English Topic Test

What is a key reason to include metaphors in a literary work?

Read the excerpt below from the poem “The Taxi” by Amy Lowell and complete the statement that follows.
When I go away from you
The world beats dead
Like a slackened drum.

Source: Lowell, Amy. “The Taxi.” The Complete Poetical Works of Amy Lowell. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1983. Poetry Foundation. Web. 9 June 2011.

Each of the following types of figurative language is used in the excerpt except __________.

What is the definition of “symbol”?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“Simile”
by N. Scott Momaday

What did we say to each other
that now we are as the deer
who walk in single file
with heads high
with ears forward
with eyes watchful
with hooves always placed on firm ground
in whose limbs there is latent flight

Source: Momaday, N. Scott. “Simile.” The Language of Literature. New York: McDougal Littell, 2006. 265. Print.
Which statement about the poem is false?

Read the excerpt below from the poem “I Knew a Woman” by Theodore Roethke and answer the question that follows.

I knew a woman, lovely in her bones,
When small birds sighed, she would sigh back at them;
Ah, when she moved, she moved more ways than one:
The shapes a bright container can contain!
Of her choice virtues only gods should speak,
Or English poets who grew up on Greek
(I’d have them sing in chorus, cheek to cheek).

Source: Source: Roethke, Theodore. “I Knew a Woman.” The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke. New York: Random House Inc., 1961. Poetry Foundation. Web. 9 June 2011.

Which excerpt best illustrates a contemplative mood?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“Simile”
by N. Scott Momaday

What did we say to each other
that now we are as the deer
who walk in single file
with heads high
with ears forward
with eyes watchful
with hooves always placed on firm ground
in whose limbs there is latent flight

Source: Momaday, N. Scott. “Simile.” The Language of Literature. New York: McDougal Littell, 2006. 265. Print.
Which of the following techniques does this poem use?

I. simile

II. sensory imagery

III. allusion

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“Simile”
by N. Scott Momaday

What did we say to each other
that now we are as the deer
who walk in single file
with heads high
with ears forward
with eyes watchful
with hooves always placed on firm ground
in whose limbs there is latent flight

Source: Momaday, N. Scott. “Simile.” The Language of Literature. New York: McDougal Littell, 2006. 265. Print.

Which word best describes the mood of this poem?

Which of the following is a key reason to include allusions in a literary work?

“Metonymy” is best defined as a figure of speech in which __________.

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“She Walks in Beauty”
by Lord Byron

She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes;
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o’er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express,
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!

Source: Byron, George Gordon. “She Walks in Beauty.” Poetry.org. The Academy of American Poets, n.d. Web. 19 July 2011.

Which excerpt best reflects Byron’s appreciation of beauty?

Read the excerpt below from the poem “miss rosie” by Lucille Clifton and answer the question that follows.

when I watch you
wrapped up like garbage
sitting, surrounded by the smell
of too old potato peels

Source: Clifton, Lucille. “miss rosie.” Good Woman: Poems and a Memoir 1969-1980. Rochester: BOA Editions, Ltd., 1987. Poets.org. Web. 9 June 2011.

Which of the following techniques is used in the excerpt?

I. simile

II. personification

III. sensory imagery

Read the excerpt below from the poem “I Knew a Woman” by Theodore Roethke and answer the question that follows.

Let seed be grass, and grass turn into hay:
I’m martyr to a motion not my own;
What’s freedom for? To know eternity.
I swear she cast a shadow white as stone.
But who would count eternity in days?
These old bones live to learn her wanton ways:
(I measure time by how a body sways).

Source: Roethke, Theodore. “I Knew a Woman.” The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke. New York: Random House Inc., 1961. Poetry Foundation. Web. 9 June 2011.

Which line is an example of the poetic technique metonymy?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“Happiness Epidemic”
by David Hernandez

Without any warning, the disease
sweeps across the country
like a traveling circus.

People who were once blue,
who slouched from carrying
a bag of misery over one shoulder

are now clinically cheerful.
Symptoms include kind gestures,
a bouncy stride, a smile

bigger than a slice of cantaloupe.
You pray that you will be infected,
hope a happy germ invades your body

and multiplies, spreading merriment
to all your major organs
like door-to-door Christmas carolers

until the virus finally reaches your heart:
that red house at the end of the block
where your deepest wishes reside,

where a dog howls behind a gate
every time that sorrow
pulls his hearse up the driveway.

Source: Hernandez, David. “Happiness Epidemic.” Casa Poema. Casa Poem, n.d. Web. 6 June 2011.

Which poetic technique is illustrated throughout the entire poem “Happiness Epidemic”?

Which of the following is a key reason to include hyperbole in a literary work?

I. to add humor

Il. to heighten effect

III. to create suspense

Read the excerpt below from the poem “There’s a certain Slant of light” by Emily Dickinson and answer the question that follows.

When it comes, the landscape listens,
Shadows hold their breath.

Source: Dickinson, Emily. “There’s a certain Slant of light.” The Poems of Emily Dickinson. Ed. R. W. Franklin. Harvard: Harvard University Press, 1999. Poetry Foundation. Web. 9 June. 2011.

Which technique does this excerpt use?

https://quizlet.com/61967682/literary-device-flash-cards/

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.
“La Belle Dame sans Merci: A Ballad”
by John Keats
Which of the following describes the meter of this poem best?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.
“The Taxi”
by Amy Lowell
Which line from the poem does not include an example of imagery?

What is the definition of “ballad”?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.
“Robin Hood and the Scotchman”
What is the structure of this poem?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.
“La Belle Dame sans Merci: A Ballad”
by John Keats
Which words offer the reader clues as to the time and place of this piece?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.
“Robin Hood and the Scotchman”
Determine the meter of this poem. Which of the following is the correct meter?

Read the excerpt below from “The Lake of the Dismal Swamp” by Thomas Moore and answer the question that follows.

“They made her a grave, too cold and damp
For a soul so warm and true;
And she’s gone to the Lake of the Dismal Swamp,
Where, all night long, by a fire-fly lamp,
She paddles her white canoe.

Which poetic device is illustrated by the line, “. . . all night long, by a fire-fly lamp”?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“Silver”
by Walter de la Mare
Which line from the poem best illustrates alliteration?

What is imagery?

Read the poem below and complete the instruction that follows.
“Porphyria’s Lover”
by Robert Browning
Identify the metrical pattern.

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“Robin Hood and the Scotchman”
How would you describe the rhyme scheme of this poem?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“Robin Hood and the Scotchman”
Who is the speaker in this poem?

Read the excerpt below from the poem “Casey at the Bat” by Ernest Lawrence Thayer and answer the question that follows.

Ten thousand eyes were on him as he rubbed his hands with dirt;
Five thousand tongues applauded when he wiped them on his shirt.
Then while the writhing pitcher ground the ball into his hip,
Defiance gleamed in Casey’s eye, a sneer curled Casey’s lip.

Source: Thayer, Ernest Lawrence. “Casey at the Bat.” Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation, n.d. Web. 24 June 2011.

Which technique is the author using in this stanza?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“La Belle Dame sans Merci: A Ballad”
by John Keats
Determine the meter of this poem. Which sentence describes the metrical pattern?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.

“My Love Reveals Objects”
by Isabel Fraire
What is the effect of the imagery in this poem?

https://quizlet.com/102846930/poetry-the-lake-of-the-dismal-swamp-by-thomas-moore-2-flash-cards/

Which term is defined as the continuation of a line of poetry to the next line without punctuation or pause?

Which poetic technique does Crapsey use when she speaks directly to the dead in her poem “To the Dead in the Graveyard Underneath My Window”?

Read the excerpt below from “The Ball Poem” by John Berryman and answer the question that follows.
What is the structure of this poem?

Which statement illustrates the use of metaphor?

Which of the following are features of blank verse?

Which statement about Millay’s techniques in these poems is true?

Which of the following illustrates how word choice can create a negative mood?

Which line from the poem “To the Dead in the Graveyard Underneath My Window” illustrates apostrophe?

Read the excerpt below from the poem “Ulysses” by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and answer the question that follows.
Which of the following describes the structure of this excerpt best?

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.
“Listening to Her Practice: My Middle Daughter, on the Edge of Adolescence, Learns to Play the Saxophone”by Barbara Cooker
Which line from the poem illustrates a simile?

Read the poems below and answer the question that follows.
“God’s World”by Edna St. Vincent Millay
“Spring”by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Which statement best reflects Millay’s attitude toward the seasons?

Read the excerpt below from the poem “Ulysses” by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and answer the question that follows.
In this poem, Tennyson refers to both Ulysses and Achilles. What is this technique called in literature?

Read the excerpt below from the poem “Edge” by Sylvia Plath and answer the question that follows.
Feet seem to be saying:
We have come so far, it is over.
Which poetic technique do these lines from Plath’s poem “Edge” illustrate?

Both Crapsey’s and Plath’s poems address the theme of ______

Read the poem below and answer the question that follows.
“Spring”by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Which excerpt illustrates the use of alliteration in this poem?

https://quizlet.com/86794183/poetry-poems-by-sylvia-plath-and-adelaide-crapsey-flash-cards/

Read the excerpt below from the short story “The Bet” by Anton P. Chekhov and answer the question that
During the first year of imprisonment, the lawyer, as far as it was possible to judge from his short notes, suffered terribly from loneliness and boredom. From his wing day and night came the sound of the piano. He rejected wine and tobacco. “Wine,” he wrote, “excites desires, and desires are the chief foes of a prisoner; besides, nothing is more boring than to drink good wine alone,” and tobacco spoils the air in his room.

Which type of conflict occurs in the excerpt above?

Read the excerpt below from the short story “The Bet” by Anton P. Chekhov and answer the question that follows.

“That I may show you in deed my contempt for that by which you live, I waive the two millions of which I once dreamed as of paradise, and which I now despise. That I may deprive myself of my right to them, I shall come out from here five minutes before the stipulated term, and thus shall violate the agreement.”

What motivates the lawyer to write the above in a letter?

Read the excerpt below from the short story “The Bet” by Anton P. Chekhov and answer the question that follows.

“Why did I make this bet? What’s the good? The lawyer loses fifteen years of his life and I throw away two millions. Will it convince people that capital punishment is worse or better than imprisonment for life? No, no! all stuff and rubbish. On my part, it was the caprice of a well-fed man; on the lawyer’s pure greed of gold.”

According to the excerpt, what motivated the lawyer to wager the bet?

Read the excerpt below from the short story “The Bet” by Anton P. Chekhov and answer the question that follows.

“Why did I make this bet? What’s the good? The lawyer loses fifteen years of his life and I throw away two millions. Will it convince people that capital punishment is worse or better than imprisonment for life? No, no! all stuff and rubbish. On my part, it was the caprice of a well-fed man; on the lawyer’s pure greed of gold.”

According to the excerpt, what motivated the banker to wager the bet?

Read the excerpt below from the short story “The Bet” by Anton P. Chekhov and answer the question that follows.

Among the company was a lawyer, a young man of about twenty-five. On being asked his opinion, he said:
“Capital punishment and life-imprisonment are equally immoral; but if I were offered the choice between them, I would certainly choose the second. It’s better to live somehow than not to live at all.”
There ensued a lively discussion. The banker who was then younger and more nervous suddenly lost his temper, banged his fist on the table, and turning to the young lawyer, cried out:
“It’s a lie. I bet you two millions you wouldn’t stick in a cell even for five years.”

Which type of conflict occurs in the excerpt above?

How does the mood of a story affect the reader?

How does diction affect theme in a story?

As Anton P. Chekhov’s writing matured, he focused less on __________ and more on __________.

In “The Bet” by Anton P. Chekhov, what motivates the lawyer to participate in the bet?

Which term refers to careful and deliberate word choice in speaking or writing?

Anton Chekhov is considered the father of the modern __________

Why is discovering character’s motivations in literature important?

Read the excerpt below from the short story “The Bet” by Anton P. Chekov and answer the question that follows.

“And I despise your books, despise all worldly blessings and wisdom. Everything is void, frail, visionary and delusive as a mirage. Though you be proud and wise and beautiful, yet will death wipe you from the face of the earth like the mice underground; and your posterity, your history, and the immortality of your men of genius will be as frozen slag, burnt down together with the terrestrial globe. . . .”

Which theme does the diction from the passage support best?

Why is diction important?

I. It develops precise images in the mind.

II. It affects the narrator’s tone in a piece of writing.

III. It determines the theme in a piece of literature.

Which of the following is a theme that frequently appears in Anton P. Chekhov’s work?