GRE Subject Test: Literature in English : Identification of Poetry
Study concepts, example questions & explanations for GRE Subject Test: Literature in English
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Example Questions
Example Question #7 : Identification Of British Poetry To 1660
In a somer seson, whan softe was the sonne,
I shoop me into shroudes as I a sheep weere,
In habite as an heremite unholy of werkes,
Wente wide in this world wondres to here.
Ac on a May morwenynge on Malverne hilles
Me bifel a ferly, of Fairye me thoghte.
I was wery forwandred and wente me to reste
Under a brood bank by a bournes syde;
And as I lay and lenede and loked on the watres,
I slombred into a slepyng, it sweyed so murye.
What is the title of the poem from which these lines are taken?
Piers Plowman
The General Prologue to The Canterbury Tales
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Troilus and Cressida
Pyramus and Thisbe
Piers Plowman
Written in the late 1300s, this poem is titled Piers Plowman and is widely considered one of the most important works of Middle English literature. Langland used unrhymed alliterative verse to develop his satirical religious allegory featuring three men, Dobest, Dobet, and Dowel.
Passage adapted from Piers Plowman, l.1-10
Example Question #2 : Identification Of British Poetry To 1660
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?
The Faerie Queene
Piers Plowman
Beowulf
Grendel
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
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 #3 : Identification Of British Poetry To 1660
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?
Beowulf
The Exeter Book
Piers Plowman
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 #10 : Identification Of British Poetry To 1660
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?
Bede
Boethius
Chaucer
The author is anonymous.
Dante
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 #241 : Identification
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
Beowulf
The Wanderer
The Seafarer
Pyramus and Thisbe
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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