A Letter to God — Class 10 MCQs with Answers

A Letter to God — important questions & MCQs with answers (Class 10 English)

6 solved questions from this chapter's difficulty levels, each with its answer and explanation. Tap an option to check yourself.

0 of 6 answered

1. Q1 of 6Easy

   What had Lencho done all morning before the rain came?

   AMended the roof of his little houseBTook his ripe corn to the town marketCWatched the sky towards the north-eastDWrote a long letter to the postmaster
   Show answerHide answer

   Answer: Watched the sky towards the north-east

   Explanation: The story says that throughout the morning Lencho 'had done nothing else but see the sky towards the north-east'.

2. Q2 of 6Easy

   What was the postmaster's first reaction to the letter?

   AHe tore it upBHe laughedCHe was angryDHe was frightened
   Show answerHide answer

   Answer: He laughed

   Explanation: He laughed before he became serious about answering it.

3. Q3 of 6Medium

   Lencho asked God for:

   AFoodB100 pesosCA new houseDTools
   Show answerHide answer

   Answer: 100 pesos

   Explanation: 100 pesos to sow his fields and survive.

4. Q4 of 6Medium

   Why does the story stress that Lencho's is the only house in the valley?

   AIt shows the valley had only recently been settledBIt explains why the postman was lateCIt tells us the family was wealthyDIt makes his dependence on this one field total
   Show answerHide answer

   Answer: It makes his dependence on this one field total

   Explanation: Isolation removes every other source of help.

5. Q5 of 6Hard

   Who opens and reads Lencho's second letter, which calls the post office employees 'a bunch of crooks'?

   ALencho's wife, who reads it to their sonsBThe postmaster who gave part of his own salaryCNo one, since it is sent on to God unopenedDThe postman, who throws it away unread
   Show answerHide answer

   Answer: The postmaster who gave part of his own salary

   Explanation: The text says 'the moment the letter fell into the mailbox the postmaster went to open it', so the man who gave part of his salary reads himself called a crook.

6. Q6 of 6Hard

   The postmaster is introduced as 'a fat, amiable fellow'. How does this prepare the reader?

   AIt hints that he is Lencho's relativeBGood humour makes his later generosity believableCIt suggests he will steal the moneyDIt implies he is too lazy to answer the letter
   Show answerHide answer

   Answer: Good humour makes his later generosity believable

   Explanation: The description sets up character, not comedy alone.

A Letter to God notes: key concepts (Class 10 English)

Gregorio Lopez y Fuentes's story of a farmer whose crop is destroyed by hail, who writes to God for money, and who receives it from the post office without ever knowing. The whole chapter turns on one irony, and the exam asks about it in almost every long-answer form.

Lencho

A farmer — 'an ox of a man', strong and stubborn — whose house stands alone on the crest of a low hill, the only house in the valley. He lives there with his wife and sons.

Why the isolation matters

Being the only house in the valley makes his dependence on that one field total, and removes every other source of help. It is why writing to God is not absurd to him.

The disaster

The ripe corn needed rain; the downpour turned to hail within the hour and fell for an hour. Lencho says a plague of locusts would have left more behind than the hail did.

The money imagery

Lencho sees the raindrops as new coins — big ones ten-cent pieces, small ones fives — and then the hailstones as new silver coins. The image that promised him wealth becomes the thing that destroys him.

'As if covered with salt'

After the hail the field is white, as though covered with salt — a ruined-earth image, and the point at which he turns to God.

The letter

He writes to God asking for a hundred pesos to sow his field again and live until the crop comes, and addresses the envelope simply 'To God'.

The postmaster

He laughs first, then becomes serious. He answers the letter because he does not want to shake Lencho's faith, giving his own money and part of his salary and asking nothing for it.

Why only seventy pesos

The postmaster and his colleagues could not raise the full hundred. That shortfall is the mechanism of the whole irony.

Lencho's reaction

He shows no surprise at the money — his confidence that God would send it is complete — and then grows angry on counting it, because it is less than he asked for.

The second letter

Since 'God could not have made a mistake', the only explanation left is theft, so he calls the post office employees 'a bunch of crooks'. He argues downwards from a premise he refuses to doubt.

The central irony

Lencho's faith is answered by human kindness that he never recognises, and his insult lands precisely on the only people who actually helped him.

Why he never learns the truth

Telling him would collapse both halves of the irony at once. The story exists to hold open the contrast between his faith and the world it lives in.

The theme

People can be more generous than those who benefit from them ever realise. The postmaster's act — unrecognised and even insulted — is the story's real centre.