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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. What number does the speaker of "The Cultivation of Christmas Trees" ascribe to the last Christmas?

2. In the fourth Landscape, which of the following does the road NOT wind?

3. Whom does the speaker of "Four Quartets: The Dry Salvages" think is a "strong brown god"?

4. In Part I of "Four Quartets: Burnt Norton", into what does the "door we never opened" lead?

5. In the sixth chorus of 'The Rock,' it is said that it is hard for those who have never known persecution or a Christian to believe what?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the tone of the five parts of the "Five-Finger Exercises" and how is this indicated?

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

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

4. What is implied about the owner of the eyes about whom the speaker is talking in "Eyes that last I saw in tears"?

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

6. What are the women doing with the card game in the "Fragment of a Prologue"?

7. For what is the ship in "Marina" a symbolic signifier?

8. What does the speaker mean by saying that "Our only health is the disease" in Part IV of "East Coker"?

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

10. What is implied by the repetition of the phrase "meaning / Death," in reference to the various stages of life's enjoyment in "Marina"?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Few poems, if any, have had as profound an impact on the world of poetry and literature as "The Waste Land", and yet its interpretation remains a subject of great dispute. In your own critical analysis, provide an interpretation of this complex and multi-layered poem. What is the significance of the major images and characters in the poem? What is meant by the often obscure and cryptic language? What is the relationship of the five parts to one another? What is the significance of the frequent inclusion of water as a symbolic figure in the poem? What is the overall, coherent signification of the poem?

Essay Topic 2

In most of T.S. Eliot's poems, most notably "The Waste Land", there is a frequency of allusion and alteration of allusions. These are often used to great effect. Analyze the usage and purpose of these allusions in one or more of Eliot's poems, demonstrating how they contribute to the poem's meaning and style. From where are the allusions taken? How are they altered if at all? What is significant about the source of the allusions? What is significant about their alteration if they are altered? What is significant about their placement in the text? How do they contribute to the poem's meaning?

Essay Topic 3

As T.S. Eliot's character of the "everyman," Sweeney appears in a number of poems and in one of the fragments of the unfinished poem, the "Sweeney Agonistes". Analyze the character of Sweeney as he appears in at least one of Eliot's works, giving an overall portrayal of the character through specific instances. What are his principal traits? What does he lack as a person? In what sort of actions does he engage? How is he representative of modern man? Who and what are used as contrasts to Sweeney as a person and Sweeney's patterns of behavior?

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