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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. The narrator remarks that “no sheltering family / could bring consolation to” which of the following (ll. 25-26)?
(a) My desolate soul.
(b) My brave voyager.
(c) My chemical romance.
(d) My exceptional skill.

2. Which of the following came from the north (l. 31)?
(a) Rain.
(b) Attack.
(c) Snow.
(d) Wind.

3. The narrator notes a lack of which of the following (ll. 25-26)?
(a) Integration.
(b) Isolation.
(c) Confirmation.
(d) Consolation.

4. Which of the following does the narrator link to the noise of the sea (ll. 18-19)?
(a) The rolling tide.
(b) The leaping dolphins.
(c) The ice-cold waves.
(d) The surging surf.

5. Which of the following does the narrator assert is true of “he whose lot is fairest on land” (ll. 12-13)?
(a) He protects and attacks.
(b) He just complains.
(c) He does not care.
(d) He does not know.

Short Answer Questions

1. The narrator remarks that “the wild swan’s song / sometimes served as my music, the gannet’s call / and the curlew’s cry for the laughter of men, / the seagull’s singing for mead-drink” (ll. 19-22). The passage offers an example of which of the following?

2. The narrator describes his doubter as which of the following (ll. 27-30)?

3. To what end does the narrator note he is driven (ll. 36-38)?

4. In line 32, “frost bound the ground, hail fell on the earth,” how many relatively stressed / emphasized syllables are present?

5. The narrator notes that which of the following darkened (l. 31)?

Short Essay Questions

1. Consider the symbolism of the seabirds the narrator catalogs (ll. 20-23). What rhetorical appeal/s does the narrator make in evoking it?

2. The poem opens with the narrator saying “I sing a true song of myself, / tell of my journeys” (ll. 1-2). What rhetorical appeal/s does the narrator make in doing so?

3. The narrator comments that “they compel me now, / my heart-thoughts, to try for myself / the high seas, the tossing salt streams; / my heart’s desire urges my spirit / time and again to travel, so that I might seek / far from here a foreign land” (ll. 33-38). What rhetorical appeal/s does the narrator make in the comment?

4. The narrator remarks that “no sheltering family / could bring consolation to my desolate soul” (ll. 25-26). What rhetorical appeal/s does the narrator make in doing so?

5. Consider the kenning for hail, “coldest of grains” (l. 33). How does the kenning construct meaning?

6. What tone is set by the first 26 lines of the poem? How do they do so?

7. The opening passages of the poem has the narrator state that “in days of toil / I’ve often suffered troubled times, / hard heartache” (ll. 2-4). What rhetorical appeal/s does the narrator make in doing so?

8. The narrator comments that “they compel me now, / my heart-thoughts, to try for myself / the high seas, the tossing salt streams; / my heart’s desire urges my spirit / time and again to travel, so that I might seek / far from here a foreign land” (ll. 33-38). What tone is conveyed in the passage?

9. The second sentence of the poem reads "Pinched with cold / were my feet, bound by frost / in cold fetters, while cares seethed / hot around my heart, hunger tore from within / my sea-weary mind" (ll. 8-12). Three things are put into juxtaposition. What are they, and what effect does the juxtaposition have?

10. The narrator remarks that “he who has tasted life’s joy in towns, / suffered few sad journeys, scarcely believes, / proud and puffed up with wine, what I, weary, / have often had to endure in my suffering” (ll. 27-30). What tone is conveyed in the passage?

(see the answer keys)

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