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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through The Difficulty of Dying: Rilke's Self-Composed Epitaph.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. From what comes the line, "Murderers are / easily comprehended"?
(a) Duino Elegies.
(b) The Seven Phallic Poems.
(c) Sonnets to Orpheus.
(d) Letters to a Young Poet.

2. In one untitled poem of "Rilke's Poems on Other Difficulties," Rilke writes, "Play the ____, the single ones, quickly and you..."
(a) Harps.
(b) Kisses.
(c) Loves.
(d) Deaths.

3. From whose point of view does the passage in "Blood-Remembering" come?
(a) William.
(b) Malte.
(c) Sarah.
(d) Johnathan.

4. In Part IV of "The Seven Phallic Poems," the poet writes, "You don't know ______, with your diffidence."
(a) Love.
(b) Towers.
(c) Sex.
(d) Gods.

5. Mood notes in his introduction to Rilke's poetry that the poet was "in no way an _______, nor in his life."
(a) Artist.
(b) Aesthete.
(c) Actor.
(d) Amateur.

Short Answer Questions

1. From what comes the line, "Killing is a form of our wandering mourning"?

2. What author does Rilke refer to in "The Dragon-Princess"?

3. Rilke's final metaphor in "The Dragon-Princess" states that perhaps all the "dragons of our lives are" what?

4. Speaking of solitude, Rilke writes, "We are solitary. We may _____ ourselves and act as though this were not so."

5. What does Rilke write in Part V of "The Seven Phallic Poems" has "weakened you and me"?

(see the answer key)

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