Multiple choice packet #8
Directions: The following poem was written by Lord Byron and published in 1815. Read the poem carefully before answering
the questions.
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies,
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meets in her aspect and her eyes;
(5) Thus mellow’d to that tender light
Which Heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair’d the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress
(10) 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,
(15) 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.
1. The first line of the poem contains an example of
A. caesura
B. ellipsis
C. metonymy
D. simile
E. metaphor
2. The first stanza of the poem also contains
A. alliteration
B. a heroic couplet
C. irony
D. slant rhyme
E. understatement
3.Which of the following best paraphrases the meaning of lines 5-6?
A. The bright light of daytime erases all shades of beauty.
B. The woman’s beauty is nuanced, like nighttime, as opposed to the straightforward and overly bright daytime.
C. When daytime is too cloudy for light to shine through, all beauty is lost.
D. The woman’s beauty is compared to that of Heaven.
E. Daylight “denies” night its soft light.
4.The difference in focus between the first and second stanzas is that
A. the first stanza limits itself to the woman’s outward appearance, while the second conjectures about what goes on in
the woman’s mind
B. the first stanza focuses on imagery of the night, while the second stanza focuses on the imagery of day
C. the first stanza relies on a simile, while the second relies on allegory
D. the first stanza describes meeting the woman, while the second describes the speaker’s first impressions
E. the metonymy of the first stanza is transformed into a simpler metaphor in the second stanza
5. The attitude of the speaker is best described as one of
A. unbridled enthusiasm
B. active discomfort
C. deep adoration
D. mild confusion
E. conflicted admiration
6.The last stanza relies heavily on which of the following?
A. characterizing the woman through her actions
B. following the progression of the woman’s life
C. dwelling on the woman’s overall appearance
D. enumerating individual aspects of the woman
E. examining the ways in which the woman speaks
7. Which of the following is true of rhyming in the poem?
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
The poem is in the form of a sonnet.
The rhyme scheme is regular throughout the poem.
The poem is written in free verse.
The poem contains no internal rhyme.
The rhyme scheme changes from stanza to stanza.
8. A major assumption of the poem is that
A. beauty is best compared to nature
B. night is always more beautiful than day
C. dark hair is associated with dark thoughts
D. only by conversing with someone can you find out how she thinks
E. outward appearance can be an indicator of inner goodness
9.The mood of the poem is
A. light and airy
B. turbulent and excited
C. calm and admiring
D. violently obsessed
E. self-effacing and distant
10.Which of the following is true of the speaker of the poem?
A. the speaker seems to dwell more on his own skills with words than on the virtues of the woman he is describing
B. the speaker seems to dwell more on his own skills with words than on the virtues of the woman he is describing
C. the speaker certainly admires the woman’s goodness because of his own lack of innocence
D. the speaker refrains from drawing attention to himself
E. the speaker conveys a feeling of sadness in his description of the woman’s beauty
Questions 11-20
Directions: Read the following passage carefully before you answer the questions. The passage is an excerpt from A Tale
of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens, and takes place around the start of the French Revolution.
A large cask of wine had been dropped and broken, in the street. The accident
had happened in getting it out of a cart; the cask had tumbled out with a run,
the hoops had burst, and it lay on the stones just outside the door of the wineshop, shattered like a walnut-shell.
(5) All the people within reach had suspended their business, or their idleness,
to run to the spot and drink the wine. The rough, irregular stones of the street,
pointing every way, and designed, one might have thought, expressly to lame
all living creatures that approached them, had dammed it into little pools;
these were surrounded, each by its own jostling group or crowd, according to
(10) its size. Some men kneeled down, made scoops of their two hands joined,
and sipped, or tried to help women, who bent over their shoulders, to sip,
before the wine had all run out between their fingers. Others, men and women,
dipped in the puddles with little mugs of mutilated earthenware, or even with
handkerchiefs from women's heads, which were squeezed dry into infants'
(15) mouths; others made small mud-embankments, to stem the wine as it ran;
others, directed by lookers-on up at high windows, darted here and there, to
cut off little streams of wine that started away in new directions; others
devoted themselves to the sodden and lee-dyed pieces of the cask, licking, and
even champing the moister wine-rotted fragments with eager relish. There was
(25) no drainage to carry off the wine, and not only did it all get taken up, but
so much mud got taken up along with it, that there might have been a
scavenger in the street, if anybody acquainted with it could have believed in
such a miraculous presence.
A shrill sound of laughter and of amused voices—voices of men, women, and
(30) children—resounded in the street while this wine game lasted. There was
little roughness in the sport, and much playfulness. There was a special
companionship in it, an observable inclination on the part of every one to join
some other one, which led, especially among the luckier or lighter-hearted, to
frolicsome embraces, drinking of healths, shaking of hands, and even joining
(35) of hands and dancing, a dozen together. When the wine was gone, and
the places where it had been most abundant were raked into a gridiron-pattern
by fingers, these demonstrations ceased, as suddenly as they had broken out.
The man who had left his saw sticking in the firewood he was cutting, set it in
motion again; the women who had left on a door-step the little pot of hot
(40) ashes, at which she had been trying to soften the pain in her own starved
fingers and toes, or in those of her child, returned to it; men with bare arms,
matted locks, and cadaverous faces, who had emerged into the winter light
from cellars, moved away, to descend again; and a gloom gathered on the
scene that appeared more natural to it than sunshine.
(45) The wine was red wine, and had stained the ground of the narrow street
in the suburb of Saint Antoine, in Paris, where it was spilled. It had stained
many hands, too, and many faces, and many naked feet, and many wooden
shoes. The hands of the man who sawed the wood, left red marks on the
billets; and the forehead of the woman who nursed her baby, was stained with
(50) the stain of the old rag she wound about her head again. Those who had
been greedy with the staves of the cask, had acquired a tigerish smear about
the mouth; and one tall joker so besmirched, his head more out of a long
squalid bag of a nightcap than in it, scrawled upon a wall with his finger
dipped in muddy wine-lees—BLOOD.
(55) The time was to come, when that wine too would be spilled on the streetstones, and when the stain of it would be red upon many there.
11. The first paragraph functions to
A. describe in detail the broken cask of wine, making it easy for the reader to picture the scene
B. overwhelm the reader with the image of spilled wine, largely through the long second sentence of the paragraph
C. quickly show that wine has spilled, without distracting the reader by explaining who dropped it, and why
D. cast blame on whoever dropped the cask, and show the spill to be unsightly
E. mislead the reader into believing that the breaking of the cask itself was more important than what followed
12. The tone of the sentence beginning in line 6 can best be described as
A. sarcastic
B. overemotional
C. apathetic
D. serene
E. frustrated
13.Which of the following statements is true of how people in the passage are characterized?
A.
B.
C.
D.
Differences between the characters are the main forces that shape their different responses to the spilled wine.
The characters are portrayed as representative of the community as a whole, more so than as individuals.
The narrator weaves a considerable amount of physical description into the passage.
The minimal characterization of individuals in the passage reflects the relatively small amount of importance placed on
the role of people in the scene.
E. The image of people celebrating the spilled wine together sets the tone for the passage as a whole.
14. The primary difference between second and third paragraphs is that
A. the second paragraph is concerned with how people respond to the wine, while the third is about how they interact with
each other
B. the second paragraph is about how the wine was spilled, and the third is about how people react to the spill
C. the second paragraph is mainly concerned with gustatory imagery, while the third is concerned with auditory imagery
D. the second paragraph questions whether the people’s actions are laudable, and the third paragraph presents a
response
E. the second paragraph shows the flaws in the setting, and the third paragraph shows the flaws in the people who live
there
15. The phrase “raked into a gridiron-pattern by fingers” (line 27), while having literal meaning, can also
be understood as an example of
A. metonymy
B. oxymoron
C. paradox
D. synecdoche
E. onomatopoeia
16. The passage as a whole relies strongly on which of the following techniques?
A. knowing where the event took place is the least important part of the passage
B. the reader is intended to be guessing where the passage takes place, until it is revealed
C. the setting is essential to understanding the passage, but would have made the rest of the passage less engaging if
revealed earlier
D. knowledge of the setting is unlikely to play a large role in the reader’s understanding of the scene
E. this event is representative of what could happen in other similar places, as well
17. The contrast between the way people act when there is still wine in the street and when all the wine
has been drunk
A. shows that their enthusiasm for anything will inevitably be short-lived
B. is expressed in stark, emotionless language
C. highlights the poverty and hardships of the characters’ lives
D. makes the celebration of the wine actually seem in bad taste and inappropriate
E. illustrates the narrator’s overly simplistic treatment of the subject at hand
18. The attitude of the narrator toward the people in the passage is best described as
A. disjointed admiration
B. distant uncertainty
C. delicate disapproval
D. detached pity
E. distinct unconcern
19. Because the setting is specified late in the passage (line 36), it is most likely true that
A. knowing where the event took place is the least important part of the passage
B. the reader is intended to be guessing where the passage takes place, until it is revealed
C. this event is representative of what could happen in other similar places, as well
D. the setting is essential to understanding the passage, but would have made the rest of the passage less engaging if
revealed earlier
E. knowledge of the setting is unlikely to play a large role in the reader’s understanding of the scene
20. The purpose of the passage as a whole is to
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
suggest that later violence could be avoided
prime the reader for violence to follow
place blame on the people of the neighborhood for future violence
analyze the relationships of the people in the neighborhood, to humanize their struggle
examine the nature of a conflict that could lead to violence