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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Apprehension of the point of intersection of the timeless with time is the occupation of whom, according to Part V of "Four Quartets: The Dry Salvages"?

2. If the eyes spoken of in "Eyes that last I saw in tears" outlast the tears, in what will they hold the speaker?

3. To which of the following are the lines of the fifth of the "Five Finger Exercises" addressed?

4. Across what river do the Tartar horsemen shake their spears in "The wind sprang up at four o'clock"?

5. Where is the speaker at the end of "Four Quartets: East Coker" according to Part I?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is a possible interpretation of the significance of the "Midwinter spring" described in Part I of "Little Gidding"?

2. What does it mean to be "redeemed from fire by fire" as stated in the fourth part of "Little Gidding"?

3. How was the speaker awoken in "The wind sprang up at four o'clock"?

4. What characterizes the metaphors used as description of the old man bearing the "tooth of wit" in "Lines for an Old Man"?

5. What is a possible interpretation of the use of the phrase "In my beginning is my end" and its inversion, "In my end is my beginning" at the beginning and end of "East Coker"?

6. What is the apparent distinction between the attitude towards Christmas of the child and the childish in "The Cultivation of Christmas Trees"?

7. What is the overall condition of true lovers described in "A Dedication to My Wife"?

8. Why does the speaker of "Lines for an Old Man" compare himself with a tiger?

9. What characterizes the tone of the poem in "Difficulties of a Statesman"?

10. What is characteristic of the gods described in all of the sections aside from Part IV of "The Dry Salvages"?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Literature and philosophy have often been considered close and sometimes overlapping disciplines of academic study and Western culture. That T.S. Eliot was well versed in both is demonstrated in his last major poems, the "Four Quartets". Select one of the "Four Quartets" and in a carefully planned critical essay, examine the relationship between its literary structure and its philosophical considerations. What are the philosophical topics approached in the poem? In what way does the poem consider things in abstraction? In what way is the poem a literary structure (operate on the definition of literature as the imaginative creation of character and/or action, according to the laws of possibility and necessity)? How does the literary structure corroborate the philosophical consideration? Wherein does one find the literary significance of the poem? Wherein is the philosophical consideration found?

Essay Topic 2

In "Choruses from 'The Rock'", it is postulated that man without the Church at the center of his life is lost. Analyze this claim in a critical essay that evaluates the messages put forth in all ten of the choruses. What is the Church itself? What does the Church provide man that the rest of the world cannot? What happens to the rest of the world, particularly insofar as men interact with it, if men put the Church at the center of their lives? What does this indicate about the nature of humanity, at least in the way that Eliot perceives it and portrays it in "Choruses from 'The Rock'"?

Essay Topic 3

Important to many of Eliot's poems are the devices of simile, metaphor, and analogy. Considering a wide selection of his poems, craft an analytical essay on these poetic devices. What are they? How do they aid in the creation of poetic imagery and poetic meaning? What are some specific instances of each? How do these specific instances aid the reader in both visualizing the poem's literal significance and its deeper meaning?

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