Literary Analysis Quiz
Name:
EMail:
1. Interpreting a literary work primarily involves _____.
summarizing the plot
identifying characters
analyzing language and themes
identifying the moral
2. Which can you generally expect to find in a literary anthology designed for college courses?
belles-lettres
doggerel
poetaster
limericks
3. By definition, a ______ teaches a lesson.
sonnet
didactic poem
lyric poem
short story
4. Dictionaries primarily give words' _______.
connotations
denotations
annotations
salutations
5. Gothic novels, pastoral poems, and other types of literature with set conventions are called ______.
tones
synecdoches
motifs
genres
6. Syntax and diction are important parts of a writer's ______.
metaphor
setting
plot
style
7. Which is an example of fiction?
essay
short story
biography
newspaper article
8. Which of the following is a novel?
Harlequin Romance
autobiography
narrative poem
dictionary
9. Adventure, larger-than-life characters, and fantastic details are characteristics of a type of literature called _______.
romance
stream of consciousness
realism
prose
10. The heartless villain, the faithful sidekick, and other stereotypes who appear in many literary works are called _______.
unreliable narrators
naive narrators
personas
stock characters
11. A novel that tells the story of a young person coming of age is called ________.
a bildungsroman
an epistolary novel
a picaresque novel
a character foil
12. Hamlet, Huckleberry Finn, Captain Ahab, and Hester Prynne are all ________.
plots
personifications
protagonists
antagonists
13. Which of the following determines the rhythm of most poetry in English?
alliteration
stress
vowel length
rhyme
14. Which type of poem is known for being long and grand?
epic
epigram
haiku
lyric
15. By definition, narrative poetry __________.
rhymes
expresses feelings
tells a story
has a moral
16. Asides and soliloquies are associated with ______.
plays
novels
poems
free verse
17. For this question and all the following questions, read the passage and choose the term that it most clearly illustrates: "Let us go then, you and I, / When the evening is spread out against the sky / Like a patient etherized upon a table."
bildungsroman
onomatopoeia
figurative language
literal language
18. "I bet you could set off dynamite in an A&P and the people would by and large keep reaching and checking oatmeal off their lists . . ."
conceit
symbol
alliteration
hyperbole
19. "The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge."
motivation
imagery
bildungsroman
paradox
20. "I celebrate myself, and sing myself . . ."
irony
in media res
couplet
first-person point of view
21. "Why, Mars Tom, I hain't got no coat o' arm; I hain't got nuffn but dish yer ole shirt, en you knows I got to keep de journal on dat."
epiphany
symbol
dialect
allegory
22. "The Figures hunched, with pain-- / Then quivered out of Decimals-- / Into Degreeless Noon--"
exact rhyme
slant rhyme
feminine rhyme
apostrophe
23. ". . . he fetched a whoop, and swore that 'he could out-swap any live man, woman, or child that ever walked these hills, or that ever straddled horseflesh since the days of old daddy Adam.'"
anaphora
allusion
epiphany
setting
24. "She said [smoking] was a mean practice and wasn't clean, and I must try to not do it any more. . . . And she took snuff too; of course that was all right, because she done it herself."
tragedy
understatement
elevated diction
satire
25. "Whose woods these are I think I know. / His house is in the village, though; / He will not see me stopping here / To watch his woods fill up with snow."
iambic tetrameter
iambic pentameter
trochaic tetrameter
free verse