The Chapter “Deep Water” from NCERT Flamingo, the CBSE board. Below you can find Deep Water Questions and Answers. Let’s get started.
Deep Water: Short Questions and Answers
Ans. William O Douglas had just learned swimming. One day, an eighteen-year-old big bruiser picked him up and tossed him into the nine feet deep end of the YMCA pool. He hit the water surface in a sitting position. He swallowed water and at once to the bottom, he nearly died in his misadventure.
Ans. Douglas was frightened when he was thrown int the pool. However, he was not frightened out of his wits. While sinking down he makes a plan. He would make a big jump when his feet hit the bottom. He would come to the surface like a cork, lie flat on it, and paddle to the edge of the pool.
Ans. The near-death experience of drowning had a very strong impact on his psychology and shaken by the whole experience. A haunting fear of water took control of his physical strength and emotional balance for many years. As he couldn’t bear being surrounded by water, he was deprived of enjoying and water-related activity.
Ans. Douglas regretted being deprived of enjoying water activities like canoeing, boating, swimming, fishing, etc. The wish to enjoy them and the craving to regain his lost confidence, while being in the water, make him try every possible way to get rid of his fear. He was finally able to overcome this mental handicap by getting himself a swimming instructor and further ensuring that no residual fear was left.
Ans. The instructor built a swimmer out of Douglas piece by piece. For three months he held him high on a rope attached to his belt. He went back and forth across the pool. Panic seized the author every time. The instructor taught Douglas to put his face underwater and exhale and to raise his nose and inhale. Then Douglas had to Kick with his legs for many weeks till these relaxed. After seven months the instructor told him to swim the length of the pool.
Ans. Even after the swimming training as over, Douglas wasn’t confident about his swimming or that he had overcome the fear. He was determined to completely get rid of it forever. He swam alone in the pool. He went to lake Wentworth to dive. There, he tried every possible stroke he had learned. He fought back the tiny vestiges of terror that gripped him in the middle of the lake. Finally, in his diving expedition in the warm lake, he realized that he had truly conquered his old terror.
Ans: In the first few days at the pool he gathered confidence. He paddled with his new water wings, watching the other boys and trying to learn by aping them. He did this two or three times on different days and was just beginning to feel ease in the water.
Related: Class 12th Chapter wise Important Question Answers.
Deep Water: Long Question Answers
Question: What was the series of emotions and fears that Douglas experienced when he was thrown into the pool? What plans did he make to come to the surface?
Ans: When he went to the bottom, he was frightened, but not yet frightened out of his wits. On the way down he planned. When his feet hit the bottom, he would make a big jump, come to the surface, lie flat on it, and paddle to the edge of the pool. It seemed a long way down. Those nine feet were more than ninety, and before he touched bottom his lungs were ready to burst.
But when his feet hit the bottom summoned all his strength and made what he thought was a great spring upwards, Instead, he came up slowly. He opened his eyes and saw nothing but water. He grew panicky. He reached up as if to grab a rope and his hands clutched only at the water. He was suffocating, he tried to yell but no sound came out. He tried to bring his legs up, but they hung as dead weights, paralysed and rigid. A great force was pulling him under.
He had started on the long journey back to the bottom of the pool. He struck at the water as he went down expending his strength. He had lost all his breath. He was getting dizzy, but he remembered the strategy. He would spring from the bottom of the pool and come like a cork on the surface.
He went down, down endlessly, he opened his eyes and he could see nothing but water with a yellow glow and the sheer, stark terror seized him, terror, that knows no understanding, the terror that knows no understanding, the terror that knows no control, the terror that no one can understand, who has not experienced it. He was shrieking underwater and paralysed, stiff, rigid with fear. Only his heart and the pounding in his head said that he was still alive.
And then in the midst of the terror came a touch of reason. At last, he felt the tiles under him. His toes reached out as if to grab them. He jumped with everything he had. But the jump made no difference. He shook and trembled with fright arms wouldn’t move. His legs wouldn’t move. He tried to call for help, to call for his mother. Nothing happened.
And then, strangely, there was light, he was coming out of the awful yellow water. At least his eyes were and nose too. Then he started down a third time. He sucked for air and got water. The yellowish light was going out then all effort ceased. He relaxed, even his legs felt limp, and a blackness swept over his brain. It wiped out fear and terror and there was no more panic, it was quiet and peaceful. He crossed oblivion and the curtain of life fell.
So these are the important Deep Water Questions and Answers for your CBSE board exam. Keep learning with Infinity Lectures.