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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Rilke write in his first letter, imploring the reader to try to love?
(a) The answers.
(b) The questions themselves.
(c) Dignity.
(d) The truth.

2. 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.

3. What does Rilke suggest that the young are apt to do in love?
(a) Marry for money.
(b) Stand solitary.
(c) Not listen to each other.
(d) Give oneself away.

4. Rilke writes in one letter, "At bottom ______ can help anyone else in life."
(a) Everyone.
(b) No one.
(c) Women.
(d) Men.

5. In the excerpt of Rilke's letter in the Introduction, what essay does he refer to reading?
(a) Cicero's Symposium.
(b) Platos' Cave.
(c) Plato's Symposium.
(d) Homer's Odyssey.

6. One poem, using nature imagery, reads, "Cheerful gift from the chillier / mountains / attempts to leap into ____."
(a) Summer.
(b) Spring.
(c) August.
(d) June.

7. Who does Rilke say is incapable of such loving as he calls for?
(a) Women.
(b) Religious people.
(c) Virgins.
(d) Young people.

8. Rilke writes in one untitled poem, "Like the _____ of quickly grown-up girls / one braids differently."
(a) Ringlets.
(b) Lipstick.
(c) Hairpins.
(d) Pigtails.

9. Two-thirds of the poems in "Rilke's Poems on Other Difficulties" come from what year?
(a) 1915.
(b) 1919.
(c) 1924.
(d) 1932.

10. Of what fruit does Rilke write of in "The Poet Praises"?
(a) Grapefruit.
(b) Strawberry.
(c) Orange.
(d) Banana.

11. Rilke writes of love that "So whoever loves must try to act as if he had a _________."
(a) Holy thing.
(b) Priceless possession.
(c) Great work.
(d) Fragile jewel.

12. From what language has the author translated the poems and prose excerpts of "Rilke on Love and Other Difficulties"?
(a) Austrian.
(b) Bohemian.
(c) French.
(d) German.

13. According to Rilke, there is "scarcely anything more difficult" than what?
(a) To stand alone.
(b) To leave one's love.
(c) To birth a child.
(d) To love one another.

14. In "The Poet Praises," Rilke writes, "Maidens, you warm ones, maidens, you mute and dumb, / dance the taste of the experienced _____!"
(a) Fruit.
(b) Silence.
(c) Berries.
(d) Jams.

15. Rilke writes in his letters, "Why have they made our sex _______, instead of making it the place for the festival of our competency?"
(a) Homeless.
(b) Loving.
(c) Dangerous.
(d) Carefree.

Short Answer Questions

1. In the Introduction to "Rilke's Poems on Other Difficulties," Mood writes that Rilke "began as a bit of a sticky late ______."

2. What is the title of the poem which begins, "Center, how you draw yourself out"?

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

4. Which poem begins, "See how in their veins all becomes spirit"?

5. Which poem from "Rilke's Poems of Other Difficulties" speaks of a king?

(see the answer keys)

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