View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 7 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. The repetition of the word "deed" in line 13 is an example of which technique?
(a) Epistrophe.
(b) Antanaclasis.
(c) Anadiplosis.
(d) Epizeuxis.

2. Which is the primary definition of "still" being used in the expression "still colonials" in line 5?
(a) Continuing to be.
(b) Nevertheless.
(c) Quiet.
(d) Unmoving.

3. What techniques are used in the lines "She was ours/ In Massachusetts, in Virginia" (lines 3-4)?
(a) Apostrophe and antithesis.
(b) Synecdoche and asyndeton.
(c) Asyndeton and apostrophe.
(d) Antithesis and synecdoche.

4. What is alluded to in the phrase "the land vaguely realizing westward" (line 14)?
(a) The Westward expansion of the United States.
(b) The Louisiana Purchase.
(c) The American Civil War.
(d) The forced resettlement of Native peoples.

5. What techniques are used in the lines "Possessing what we still were unpossessed by,/ Possessed by what we now no more possessed" (lines 6-7)?
(a) Antithesis and oxymoron.
(b) Epistrophe and chiasmus.
(c) Chiasmus and antithesis.
(d) Oxymoron and epistrophe.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is the antecedent of "it" in the phrase "it was ourselves" (line 9)?

2. Which technique is used in the first line, "The land was ours before we were the land’s"?

3. To what event does the phrase "more than a hundred years/ Before we were her people" obliquely refer?

4. What technique is used in the line "Such as she was, such as she would become" (line 16)?

5. According to the poem's second sentence, how did "we" find "salvation"?

Short Essay Questions

1. Explain the synecdoche in line 4, "In Massachusetts, in Virginia."

2. What does the speaker mean by "the land vaguely realizing westward" (line 14)?

3. What does the speaker claim makes the colonists "weak," and what is the solution to this weakness (line 8)?

4. Describe the form of "The Gift Outright."

5. What is implied by the diction the speaker uses to describe the lands yet to be conquered by American settlers: "unstoried, artless, unenhanced" (line 15)?

6. To whom is it implied the pronouns "our" and "we" refer in this poem?

7. Explain the poem's title.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 637 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample