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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. Which of these words is used by the editor to describe Oliver's style?

2. Where did Oliver attend college?

3. What poet did Oliver live with for a time?

4. How many poems are in the first section?

5. What does Oliver call most of her poems?

Short Essay Questions

1. In Mysteries, Four of the Simple Ones, what is personified in the last lines?

2. In Mysteries, Four of the Simple Ones, what does Oliver ask about the blue heron?

3. In Mysteries, Four of the Simple Ones, what does Oliver ask about a seed grain?

4. What is the main question Oliver asks in Work Sometimes?

5. In Everything, what does Oliver say she wants her poems to be able to do?

6. How did Oliver feel at the beginning of Work Sometimes and why?

7. In The Real Prayers are Not the Words, but the Attention that Comes First, what does Mary Oliver state the real method of praying should be?

8. In The Measure, what does Oliver say happens to the lives that are watched over?

9. How did Oliver feel at the end of Work Sometimes?

10. What does Oliver state the reader has probably felt before in Work Sometimes?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Religion was a theme that was touched on a number of times in this book. Where did this theme appear, and what are some of the different ways this theme was introduced?

Essay Topic 2

Which of these poems did you relate most to, and why? What about that poem touched you in a personal way?

Essay Topic 3

What are some of the main examples of irony from these poems? How do these moments of irony change the tone of those poems?

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