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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Whom does Shakespeare attack in "Timon of Athens"?
(a) Alcibiades.
(b) Nietzsche.
(c) Christopher Marlowe.
(d) Geoffrey Chaucer.

2. In what way does Bloom say "The Merry Wives of Windsor" could be considered funny?
(a) As a sadomasochistic exercise.
(b) As slapstick.
(c) As a comedy of errors.
(d) As an existential comedy.

3. What does Bloom say the reader needs to know about "Henry V"?
(a) The end of the story, where Henry V is betrayed.
(b) The seething undercurrents beneath Henry V's pageantry.
(c) Henry V's true motives.
(d) The limits of the pageantry.

4. What does Fluellen's comparison mean for Henry V?
(a) He will be betrayed by his friends.
(b) He will turn on his friends.
(c) He will enjoy great power.
(d) He will avoid responsibilities.

5. How does Bloom characterize Coriolanus as a character of Shakespeare's?
(a) Not very introspective.
(b) More doubtful than most.
(c) Not passive at all.
(d) More powerful than most.

6. What does Bloom say Thebes in "Two Noble Kinsmen" refers to?
(a) London in 1609.
(b) Athens in 431.
(c) Paris in 1599.
(d) London in 1613.

7. What was Wilkins' role in "Pericles"?
(a) He wrote the whole play.
(b) He wrote the play on which Shakespeare based his 'Pericles'.
(c) He made substantive changes to the only surviving manuscript of the play.
(d) He wrote the first two acts.

8. What does Bloom say in response to Hamlet's claim that he was a prisoner in Denmark?
(a) That he is not in fact imprisoned, except in the metaphor of imprisonment.
(b) That he is a free personality.
(c) That he is only partly correct.
(d) That imprisonment is a human condition.

9. Why does Bloom say "Timon of Athens" was never performed?
(a) Shakespeare felt the play was too personal.
(b) Shakespeare died before he finished it.
(c) Shakespeare's patron was offended by the play.
(d) Shakespeare used the play to denounce contemporary London.

10. How does Auden describe Iago?
(a) As karmic vengeance.
(b) As a practical joker.
(c) As a devil.
(d) As the subterranean soul of Western culture.

11. Why does Janet Adelman say that Cordelia had to be murdered in "King Lear"?
(a) To counter the demise of Regan and Goneril.
(b) To preserve the play's philosophy consistently.
(c) To protect the masculinity of the play.
(d) To prevent love from being triumphant.

12. How does Bloom characterize the Falstaff of "The Merry Wives of Windsor"?
(a) A false Falstaff.
(b) A bastardization of Henry IV.
(c) The genuine Falstaff.
(d) A precursor to later villains.

13. Why was Caliban suffering, according to critic Browning?
(a) Because Prospero will not adopt him.
(b) Because he is incapable of attaining the beautiful things he imagines.
(c) Because his nature is still too bestial.
(d) Because he will never win Ariel for himself.

14. What does Bloom say constitutes the darkness of "Cymbeline"?
(a) Cymbeline is still jealous, even after he repents sentencing his wife to death for betrayal.
(b) Iachino is not killed off, but he can continue his evil ways.
(c) There is a suggestion that Imogen might be unfaithful at heart.
(d) Posthumous is ineffective against Iachino's manipulations.

15. M. C. Bradbrook describes "Pericles" as half spectacle and half what?
(a) Farce.
(b) Tragedy.
(c) Satyr play.
(d) Prophetic vision.

Short Answer Questions

1. Whose philosophy does Bloom say Iago embodies?

2. What important character does Bloom say Iago influenced?

3. What id Dryden's objection to Caliban's depiction?

4. What is Bloom's complaint about "Henry VIII"?

5. How does Bloom say "Henry V" has been used in England?

(see the answer keys)

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