GRE Subject Test: Literature in English : Contexts of British Poetry 1660–1925
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Example Questions
Example Question #73 : Contexts Of British Poetry
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes;
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
Who is the author of this work?
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
George Gordon
John Keats
Christina Rossetti
Robert Browning
George Gordon
This is the beginning of “She Walks in Beauty,” (1813) is a poem by George Gordon (A.K.A Lord Byron).
Robert Browning wrote Sordello (1840), Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote A Essay on Mind, with Other Poems (1826), John Keats wrote "O Solitude" (1816), and Christina Rossetti wrote Goblin Market (1862).
Example Question #74 : Contexts Of British Poetry
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes;
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
What is the other name of the author of this work?
George Eliot
C.S. Lewis
Lord Byron
“Man Without a Spleen”
Lord Tennyson
Lord Byron
George Gordon was commonly known by his baronial title: Lord Byron.
Alfred, Lord Tennyson wrote Poems (1842), George Eliot wrote Middlemarch (1874), and C.S. Lewis wrote The Pilgrim's Regress (1933).
Passage adapted from “She Walks in Beauty” (1813) by George Gordon.
Example Question #75 : Contexts Of British Poetry
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes;
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
Which of the following is not another work by this poet?
The Bride of Abydos
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
“My Last Duchess”
Don Juan
Manfred
“My Last Duchess”
“My Last Duchess” is a poem by the English poet Robert Browning.
Don Juan was published in 1819, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage was published in 1812, The Bride of Abydos was published in 1814, and Manfred was published in 1817.
Passage adapted from “She Walks in Beauty” (1813) by George Gordon.
Example Question #72 : Cultural And Historical Contexts
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes;
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
When was this work published?
1820s
1810s
1850s
1840s
1830s
1810s
This poem was published in 1814. You could have narrowed down the choices if you knew that Lord Byron lived from 1788 to 1824.
Passage adapted from “She Walks in Beauty” (1813) by George Gordon.
Example Question #77 : Contexts Of British Poetry
On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the wold and meet the sky;
And thro' the field the road runs by
To many-tower'd Camelot;
And up and down the people go,
Gazing where the lilies blow
Round an island there below,
The island of Shalott.
During what historical era was this poem published?
Victorian
fin de siècle
Gilded Age
American Revolutionary
French Revolutionary
Victorian
“The Lady of Shalott” was published in England in two versions: the first in 1833 and the second in 1842. Both dates situate this poem within the beginning of the Victorian era.
Passage adapted from "The Lady of Shalott," first published in Poems by Alfred Tennyson (1833).
Example Question #78 : Contexts Of British Poetry
On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the wold and meet the sky;
And thro' the field the road runs by
To many-tower'd Camelot;
And up and down the people go,
Gazing where the lilies blow
Round an island there below,
The island of Shalott.
Which of the following words best describes this stanza of the poem?
Parodic
Pastoral
Paean
Picaresque
Panegyric
Pastoral
The first several stanzas of “The Lady of Shalott” are pastoral; that is, they describe an idyllic country scene with great detail and vivid nature imagery. There are few things more pastoral than the idea of "long fields of barley and rye,/ that clothe the world and meet the sky."
Passage adapted from "The Lady of Shalott," first published in Poems by Alfred Tennyson (1833).
Example Question #79 : Contexts Of British Poetry
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings;
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Who is the author of this poem?
John Keats
George Gordon
William Wordsworth
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley
This is the full text of “Ozymandias,” one of the most famous poems by the English author Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822).
Alfred, Lord Tennyson wrote Poems (1833), George Gordon wrote Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (1812), John Keats wrote "Sleep and Poetry" (1816), and William Wordsworth co-wrote The Lyrical Ballads (1798)
Passage adapted from "Ozymandias," by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1818).
Example Question #67 : Contexts Of British Poetry 1660–1925
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings;
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Which of the following is not a work by this poet?
“Ode to the West Wind”
“I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud”
Queen Mab
Adonais
“Love’s Philosophy”
“I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud”
Queen Mab (1813), Adonais (1821), “Love’s Philosophy” (1820), and “Ode to the West Wind” (1820) are all by Percy Bysshe Shelley. “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” is an 1807 poem by William Wordsworth.
Passage adapted from "Ozymandias," by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1818).
Example Question #81 : Contexts Of British Poetry
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings;
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
When was this poem published?
1790s
1850s
1830s
1870s
1810s
1810s
This poem first appeared in January 1818 in The Examiner, a few weeks before Horace Smith’s poem of the same name.
Passage adapted from "Ozymandias," by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1818).
Example Question #82 : Cultural And Historical Contexts
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings;
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
This poem was written in competition with which poet?
William Blake
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Arthur Henry Hallam
Horace Smith
William Cowper
Horace Smith
Shelley and his friend, the English poet Horace Smith (1779–1849), each wrote a poem inspired by the British Museum’s acquisition of a statue of the ancient Egyptian pharaoh Ozymandias (also known as Ramesses II). Shelley’s was published a few weeks before Smith’s and achieved far more fame, even though there are many marked similarities between the two.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge co-wrote The Lyrical Ballads (1798), William Cowper wrote The Task (1785), William Blake wrote Songs of Innocence (1789), and Arthur Henry Hallam wrote Remains in Verse and Prose of Arthur Henry Hallam (1862).
Passage adapted from "Ozymandias," by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1818).
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