“Sonnet 43” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
1.
Paraphrase using your own words how the speaker describes her love in lines 1-8?
2.
What do these lines reveal about the nature of the speaker’s love?
3.
How does the speaker describe her love in lines 9-12?
4.
What can you infer about the speaker’s past from lines 9-12?
5.
What does the speaker mean when she states,” I love thee with the breath, / Smiles, tears, of all
my life”?
6.
How long does the speaker expect her love to last? Cite from the poem to support this answer.
7.
How does the repetition of “I love thee” contribute to the poem’s message? State the message.
8.
What is the speaker’s tone toward the subject of the poem?
“Porphyria’s Lover” by Robert Browning
1.
What does Porphyria do after entering the cottage (lines 6-35)?
2.
What does her behavior seem to suggest about her character?
3.
Describe the nature of the relationship between the speaker and Porphyria.
4.
What does the speaker do to Porphyria? What do his subsequent thoughts and actions seem to
suggest about his motivation for this act?
5.
What does the last line tell you about the speaker’s state of mind?
6.
How does the setting of the poem contribute to its story?
7.
How does the tone of the speaker contribute to its atmosphere?
8.
How does the regular meter and rhyme scheme contribute to the speaker’s actions?
“Dover Beach” by Matthew Arnold
1.
What does the speaker describe in lines 1-5? How does the speaker feel about the things he
describes?
2.
What emotion does the speaker associate with the sound of waves?
3.
What contrast does the speaker set up in the first stanza?
4.
What allusion does Arnold make in the second stanza? What does this allusion suggest about
the speaker’s thoughts?
5.
What is faith compared to in the third stanza? What is the speaker saying about faith?
6.
How does the speaker describe the world in the fourth stanza?
7.
What is the speaker’s outlook on life? On love?
8.
What is the theme of the poem?
“Ah, Are You Digging on My Grave?” by Thomas Hardy
1.
Who does the woman think might be digging on her grave?
2.
How do these people now regard the woman?
3.
How does the woman react when she learns who is digging?
4.
What can you infer about the digger’s response?
5.
What is the theme of the poem?
“The Man He Killed” by Thomas Hardy
1.
What does the speaker think would have happened if he had met the man at an inn?
2.
What actually happened and why?
3.
In the fourth stanza, how does the speaker compare himself to the dead man?
4.
Why does he make this comparison?
5.
What is the tone of the poem?
“To an Athlete Dying Young” by A.E. Houseman
1.
Compare the two occasions on which the athlete is brought home “shoulder-high.” What has
happened in each case?
2.
What is the commentary and advice the speaker gives in lines 9-28?
3.
What is the speaker’s message of youth and fame?
“When I Was One-and Twenty” by A.E. Houseman
1.
What advice does the wise man give to the speaker?
2.
How does the speaker respond to the advice? Why?
3.
How does the speaker’s attitude change?
4.
What causes this change?
5.
What is ironic about the speaker’s life experience that he describes?
“When You Are Old” by William Butler Yeats
1.
According to the speaker, how did his love differ from that of others?
2.
What might you infer about the relationship between the woman and the speaker?
3.
What finally happened to Love?
4.
What does the personification of love seem to suggest about the woman?
5.
What is the speaker’s tone in the poem?
“Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night” by Dylan Thomas
1.
What is the speaker’s advice in the first stanza?
2.
What do dark and light symbolize in the poem?
3.
What types of people are mentioned in the poem? Why does each rage against death?
4.
What is the attitude the speaker wants his father to take toward death?
“Tears, Idle Tears” by Tennyson
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
In line 4, what sight inspires the speaker?
How is this sight both happy and sad? Cite from the poem to support each feeling.
In lines 10 and 15, what general adjectives does the speaker use to describe “the days that are
no more”?
What specific examples does the speaker present to illustrate and reinforce the adjectives from
question #3?
In lines 16-19, to what does the speaker compare “the days that are no more”?
How do the similes in #5 illustrate line 20 “death in life”?
What is the theme of the poem?
How does the title relate to the theme?
“Tears, Idle Tears”
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean,
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes,
In looking on the happy Autumn-fields,
And thinking of the days that are no more.
Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail,
That brings our friends up from the underworld,
Sad as the last which reddens over one
That sinks with all we love below the verge;
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more.
Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns
The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes
The casement slowly grows a glimmering square;
So sad, so strange, the days that are no more.
Dear as remembered kisses after death,
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned
On lips that are for others; deep as love
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret;
O Death in Life, the days that are no more.
Thomas Hardy’s “The Man He Killed”
"Had he and I but met
By some old ancient inn,
We should have sat us down to wet
Right many a nipperkin!
"But ranged as infantry,
And staring face to face,
I shot at him and he at me,
And killed him in his place.
"I shot him dead because –
Because he was my foe,
Just so – my foe of course he was;
That's clear enough; although
"He thought he'd 'list perhaps,
Off-hand like – just as I –
Was out of work – had sold his traps –
No other reason why.
"Yes; quaint and curious war is!
You shoot a fellow down
You'd treat if met where any bar is,
Or help to half-a-crown."