GRE Subject Test: Literature in English : GRE Subject Test: Literature in English
Study concepts, example questions & explanations for GRE Subject Test: Literature in English
All GRE Subject Test: Literature in English Resources
Example Questions
Example Question #271 : Gre Subject Test: Literature In English
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?
French Revolutionary
fin de siècle
Victorian
Gilded Age
American 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 #272 : Gre Subject Test: Literature In English
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?
Pastoral
Picaresque
Parodic
Paean
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 #273 : Gre Subject Test: Literature In English
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?
William Wordsworth
Percy Bysshe Shelley
John Keats
George Gordon
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
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?
“I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud”
Adonais
Queen Mab
“Ode to the West Wind”
“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 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?
1870s
1810s
1850s
1790s
1830s
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 #64 : 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.
This poem was written in competition with which poet?
Horace Smith
Arthur Henry Hallam
William Blake
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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).
Example Question #82 : Contexts Of 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.
What form is this poem?
Pantoum
Sonnet
Villanelle
Ghazal
Sestina
Sonnet
This is a sonnet, identifiable by its 14 lines and loose iambic pentameter. This poem, though, lacks the traditional rhyme scheme and octave-sestet structure of most sonnets.
Passage adapted from "Ozymandias," by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1818).
Example Question #84 : Contexts Of 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.
What is the name of the work by this same poet that elegizes John Keats?
“The Masque of Anarchy”
Adonais
Prometheus Unbound
“Music, When Soft Voices Die”
The Revolt of Islam
Adonais
Adonaïs: An Elegy on the Death of John Keats, Author of Endymion, Hyperion, etc. is, as its full title suggests, an 1821 pastoral poem eulogizing the death of the English poet John Keats (by Percy Bysshe Shelley). All the other titles are also works by Shelley. The Revolt of Islam was published in 1818, Prometheus Unbound was published in 1820, “The Masque of Anarchy” was published in 1819, and “Music, When Soft Voices Die” was published in 1824.
Passage adapted from "Ozymandias" (1818) by Percy Bysshe Shelley.
Example Question #83 : Contexts Of Poetry
On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the world 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.
Who is the author of this poem?
Percy Bysshe Shelley
George Gordon
William Wordsworth
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
John Keats
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
This is Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s poem “The Lady of Shalott.”
George Gordon (A.K.A Lord Byron) wrote Manfred (1817), William Wordsworth wrote The Prelude (1850), John Keats wrote Lamia, Isabella, The Eve of St. Agnes, and Other Poems (1820), and Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote Zastrozzi: A Romance (1810).
Passage adapted from "The Lady of Shalott" first published in Poems by Alfred Tennyson (1833).
Example Question #84 : Contexts Of Poetry
On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the world 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 is not another poem by this author?
“Endymion”
“Crossing the Bar”
“In Memoriam A.H.H.”
“Break, Break, Break”
“Ulysses”
“Endymion”
“Ulysses” (1842), “In Memoriam A.H.H.” (1849), “Break, Break, Break” (1842), and “Crossing the Bar” (1889) are all among Tennyson’s best known works. “Endymion” is an 1818 poem by the English poet John Keats.
Passage adapted from "The Lady of Shalott" first published in Poems by Alfred Tennyson (1833).
All GRE Subject Test: Literature in English Resources
