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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. The final portion of Part IV of "The Dry Salvages" sees the speaker implore prayer on behalf of those who end "wherever cannot reach them the sound of the sea bell's" what?

2. What is the first of the "gifts reserved for age" that the speaker's interlocutor discloses in Part II of "Little Gidding"?

3. The last two lines of Part IV of "Little Gidding" state that "We only live, only suspire / Consumed by either" what or what?

4. It is said in the second part of "The Dry Salvages" that when one becomes older it seems as though "the past has another pattern, and ceases to be a" what?

5. The speaker in the "The Dry Salvages"'s third part, enjoins his auditor to consider the future and the past with what?

Short Essay Questions

1. How can one be "redeemed from fire by fire," as is stated in Part IV of "Little Gidding"?

2. What is the meaning of "Behovely" as it is used in the phrase, found in Part III of "Little Gidding" that, "Sin is Behovely"?

3. What is meant by the speaker's interlocutor's phrase that "next year's words await another voice" in Part II of "Little Gidding"?

4. What is meant by saying in the final part of "Little Gidding" that "history is a pattern / Of timeless moments"?

5. How is "Time the destroyer" also "time the preserver," as stated in Part II of "The Dry Salvages"?

6. What is the significance of the lines in Part II of "The Dry Salvages," "Only the hardly, barely prayable / Prayer of the one Annunciation"?

7. Explain what is meant by the paradoxical statement in Part V of "The Dry Salvages," "music heard so deeply / That it is not heard at all."

8. With whom does the speaker of Part II of "Little Gidding" converse, and what is their relationship to one another, on the literal level?

9. What is meant by the phrase, in Part V of "Little Gidding," "Every poem [is] an epitaph"?

10. What is the purpose of the lines in Part V of "The Dry Salvages" from "To communicate with Mars, converse with spirits," to "Whether on the shores of Asia, or in the Edgware Road"?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In a critical essay, evaluate the meaning and significance of the following lines:

"Only a flicker

Over the strained time-ridden faces

Distracted from distraction by distraction

Filled with fancies and empty of meaning

Tumid apathy with no concentration"

Specifically, what is being conveyed by these lines? What is the meaning of each line? What does each line demonstrate about the condition of the human person? What do they demonstrate about human nature? How is this conception important to the interpretation of The Four Quartets? Against what is modern man struggling?

Essay Topic 2

Though explicitly mentioned only once, in Part V of "Burnt Norton," the Word, a conventional Christian signifier for Christ, is a vitally important concept to understanding the whole of The Four Quartets. Through careful exegesis, discuss the way in which the Word is central to the four poems. What is the Word? Why is Christ called the Word? What other significations does the Greek word "logos" have that are associated with Christ as the Word? In what way is this Word unlike all others? What is expressed by the Word? What is the relation of the Word to perfection? How is this Word, as perfection, within the world? What is significant about Its presence in the world? How can this be seen throughout the poem?

Essay Topic 3

Compose an expository essay on the nature of poetic imagery, using Eliot's Four Quartets as an example. What is imagery? What is the purpose of imagery? How is imagery commonly used in poetry? What are some specific examples of poetic images? What are metaphorical images? What are some examples of metaphorical images in The Four Quartets? What are the literal significations of such images? What are their non-literal significations? How does one interpret their meaning? How are they important for interpretation of the meaning of the poem? What do they uniquely contribute to the poem?

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