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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. What techniques are evident in the phrase "Rebuffed the big wind" (line 7)?
(a) Euphony and personification.
(b) Personification and consonance.
(c) Assonance and euphony.
(d) Consonance and assonance.

2. In lines 5 and 6, what is the bird's motion compared to?
(a) An ice skater.
(b) A ball being thrown.
(c) A swing.
(d) An arrow.

3. In lines 2-3, "in his riding/ Of the rolling level underneath him steady air," which word tells what the bird is "riding"?
(a) "Level."
(b) "Air."
(c) "Rolling."
(d) "Him."

4. What type of rhyme is seen in the poem's "A" lines?
(a) Eye.
(b) Feminine.
(c) Slant.
(d) Masculine.

5. What would it mean to have "Rebuffed the big wind" (line 7)?
(a) To have brushed against its force and been knocked back.
(b) To have stood up to and turned away its advance.
(c) To have used rapid movements to shine or polish it.
(d) To have abruptly and rudely responded to it.

Short Answer Questions

1. What device is evident in line 10's "the fire that breaks from thee then"?

2. What does "shéer plód" mean (line 12)?

3. What technique is employed in the poem's final two lines, "blue-bleak embers, ah my dear/ Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion"?

4. What is the common name of the titular bird?

5. What is "sillion" (line 12)?

Short Essay Questions

1. What Christian paradox is expressed when the speaker refers to the bird as both a "minion" and a "dauphin" (lines 1-2)?

2. In "The Windhover," who is speaking, and what moves him to speak?

3. What are the literal and figurative meanings of the poem's references to a "dauphin" and a "chevalier"?

4. Describe the poetic form of "The Windhover."

5. How do the images in the last three lines support the idea that there is "no wonder" in the kestrel's fight (line 9)?

6. What makes a creature like the windhover an appropriate symbol for Christ?

7. Describe the relationship of the content in the poem's final six lines to the content in lines 1-8.

8. What is a "windhover," and what characteristic of its flight is focused on in this poem?

9. What is the meaning of the simile contained in lines 6 and 7: " As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding/ Rebuffed the big wind"?

10. What is the relationship of the expression "in his riding/ Of the rolling level underneath him steady air" (lines 2-3) to the later reference to "the rein of a wimpling wing" (line 4)?

(see the answer keys)

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