GRE Subject Test: Literature in English : Identification of British Poetry
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Example Questions
Example Question #92 : Identification Of Poetry
Lo! the Spear-Danes’ glory through splendid achievements
The folk-kings’ former fame we have heard of,
How princes displayed then their prowess-in-battle.
Oft Scyld the Scefing from scathers in numbers
From many a people their mead-benches tore.
Since first he found him friendless and wretched,
The earl had had terror: comfort he got for it,
Waxed ’neath the welkin, world-honor gained,
Till all his neighbors o’er sea were compelled to
Bow to his bidding and bring him their tribute:
An excellent atheling!
These lines begin which work of literature?
Piers Plowman
Beowulf
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Grendel
The Faerie Queene
Beowulf
Beowulf, one of the most important works of Old English literature, features the characters Scyld the Scefing, Hrothgar, Grendel, and the eponymous Beowulf of the Geats. The epic poem begins with the monster Grendel attacking Hrothgar’s mead-hall, Heorot, and follows Beowulf as he seeks vengeance.
Passage adapted from Beowulf l.1-11 (trans. Leslie Hall, 1892)
Example Question #93 : Identification Of Poetry
Lo I the man, whose Muse whilome did maske,
As time her taught, in lowly Shepheards weeds,
Am now enforst a far unfitter taske,
For trumpets sterne to chaunge mine Oaten reeds,
And sing of Knights and Ladies gentle deeds;
Whose prayses having slept in silence long,
Me, all too meane, the sacred Muse areeds
To blazon broade emongst her learned throng:
Fierce warres and faithfull loves shall moralize my song.
These lines begin which work of literature?
The Exeter Book
Piers Plowman
Beowulf
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
The Faerie Queene
The Faerie Queene
The Faerie Queene, published in the 1590s by Edward Spenser, includes an Arthurian plotline and various religious allegories. The poem is distinguishable by its nine-line Spenserian stanzas, which follows an ABABBCBCC rhyme scheme, with the first eight lines in iambic pentameter and the last in iambic hexameter.
Passage adapted from The Faerie Queene I.i.1.1-9 (1590)
Example Question #94 : Identification Of Poetry
Thou lykenest wommanes love to helle,
To bareyne lond, ther water may not dwelle.
Thou lyknest it also to wilde fyr;
The more it brenneth, the more it hath desyr
To consume every thing that brent wol be.
Thou seyst, that right as wormes shende a tree,
Right so a wyf destroyeth hir housbonde;
This knowe they that been to wyves bonde.
The above lines are written by which of the following authors?
Chaucer
Dante
Boethius
Bede
The author is anonymous.
Chaucer
This excerpt from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales is, like the rest of the work, unafraid to poke fun at idealized notions of romance. This particular passage is taken from the Wife of Bath's Tale. Chaucer’s poetry is distinguishable by its Middle English and The Canterbury Tales in particular can be identified by any mentions of its more famous characters, including the Wife of Bath, the Knight, the Miller, and the Reeve.
Passage adapted from the Prologue to "The Wife of Bath's Tale" l.371-378 in The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer (1475)
Example Question #31 : Identification Of British Poetry
May I for my own self song's truth reckon,
Journey's jargon, how I in harsh days
Hardship endured oft.
Bitter breast-cares have I abided,
Known on my keel many a care's hold,
And dire sea-surge, and there I oft spent
Narrow nightwatch nigh the ship's head
While she tossed close to cliffs.
These lines, originally written in Old English, are from an eleventh-century poem about a man sailing alone and his relationship to God. From which of the following poems is this passage taken?
The Canterbury Tales
Pyramus and Thisbe
The Seafarer
The Wanderer
Beowulf
The Seafarer
Translated by Ezra Pound, these are the opening lines of the anonymous 11th-century poem The Seafarer. The first-person poem appears in the Exeter Book, a canonical anthology of early poetry.
Passage adapted from The Seafarer l.1-8 (trans. Pound 1911)
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