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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.
Short Answer Questions
1. In line 29, “proud and puffed up with wine, what I, weary,” how many relatively stressed / emphasized syllables are present?
2. The narrator remarks he "heard nothing there but the noise of” which of the following (l. 18)?
3. The narrator remarks that “That man does not know, / he whose lot is fairest on land, / how I, wretched with care, dwelt all winter / on the ice-cold sea in the paths of exile, / deprived of dear kinsmen, / hung with icicles of frost while hail flew in showers” (ll. 12-17). In the sentence, “I” is in apposition to which of the following?
4. In line 29, the description “proud and puffed up with wine” offers an example of which of the following?
5. 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?
Short Essay Questions
1. What tone is set by the first 26 lines of the poem? How do they do so?
2. 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?
3. Consider the kenning for hail, “coldest of grains” (l. 33). How does the kenning construct meaning?
4. 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?
5. 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?
6. 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?
7. 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?
8. Consider the symbolism of the seabirds the narrator catalogs (ll. 20-23). What rhetorical appeal/s does the narrator make in evoking it?
9. 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?
10. The narrator states that “The night-shadow darkened; snow came from the north, / frost bound the ground, hail fell on earth, / coldest of grains” (ll. 31-33). What rhetorical appeal/s does the narrator make in the statement?
Essay Topics
Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:
Essay Topic 1
Liuzza translates the Old English “forþon” as “and so” throughout his rendering, emphasizing the uncertainty of relationships between ideas in it (19n4). What effects does such ambiguity have for CURRENT readers (that is, those hearing / reading the text today)? How does it enact those effects?
Essay Topic 2
Consider the central message of "The Seafarer." Argue how the message and / or its support is incorrect; identify the weaknesses in the poem's central message and / or the way it presents the message, articulating why the identified weaknesses are, in fact, weaknesses.
Essay Topic 3
There are a few points in the poem, of which “deprived of dear kinsmen” (l. 16) is an example, where the line Liuzza presents (as well as that in the Old English) is markedly short. What effects did the short lines have for the PRESUMED PRIMARY AUDIENCE (that is, the people at Exeter Cathedral who would have read or heard the text in the Middle Ages)? How might they have enacted those effects?
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This section contains 1,125 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) |
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