Read the excerpt from "London's Summer Morning." Now pastry dainties catch the eye minute Of humming insects, while the limy snare Waits to enthrall them. What does this excerpt from the poem describe?
Which best describes the speaker of "London's Summer Morning"?
Read the excerpt from "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, The muttering retreats Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells: How is this excerpt an example of dramatic monologue?
Read the excerpt from "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock."And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully! Smoothed by long fingers, Asleep . . . tired . . . or it malingers, Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me. Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis? But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed, Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter, I am no prophet— and here’s no great matter; Which words best indicate that Prufrock feels anxious?
What does the repetition of the word "neutral" throughout "How We Entered World War I" emphasize?
Read the excerpt from "Poetry." nor is it valid to discriminate against "business documents andschool-books"; all these phenomena are important. One must make a distinction however: when dragged into prominence by half poets, the result is not poetry, nor till the poets among us can be "literalists of the imagination"—aboveinsolence and triviality and can presentfor inspection, "imaginary gardens with real toads in them," shall we have it.What selection supports the theme that “poetry is a relationship between imagination and reality”?
Read the excerpt from “Birches” by Robert Frost. When I see birches bend to left and right Across the line of straighter darker trees, I like to think some boy’s been swinging them. But swinging doesn’t bend them down to stay. Ice-storms do that. Often you must have seen themLoaded with ice a sunny winter morning After a rain. They click upon themselves As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel. Soon the sun’s warmth makes them shed crystal shells Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust— Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away You’d think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.What is the best description of the theme of this excerpt?
Read “Grass” by Carl Sandburg.Pile the bodies high at Austerlitz and Waterloo. Shovel them under and let me work— I am the grass; I cover all. And pile them high at Gettysburg And pile them high at Ypres and Verdun.Shovel them under and let me work. Two years, ten years, and passengers ask the conductor: What place is this? Where are we now? I am the grass. Let me work. Which statement best describes the speaker of the poem?
How does the author of "How We Entered World War I" organize the information in the text?
Read the poem “Roses,” by George Eliot. You love the roses—so do I. I wishThe sky would rain down roses, as they rainFrom off the shaken bush. Why will it not?Then all the valley would be pink and whiteAnd soft to tread on. They would fall as lightAs feathers, smelling sweet; and it would beLike sleeping and like waking, all at once! What is the main style difference between “Roses” and "Night"?
Read the excerpt from "Rhapsody on a Windy Night."Twelve o'clock. Along the reaches of the street Held in a lunar synthesis, Whispering lunar incantations Dissolve the floors of memory And all its clear relations, Its divisions and precisions, Every street lamp that I pass Beats like a fatalistic drum, And through the spaces of the dark Midnight shakes the memory As a madman shakes a dead geranium. Which phrase from the excerpt best indicates that the narrator is lost in thought?
Read the excerpt from "Rhapsody on a Windy Night."So the hand of a child, automatic, Slipped out and pocketed a toy that was running along the quay. I could see nothing behind that child’s eye. I have seen eyes in the street Trying to peer through lighted shutters What theme is reflected in this excerpt?
Read the excerpt from "Rhapsody on a Windy Night."The lamp hummed: "Regard the moon, La lune ne garde aucune rancune, She winks a feeble eye, She smiles into corners. She smoothes the hair of the grass. The moon has lost her memory. The French line “La lune ne garde aucune rancune” translates to “The moon never holds a grudge.” Which best describes the meaning of this line?
Read the excerpt from "Rhapsody on a Windy Night."I could see nothing behind that child's eye. I have seen eyes in the street Trying to peer through lighted shutters, And a crab one afternoon in a pool, An old crab with barnacles on his back, Gripped the end of a stick which I held him. The excerpt is an example of what type of narration?
There are many time references in "Rhapsody on a Windy Night," such asTwelve o'clock. Half-past one, Half-past three, The lamp said, "Four o'clock, What is the most likely explanation for these repeated references?
Read the excerpt from "The Lady Maid's Bell."But that wasn’t the only queer thing in the house. The very next day I found out that Mrs. Brympton had no nurse; and then I asked Agnes about the woman I had seen in the passage the afternoon before. Agnes said she had seen no one, and I saw that she thought I was dreaming. To be sure, it was dusk when we went down the passage, and she had excused herself for not bringing a light; but I had seen the woman plain enough to know her again if we should meet. I decided that she must have been a friend of the cook’s, or of one of the other women servants: perhaps she had come down from town for a night’s visit, and the servants wanted it kept secret. Some ladies are very stiff about having their servants’ friends in the house overnight. At any rate, I made up my mind to ask no more questions. Which statement describes a gothic element in this excerpt that reflects a social attitude of Wharton’s time?
Read the excerpt from "The Lady Maid's Bell."I had been near a week at Brympton before I saw my master. Word came that he was arriving one afternoon, and a change passed over the whole household. It was plain that nobody loved him below stairs. Mrs. Blinder took uncommon care with the dinner that night, but she snapped at the kitchen-maid in a way quite unusual with her; and Mr. Wace, the butler, a serious, slow-spoken man, went about his duties as if he'd been getting ready for a funeral. He was a great Bible-reader, Mr. Wace was, and had a beautiful assortment of texts at his command; but that day he used such dreadful language that I was about to leave the table, when he assured me it was all out of Isaiah; and I noticed that whenever the master came Mr. Wace took to the prophets.Which best describes a gothic element in the excerpt and the social attitude it reveals?
Read the excerpt from "The Lady Maid's Bell."But that wasn’t the only queer thing in the house. The very next day I found out that Mrs. Brympton had no nurse; and then I asked Agnes about the woman I had seen in the passage the afternoon before. Agnes said she had seen no one, and I saw that she thought I was dreaming. To be sure, it was dusk when we went down the passage, and she had excused herself for not bringing a light; but I had seen the woman plain enough to know her again if we should meet. I decided that she must have been a friend of the cook’s, or of one of the other women servants: perhaps she had come down from town for a night’s visit, and the servants wanted it kept secret. Some ladies are very stiff about having their servants’ friends in the house overnight. At any rate, I made up my mind to ask no more questions. How does this excerpt support the idea that the story is told by an unreliable narrator?
Read the excerpt from "The Lady Maid's Bell."Then he turned his back on me, and went on talking to his wife; and I knew what that meant, too. I was not the kind of morsel he was after. The typhoid had served me well enough in one way: it kept that kind of gentleman at arm’s-length.What does the narrator mean when she refers to Mr. Brympton as “that kind of gentleman”?
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