional individuals. So when such an individual dies, the whole
ecosystem that grew up around them seems to collapse; even the reality they
helped de ne seems to disappear. As such, the tree is a perfect symbol for era-
de ning souls.
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