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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 does the word "wimpling" literally mean in the context of line 4?
(a) Covering.
(b) Like a nun's habit.
(c) Rippling.
(d) Muffling.

2. What technique is employed in the line 9 phrase "oh, air, pride, plume, here"?
(a) Asyndeton.
(b) Atanaclasis.
(c) Anaphora.
(d) Antithesis.

3. Which techniques are evident in the phrase "dapple-dawn-drawn" (line 2)?
(a) Internal rhyme and onomatopoeia.
(b) Alliteration and internal rhyme.
(c) Onomatopoeia and metaphor.
(d) Metaphor and alliteration.

4. Between which lines does the poem use "light rhyme"?
(a) A and B.
(b) A and C.
(c) B and C.
(d) B and D.

5. Who is being referred to in line 10's "thee"?
(a) Christ.
(b) The air.
(c) The speaker.
(d) The windhover.

Short Answer Questions

1. What type of rhyme is seen in the poem's "A" lines?

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

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

4. In line 5, what does the speaker claim the bird is feeling?

5. In lines 10 and 11, the speaker says that the fire "that breaks from thee" is a billion times "lovelier" and more what?

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

3. 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)?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

(see the answer keys)

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