Category: Modern Poetry and Poetics

Which of the following statements best describes the relationship between Georgian poetry and English World War I poetry ?

A. Georgian poetry was modeled on World War I poetry and adapted its insights to postwar realities.
B. Unlike World War I poetry, Georgian poetry was concerned primarily with the effects of urbanization and industrialization.
C. Unlike World War I poetry, Georgian poetry was concerned primarily with women’s rights.
D. World War I poets like Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen adapted the Georgian poetic manner to write about modern subjects; most Georgian poets focused on individual experience and avoided writing about the upheavals of modernity.

Which of the following statements best characterizes the contrast between T.S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land” and the futurist aesthetic project ?

A. “The Waste Land” is primarily concerned with nature, whereas the futurists are most interested in industrial and urban landscapes.
B. “The Waste Land” confronts the fragmentation of modernity by exploring a variety of modes and voices, whereas the futurists do not focus on the fragmentation of modern experience, praising speed and industrial progress instead.
C. “The Waste Land” is an ironic exploration of Romantic themes, whereas the futurists incorporate ironic evocations of the classical tradition in their poetry.
D. “The Waste Land” focuses on the personal connection between poet and speaker, whereas the futurists focus on an impersonal connection between humans and industry.

Which of the following statements best characterizes Langston Hughes’s poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” ?

A. Hughes uses a universal speaker for an exploration of a profound racial divide between blacks and whites.
B. The poem is an analytical exploration of racial differences in the United States.
C. Similar to Hart Crane and Whitman, Hughes uses a personal and universal “I” to address issues of history, race, and identity.
D. The poem is an indictment of racial prejudice in Harlem.

The poem “Dulce et Decorum Est” ends with the following lines: “My friend, you would not tell with such high zest/To children ardent for some desperate glory,/The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est/ Pro patria mori.” Which of the following statements best describes these lines ?

A. Brooke’s inclusion of a quotation from Horace in these lines serves to emphasize
the distance between the ideals ofWestern civilization and its realities.
B. These lines suggest the author’s anger and disillusionment with cultural norms which glorify war.
C. In these lines, Brooke seeks to bridge the gap between individual experience and cultural norms and beliefs.
D. All of the above

Which of the following best characterizes the contrast between Gertrude Stein’s poetry and Imagist poetry ?

A. Stein experimented only with the sound qualities of language, whereas the Imagists focused on visual imagery.
B. Stein experimented with language that skirted the edges of sense, whereas the Imagists sought precision and clarity of expression.
C. Stein sought to combine classical poetic form with contemporary content, whereas the Imagists used traditional poetic subject matter but experimented with form.
D. Stein sought precision and clarity in her poems, whereas the Imagists sought experimental forms that enhanced visual imagery.