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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How does the speaker characterize herself in line 4?
(a) Lively and confident.
(b) Lighthearted and silly.
(c) Brave and perseverent.
(d) Intelligent and curious.

2. Which two things does the final stanza use to represent the past and present?
(a) Night and daybreak.
(b) Gathering clouds and rain.
(c) The directions east and west.
(d) A seed and a sprout.

3. What is the rhyme scheme of the first seven stanzas?
(a) ABCB.
(b) ABAC.
(c) ABBA.
(d) ABAB.

4. Which is the best definition of "beset" in line 6?
(a) Inspired.
(b) Troubled.
(c) Cradled.
(d) Decorated.

5. What technique is used in line 21, "You may shoot me with your words"?
(a) Innuendo.
(b) Kenning.
(c) Simile.
(d) Metaphor.

6. Who is the author of "Still I Rise"?
(a) Maya Angelou.
(b) Nikki Giovanni.
(c) Toni Morrison.
(d) Alice Walker.

7. What techniques are used in line 19, "’Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines"?
(a) Onomatopoeia and alliteration.
(b) Assonance and sibilance.
(c) Alliteration and assonance.
(d) Sibilance and onomatopoeia.

8. What technique does the first line of the poem, "You may write me down in history," introduce?
(a) Allegory.
(b) Apostrophe.
(c) Verbal irony.
(d) Catalog.

9. Which is the best definition for "trod" in the context of line 3?
(a) The sound of footsteps.
(b) Drag along the floor or earth.
(c) Press down with the foot.
(d) Throw or hurl downward.

10. Which is the first stanza of the poem that is longer than four lines?
(a) 9.
(b) 7.
(c) 8.
(d) 6.

11. What technique is used in lines 7 and 8, "’Cause I walk like I've got oil wells/ Pumping in my living room"?
(a) Juxtaposition.
(b) Simile.
(c) Personification.
(d) Metaphor.

12. What technique is used in line 29, "Out of the huts of history’s shame"?
(a) Oxymoron.
(b) Allusion.
(c) Juxtaposition.
(d) Allegory.

13. Which technique is used in line 9, "Just like moons and like suns"?
(a) Parallelism.
(b) Allusion.
(c) Dialect.
(d) Euphemism.

14. In the final quatrain, what does the speaker wonder about upsetting "you" with?
(a) Beauty.
(b) Kindness.
(c) Sexiness.
(d) Intelligence.

15. Which is the most logical description of who "You" is in line 1?
(a) An unnamed oppressor.
(b) Scholars and critics.
(c) People of the past.
(d) A romantic partner.

Short Answer Questions

1. In line 17, what kind of a person is described by the word "haughtiness"?

2. Why is the speaker's past "rooted in pain" (line 32)?

3. What precious stones does the speaker use to evoke beauty and value in the simile in line 27?

4. What is the primary quality that the speaker's stanza eight description of a body of water is intended to convey?

5. What words create a refrain in the final two stanzas of the poem?

(see the answer keys)

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