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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. In lines 10 and 11, the speaker says that the fire "that breaks from thee" is a billion times "lovelier" and more what?
(a) Rapturous.
(b) Hypnotic.
(c) Sanctified.
(d) Dangerous.

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

3. What does "shéer plód" mean (line 12)?
(a) Keen and attentive determination.
(b) Slow, boring, repetitive work.
(c) Clumsy and random movement.
(d) A heavy feeling of apathy.

4. Who is the author of "The Windhover"?
(a) Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
(b) Gerard Manley Hopkins.
(c) Christina Rossetti.
(d) Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

5. What technique is employed in the poem's final two lines, "blue-bleak embers, ah my dear/ Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion"?
(a) Oxymoron.
(b) Metaphor.
(c) Euphemism.
(d) Imagery.

Short Answer Questions

1. To whom is the poem dedicated?

2. Who is being referred to in line 10's "thee"?

3. What would it mean to have "Rebuffed the big wind" (line 7)?

4. Where is the volta of "The Windhover"?

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

Short Essay Questions

1. 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"?

2. 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)?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

(see the answer keys)

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