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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. What technique is evident in the line "Breaking the silence of the seas" (line 15)?

2. In the fourth stanza, when the speaker finally places himself in the scene, what is it clear he is there to do?

3. How does line 3, "Reaping and singing by herself," interrupt the poem's dominant metrical pattern?

4. What do the metaphors in lines 9-12 and 13-16 have in common?

5. In the second stanza, to whom is the nightingale depicted singing?

Short Essay Questions

1. What question does the speaker ask in the third stanza, and what two contrasting answers does he speculate about?

2. In what way do the places associated with the two birds create a dramatic contrast with one another?

3. Summarize the action of "The Solitary Reaper."

4. What are the names of the two forms of poetry that are combined in this poem, and how are they combined?

5. Describe the rhyme scheme of "The Solitary Reaper."

6. How does the speaker's line 26 description of the reaper singing "As if her song could have no ending" reinforce the meaning of the poem's ending?

7. Explain how the mention of "spring-time" in line 14's description of the cuckoo enhances the contrast between this image and the image of the nightingale.

8. Describe the meter of "The Solitary Reaper."

9. To which two birds does the speaker compare the reaper, and what area of the world does the speaker associate with each?

10. Describe the tense shift in "The Solitary Reaper" and explain what it reveals about the poem's narrative present.

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay that makes and defends a claim about the significance of the action of "reaping" in "The Solitary Reaper." Support your assertions with evidence from the text.

Essay Topic 2

Wordsworth wrote in Preface to the Lyrical Ballads that poetry emerges from the "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" that are "recollected in tranquility." Write an essay that demonstrates how these ideas are reflected in "The Solitary Reaper." Be sure to support your claims with evidence from the text.

Essay Topic 3

Write an essay that makes and defends a claim about the relationship of the reaper to the land in "The Solitary Reaper." Defend your ideas with evidence from the text.

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