Direction: Read the following passage carefully and answer the given questions.
PASSAGE
Emily Dickinson, who was born nearly 200 years ago, has long been an enigma. She was so reclusive that the townsfolk of Amherst, Massachusetts, where she spent her life, called her “the myth”, as if her very existence were in question. Few got so much as a glimpse of her white dress— as an adult she only wore white—and only ten of her poems were published in her lifetime. After her death in 1886, hundreds of others were discovered in a wooden chest, and a new legend grew up, sweet with pathos, of a woman too delicate for this world, disappointed in love. Emily Dickinson lived with her unmarried sister Lavinia in an elegant house called The Homestead. Next door, at Evergreens, was the family home of her brother Austin; his wife, Sue, was Emily’s intimate, and she addressed much of her poetry to her. But their comparative Eden was shattered by the arrival in Amherst of Mabel Loomis Todd, a young faculty wife. Musical, artistic and ambitious, the ruthless Mabel insinuated herself into the Dickinsons’ lives. In 1882 she embarked on an affair with Emily’s brother Austin, who ensured Mr Todd’s compliance by promoting his academic career. The lovers thought their passion was so special that normal rules did not apply. The spurned wife, Sue, was devastated, and the resulting family feud would echo down the generations. Mabel effectively destroyed the Dickinson family. The irony is, however, that she was one of the only people to recognise Emily’s originality and brilliance in her lifetime. After Emily died, Mabel determined that the public should read the poetry, and devoted herself to editing, publishing and promoting it. In doing so, she suppressed some of its originality, conventionalising Emily’s odd punctuation. She also constructed the sentimental view of the mythic poetess and her milieu which Ms Gordon’s biography has now so effectively dispelled.
MEANINGS OF DIFFICULT WORDS/PHRASES
(1) enigma (N.) : mystery
(2) reclusive (Adj.) : seeking solitude
(3) pathos (N.) : a style that has the power to evoke feelings
(4) insinuated (V.) : give to understand
(5) embarked (V.) :proceed some where despite the risk of possible dangers
(6) compliance (N.) : surrendering power to another
(7) spurned (Adj.) : rejected by a lover without warning
(8) devastated (V.) : to make somebody feel extremely shocked and sad
(9) feud (N.) : a bitter quarrel between two parties
(10) irony (N.) : the amusing/strange aspect of a situation that is very different from what you expect
(11) conventionalising (V.) : normalising
(12) mythic (Adj.) : that has become very famous, like somebody/something in a myth
(13) dispelled (V.) : to make something, especially a feeling/belief, go away/disappear

Direction: Read the following passage carefully and answer the given questions.
PASSAGE
After 500 years, Christopher Columbus’s ship the Santa Maria were claimed to be found by archaeological investigators led by Barry Clifford. Christopher Columbus’s flagship, the Santa Maria, got wrecked in the Caribbean. The vessel’s long-lost remains was claimed to be lying at the bottom of the sea off the north coast of Haiti. An expedition was mounted by team of Barry Clifford a decade ago. He had found and photographed the wreck but had not realized its probable identity. Tentatively identifying the wreck as the Santa Maria was made possible by quite separate discoveries made by other archaeologists in 2003 suggesting that the probable location of Columbus’ fort relatively nearby. Santa Maria was the largest of the three ships used by Christopher Columbus in his first voyage. The ship was constructed in 1460 and was struck in 1492. The ship was used by Columbus in 1492 to find a direct trade route to India.
MEANINGS OF DIFFICULT WORDS/PHRASES
(1) archaeological (Adj.) : related to/dealing with/ devoted to study of prehistoric people and their cultures
(2) flagship (N.) : the ship that carries the commander of a fleet and flies his flag
(3) tentatively (Adv.) : in a way that is not definite/ certain because you may want to change it later