英国文学练习册大题

英国文学练习册大题

Renaissance 1.“And ever as he rode , his hart did earne , To prove his puissance in battelll brave ” \\Questions; A. Identify the poem and the poet . B. What does the word “puissance ”mean?

C. Is theme of the poem”Arms and the Man ”? If not , tell your point and exp0lain it briefly . A.The Far\\erie Queene : Edumund Spenser B. Power ,p rowess.

C. No, “Fiercxe Wars and faithful loves .”

2.All the events are told in a romantic and fantastic way in order to arouse wonder .

“If he be not apt to beat over matters , let him study the lawyer?s cases . So every defect of the mind may have a special receipt .”

A. What does “beat over matters”mean ? B.What do“receipt”refer to ?

C.From which essay does the above sentences come , what is the essat mainly about? A.make thorough examinations of things

B.cure ,prescription

C.Of Sudies . It is the most popular of Bacon?s essays . It analyzes what studies chiefly serve for , the different ways adopted by different people to pursue studies , and how studies exert influence over human character .

3.:... So long as men can breathe , or eyes can see, / So long lives this and this give s life to thee.” Identify the author and the title of the work from which the two lines are taken . What is the implication of this work? What idea to the two lines express? William Shakespeare?s Sonnet18

A.The beauty in peotry can last for ever .

B.Shakespeare?s faith in th permanance of poetry .

4.“Here in the heart of \\hell to work in fire ,/ Or do his errand s in the gloomy deep.” A.Identify the title and the author .

B. what?s the meaning of “in the gloomy deep”? C.What does the poem attempts to convince us ?

Paradise Lost,John Milton . In chaos

The poem tries to convince us that the unquestionable truth of Biblical revelation means that an LL-knowing God was just in allowing Adam and Eve to be tempted and , out of their free will to choose sin and its inevitable punishment .

III. what are the characteristics of the Humanism ? A.Humanism is the essence of Renassance .

B. Humanists see that human beings were gloprious creatures capable of individual development in the dirction of perfection , and that the world they inhabited wasf theirs not despise but to question, explore , and enjoy the neauty of this lie , but had the ability to perfect himself and to perform wonders .

IV. What are the characteristics in the style of “Paradise Lost”?

Paradise Lost”, the greatest English epic since “Beowulf”, long and complicated lines , formal words . A

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lot of contrasts and parallels . The meanings of some lines are vague ; it is called Miltonic Vagueness. As a whole his style is a grand style . V.Francis Bacon is “Father of Science”. His work”Novum Organum”is the most impressive display of his intellect .

What is the main concern of the work?Qhy the work is so important for the development of modern science ?

The work is an argument for the imductive reasoning in place of the Aristotelian deductive reasoning . The Aristotelian reasoning only states the fact , not capable of discovery while the inductive reasoning , although starting with a hypothesis and developing with experiments , may lead to the discovery of true knowledge .

VI. Please give summary of the periods of Shakespeare?s literary career.

Shakespeare?s dramatic career is divided into four periods . The first : a period of apprenticeship , five historic plays . The second : his style and approach became highly individualized five histories, six comedies , e.g., and two tragedies. E.g. . The thierd : The most important period, the four greatest tragedies. ., tow comedies . The fourth:romantic tragicomedies:e.g. Neoclssical Perid 1. Some to conceit alone their taste confine , And glittering thoughts struck out at every line ; Pleased with a work where nothing ?s just or fit , One glaring chaos and wild heap0 of wit . Poets, like painters thus unskilled to trace The naked nature and the living grace, With gold and jewels cover every art. True wit is Nature to advantage dressed,

What oft was thought , but ne?er so well expressed;

Who is the author of this poem? What is the title from which tyhese lines are taken ? What idea does the poemexpress?

What is the great significance of the poem?

A.An Essay on Criticism by Alexander Pope.

B.Here Pope advises the critics not to stress too much the artificial use of conceit or the external beauty of language but to pay special attention to True Wit.

C.The poem, as a comprehensive study of the theories of literary criticism, exerted great influence upon Pope?s contemporary writers in advocating the classical rules and popularizing the neoclassicist tradition in England .

2. My gentleness and good behaviour had gained so far on the Emperor and his court , and indeed upon the army and people in gneral, that Ibegan to conceive hopes of getting my liberty in a short time .I took all possible methods to cultivate this favorable disposition . A.Identify the title and the author . B.Briefly interpret this passage .

A.Jonathan Swift: Gulliver?s Travels.

B.My good manner and deeds had made such a good impression on the emperor and his subjects that I began to hope that I could be set free soon . I tried my best to develop my good image . 3. Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,

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Their homely joys . and destiny obscure; Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile The short and simple annals of the poor.l A . Identify the title and the author B. What?s the meaning of this passage ?

A.Thomas Gray : Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard.

B. Ambitious people should not mock the poor people?s labour and their humble life, important people should not laugh at the short history of the poor .

II.What;s “neoclassicism”?

With the introduction of the Enlightenment Movement into England , a revival of interest in the old classical works was in full swing . This tendency is known as neoclassicism . According to the neoclassicist , all forms of literature were to be modeled after the classical works of the ancient Greek and Roman writers and those of the contemporary French ones . They believed that the artistic ideals should be order , logic, restrained emotion and acuracy , and that literature should be judged in terms of its service to humanity .

III.“Robinson Crusoe”is universally considered as Daniel Defoe?s masterpiece . Discuss why it became so successful when it was published?

Robinson Crusoe is supposedly based on the real adventure of an Alexander Selkirk who once stayed alone on the uninbabited island for five years . Actually , the story is an imagination .

In Robinson Crusoe, Defoe traces the growth of Robinson from a naive and artless youth into a shrewd and hardened man , tempered by numerous trials in his eventful life .

In the novel, Robinson is a real hero and he is an embodiment of the rising middle-class virtues in the mid-eighteenth century England .

Robinson Crusoe is an adventure story very much in the spirit of the time , Because of the above reasons , when it was published, people all liked that sory , and it became an immediate success. IV.What is the symbolic meaning of the “Vanity Fair ”in Bunyan?s “The Pilgrim?s Rogress”?

“Vanity Fair”sells all kinds of merchandise such as houses,lands , honors, titles, lusts ,pleasures. It symbolizes the society where everything becomes goods and can be bought by money .

V.What is the implication of the title of the play “The School for Scandal”?

The title “The School for Scandal” is satiric term . The society of the rich people was a school in which they wer learning to creat and spread scandals to ruin others? reputations. VI. briefly discuss “Enlightenment Movement”

Enlightenment Movement was a progressive intellectual movement , which flourished in France and swept through the whole Western Europe. The movement was a furtherance of the Renaissance from the 14th century to the mid-17th century . The purpose of the movement was to enlighten th whole world with the light of modern phiosophical and artistic ideas . It celebrated reason of rationality , equality and science . It advocated universal education .Literature at the time became a very popular means of public education . Romantic Period 1. When my mother died I was very young , And my father sold me while yet my tongue Could scarcely cry “weep!weep!weep!”.So your chimney I sweep , &in soot I sleep .

A. Who is the autor ?and the title of the poem from which this stanza is taken ? B. What does the “weep” mean.

C. Based on this stanza , discuss the characteristics of his poems in his early years . A. William Blake?s “Songs of Innocence.”

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B. Here means “sweep”, it is the child?s lisping attempt at the chimney sweeper?s street cry .

C.The tones of his early poems are mainly joy , laughter , love and harmony. His language in many poems is plain and direct . His poems often carry the lyric beauty with immense compression of meaning . jSymbolism in wide range is also a distinctive feature of his poetry . 2.I wandered lonely as a cloud that floats on higho?er vales and hills ,

When all at once I saw a crowd, A host , of golden daffodils; Beside the lake , beneath the trees , Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. A.Identify the poem and the poet .

B.In several sentences , interpret the meaning of this stanza .

C.From the characteristics of this stanza , we can deduce which period it belongs to .

A.by William Wordsworth

B.Like a cloud flying over valleys and moutains , I was travlling .suddenly to my surprise I saw a grove of daffodils at the side of the lake . How beautiful they were, fluttering and dancing in the wind . This poem typically depicts the author?s respect for nature . C.The Romantic Period.

3. Cleave themselves into chasms , while far below The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear The sapless foliage of the ocean , know The vocie , and suddenlygrow grey with fear , And tremble and despoil themselves: O hear !

A. What do the two stanzas describe?

B. What idea does the poem express from which the two stanzas taken from? c. Based on the above qualities , identify the author of the poem .

A.the power of the wind , even the vegetation at the bottom of the sea grow grey when it comes. b. The poem expresses his eagerness to enjoy the boundless freedom from the reality . c. Percy Bysshe Shelley. Questions and Answers : I.What are the characteristics of the romantic literature ?

In poetry writing , the romanticist employed new theories and innovated new tchniques , for example , the preface to the second edition of the “Lyrical Ballads”acts as a manifesto for the new school . The romanticist not only extol the faculty of imagination , but also elevate the concepts of spontaneity and inspiration .

They regarded nature as the major source of poetic imagery and the dominant subject . Romantics also tend to be nationalistic .

II.What are the features of the “Byronic Hero”

A proud , mysterious rebel figure of noble origin . With immense superiority in his passions , and powers , this Byronic hero would carry on his shoulders the burden of righting all the wrongs in a corrupt society , and would rise single-handedly against any kind of tyrannical rules. What are the two functions of the west wind in Shelley ?s “Ode to the West Wind ”?

The west wind is both a destroyer and a preserver . It destroys the dead leaves , thesymbol of old rotten society , it preserves the seeds , th symbol of new-born things and a new world .

III**Generally speaking , Jane Austen was a writer of the 18th-century , though she lived mainly in the nineteenth century . Based on her writings, discuss Jane Austen?s greatest contribution to English literature. Jane Austen is one of the most important Romantic novelists in English literature . She creates six influential novels.

Her main literary concern is about human heings in their personal relationships . She makes trivial daily life as important as the concerns about human belief or career and salient social event . This is

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what makes her important in English literature .

Jane Austen has brought the English novel, as an art of form, to its maturity because of her sensitivity to universal patterns of human behavior and her accurate portrayal of human individuals.

She describes the world from a woman?s point of view , and depicts a group of authentic and common women . Victoria Period 1. Yes ,so ,sir , I rejoined : and yet not so : for you are a married man –or as good as a married man , and wed to one inferior to you –to one with whom you have no sympathy –whom I do not believe you truly love ; for I have seen and heard you sneer at her . I would scorn such a union ; therefore I am better than you –let me go !

Questions : A. What does “I ” represents ? Who is “i” in text ?

B: Identify the writer and the title of the novel from which this passage is taken .

C.What idea do the passage expresses?

Answers : A. In text , “I” refers to Jane Eyre . B. Charlotte?s Jane Eyre

C. Those middle-class working women are struggling for recognition of their basic rights and equality as a human being .

2. T;sis not too late to seek a newer world .

Push off, and sitting well in order smite The sounding furrows: for purpose holds To sail beyond sunset and the baths Of all the western stars until I die.

Questions: A. Identify the writer and the title of the poem . B. What?s the meaning of “smile”? C. Interpret this passage .

Answers: A. Alfred \\Tennyson: Ulysses. B. Strike hard.

C. It is not late to explore a new world . Sart our sailing and get ready to fight against the roaring tides . My goal is to pursue the setting sun beyond the seas till the end of my life .

3. “Her blooming full-pulsed youth stood there in moral imprisonment which made itself one with the chill, colourless, narrowed landscape , with the shrunken furniture , the never –read books, and the ghostly stay in pale fantastic world that seemed to be vanishing from the daylight.” Questions : A. Who is the lady mentioned in this passage? B. Who is the author of this novel?

C. Scan the woman protagonist in this novel . Answers : A. Dorothea

B. George Eliot

c. Dorothea is a beariful , intelligent young lady of an ardent and theoretic nature”.She , with great intelligence , potential and social aspirations , isn\\t satisfied with the common fate of gentle –women , but she fails in achieving her goals owing to the social environment as well as her own vulnerability l. I. What kind of characyter is “Jane Eyre” in Charlotte?s novel?

Jane Eyre , an orphan child with a fiery spirit and lionging to love and to be loved , a poor , plain , little governess who dares to love her master , and brave enough to declare her love for him . She has quick wit , honesty , frankness and a spirit of independence and self-dignity .

II.What does Thomas Hardy think of fate and chance ?

Hardy thinks that the nature I shown as some mysterious supematural force , powerful but half-blind ,

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uncaring to the individual?s will , hope , passion or suffering . It play s practical jokes upon human beings by producing a series of mistimed actions and unfortunate coincidences . Man proves impotent before fate .

III. Browning?s style is very different from that of any other Victorian poets His poetic style belongs to the twentieth century rather than to the Victorian age . What is the art of his poems ?

A. In his poems , Browning chosses a dramatic moment or a crisis , in which his characters are made to talk about their lives , and about their minds and hearts .

B. Browning ?s poetry is not easy to read . His rhythms are often too fast , too rough and unmusical . The syntasx is usually clipped and highly compressed . the similes and illustration s appear too profusely .

C. The allusions and implications are sometimes odd and farfetched. All this makes up his obscurity . D. There are abundanbt metaphors in his poems .

IV. Charles Dickens is one of the greatest Victorian writers in his own unique way . Discuss Dickens? art of novels : the setting , the language , and the characters , etc . based on his nivel Olive Twist . A. He uses a mixture of the contemporary and recollected past as his fictionl settings . B. With his first sentence, he engages the reader?s attention and holds it to the end .

C. His best –depicted characters are those innocent , virtuous , persecuted, helpless child characters such as Oliver Twist .

D. The figures that he depicted, marked out by some peculiarity in physical , speech or manner , are both types and individuals .

E. Dicken?s works are also characterized by a mingling of humor and pathos. Modern Period 1. “I will arise and go now , and go to Innisfree. And a small cabin build there , of clay and wattles madep; Nine bean –rows will I have ther , a hive for the honey bee, And live alone in the bee-loud glade .” Questions : A. From which poem the stanza is taken ?

B. What is the setting of the poem ?

c. From the syle of the poem , which period can we deduce the writer beling to ?

A. William Butler Yeats?

B. Tired of the life of his day , Yeats sought to escape into an ideal “fairy-land ”where he could live calmly as a hermit and enjoy the beauty of nature , then he wrote this poem . c. The Modern Period .

2. “The yellow fog that rubs its ack upon the windowpanes , The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the windowpanes . Linked its tongue into the corners of the evening, Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains .”

Questions: A. Identify the author and the title of the work from which this stanza is taken . B. Write down the characteristics of the protagonist in the poem .

c. What is the setting of the poem ?

A. T.S.Eliot, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”.

B. Prufrock , the protagonist of the poem , is neurotick, self-important , illogical and incapable of action . He is a kind of tragic figure caught in a sense of defeated idealism and tortured by unsatisfied desires .

C. The setting of the poem resembles the “polite society ”of Pope?s The Rape of the Lock , in which a tea party is sinificant event and a game of cards is the only way to stave off boredon .

3. “He went out to dinner several times in his evening suit that had been William?s. Each time his mother?s

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heart was firm with pride and joy . He was stated now . The studs she and the children had bought for William were in his shirt – front ; he wore one of William?s dress shirts . But he had an elegant figure . His face was rough , but wrm-looking and rather pleasing . He did not look particularly a gentleman , but she thought he looked quite a man .”

Questions : A. What is the title of the novel from which this passage is taken ? Who is the author ? B. Why each time his mother?s heat was firm with pride and joy ? C/ What idea does this passage express? A. D.H. Lawrence?s Sons and Lovers /

B. Because his mother wanted him to climb into the middle class. C. Mrs. Morel is eager to make her son climb into the middle class .

I. What is “stream of consciousness ” in novel writing ?

Stream of consciousness is a literary trend of modernism with the notion that multiple levels of consciousness existed simultaneously in human mind , that one?s present was the sum of his past , present and future , and that the whole truth about human being s existed in the unique , isolated and private world of each individual . Writers like Dorothy Richardson , James Joyce and Virgina Woolf concentrated all their efforts on digging into human consciousness . In their writings , the past , The present and the future are mingled together and exit at the same time in the consciousness of an individual .

II. George Bernard Shaw is the leading playwright of his time .What?s Bernard Shaw?s viewpoint on literature ?

Shaw attacked the Neo-Romantic tradition and the fashionable drawing drama . He hold that art should serve social purposes by reflecting human life , revealing social contradictions and educating people . The mission of his drama was to reveal th emoral , political and economic truth from a raical rformist point of view .

III. What are the modernistic characteristics of D. H. Lawrence?s novels ?

Lawrence introduces psychology into his works . He believes that the healthy way of the individual?s psychological development lay in the primacy of the life impulse , the sexal impulse . \\By presenting the psychological experience of individual human life and of human relationship , he openes up a wide new territory to the novel . IV. Discuss the striking feature of Paul . the ain character in “Sons and Lovers ”?

A. He gradually comes under the strong influence of the mother in affections , aspiration and mental habits , and sees his father with his mother?s eyes .

B. Paul depends heavily on his mother?s love and help to make sense of world around him .

C. In order to become an independent man and a true artist he has to make his own decisions about his life and work , and has to struggle to become free from his mother?s influence .

D. Paul is proved to be incapable of escaping the over pwering emotional bond imposed by his mother?s love , so he fails to achieve a fulfilling relationship with either girl .

e.Finally ,Paul deterined to face the unkonwn future . V. What;?s the theme of “ The Man of Peoperty

The theme of it is that of the predomant possessive instinct of the Forsytes and its effects upon the personal relationships of family with the underlying assumption that human relationships of the contemporary English society are merely an extension of property relationships .

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