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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. The narrator describes how many people as fearless (ll. 39-43)?

2. What does the narrator claim is a gift that does not help against fear?

3. Whom does the narrator state might have something in store for a person (l. 43)?

4. In l. 102, “the gold he had hidden while he lived here on earth,” how many times is the DOMINANT alliteration iterated?

5. Whence does the narrator's thought fly out (l. 58)?

Short Essay Questions

1. Consider the narrator’s assertion that “Always, for everyone, one of three things / hangs in the balance before its due time: / illness or age or attack by the sword / wrests life away from one doomed to die” (ll. 68-71). What tone is conveyed by the passage, and how is it conveyed?

2. The narrator comments that “He has no thought of the harp or the taking of rings, / nor the pleasures of woman or joy in the world, / nor anything else but the tumbling waves— / he always has longing who hastens to sea” (ll. 44-47). What tone is conveyed in the comment, and how?

3. The narrator asserts that “And so no man on earth is so proud in spirit, / nor so gifted in grace or so keen in youth, / nor so bold in deeds, nor so beloved of his lord, / that he never has sorrow over his seafaring, / when he sees what the Lord might have in store for him” (ll. 39-43). What tone is conveyed in the assertion, and how?

4. Consider ll. 58-102 as a unit. What is the overall tone of the passage, and how is it conveyed?

5. What tone is present in the following passage, and how is it conveyed? “The days are lost, / and all the pomp of this earthly kingdom; / there are now neither kings nor emperors / nor gold-givers as there once were, / when they did the greatest glorious deeds / and lived in most lordly fame” (ll. 80-85)?

6. The narrator asserts that “And so no man on earth is so proud in spirit, / nor so gifted in grace or so keen in youth, / nor so bold in deeds, nor so beloved of his lord, / that he never has sorrow over his seafaring, / when he sees what the Lord might have in store for him” (ll. 39-43). Line 40 stands out from the surrounding lines in using the conjunction “or” instead of “nor,” implying a different relationship between “so gifted in grace” and “so keen in youth” than between “bold in deeds” and “beloved of his lord” (l. 41). What is the implied relationship, and how is it implied?

7. Consider the narrator’s comments that “When life fails [a man], his fleshly cloak will neither / taste the sweet nor touch the sore, / nor move a hand nor think with his mind” (ll. 94-96). What is the “fleshly cloak,” and what wears it? How do you know?

8. What is the strongest pattern of alliteration in line line 42, "that he never has sorrow over his seafaring," and why?

9. Consider ll. 64-66, “because hotter to me / are the joys of the Lord than this dead life, / loaned, on land.” Given the physical and historical context of the poem, as well as its content, why might “the joys of the Lord” be described favorably as “hotter” by the narrator?

10. Consider the narrator’s statement that “And so now my thought flies out from my breast, / my spirit moves with the sea-flood. / roams widely over the whale’s home, / to the corners of the earth, and comes back to me / greedy and hungry” (ll. 58-62). What tone is conveyed by the passage, and how is it conveyed?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The narrator notes having “dwelt all winter / on the ice-cold sea in the paths of exile” (ll. 14-15). How does the poem read if “paths of exile” is a literal statement meaning “paths taken by someone not allowed to return home?” How does it read if, instead, “paths of exile” is a kenning referring simply to “the sea”?

Essay Topic 2

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 do the short lines have for CURRENT readers (that is, those hearing / reading the text today)? How do they enact those effects?

Essay Topic 3

Consider ll. 80-90, “The days are lost” through “throughout middle-earth.” The passage speaks to a commonplace attitude, namely that things were better in earlier days. Given the historical and physical contexts of “The Seafarer,” why might such an attitude have been true for members of the poem’s presumed primary audience? What in the contexts would make it so, and how would they do so?

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