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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. The last two lines of Part IV of "Little Gidding" state that "We only live, only suspire / Consumed by either" what or what?
(a) Love or hate.
(b) Fire or fire.
(c) Water or fire.
(d) Truth or lies.

2. Which of the following does the speaker NOT say man must think of as forever doing in Part II of "The Dry Salvages"?
(a) Heaving.
(b) Setting.
(c) Hauling.
(d) Bailing.

3. What is said to be "heard so deeply / That it is not heard at all," in Part V of "The Dry Salvages"?
(a) Wisdom.
(b) Silence.
(c) Music.
(d) Nature.

4. The speaker states in Part III of "Little Gidding" that "It is not to ring the bell backward / Nor is it an incantation / To summon the spectre of a" what?
(a) God.
(b) Ghost.
(c) Truth.
(d) Rose.

5. The speaker asserts in Part I of "The Dry Salvages" that the sea has many what?
(a) Stories and whispers.
(b) Gods and voices.
(c) Tragedies and failings.
(d) Truths and half-truths.

Short Answer Questions

1. Into what are the "tongues of flame" said to be enfolded in the last lines of the poem, found in "Little Gidding"?

2. With what does the speaker's old master leave him at the end of Part II of "Little Gidding"?

3. The hedgerow is said in Part I of "Little Gidding" to be "blanched for an hour with transitory blossom" of what?

4. Near the end of Part I of "Little Gidding," it is said that "the communication / Of the dead is tongued with" what?

5. "Over the asphalt where no other sound was," what does the speaker of Part II of "Little Gidding" hear?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is meant by the speaker's interlocutor's phrase that "next year's words await another voice" in Part II of "Little Gidding"?

2. How is "Time the destroyer" also "time the preserver," as stated in Part II of "The Dry Salvages"?

3. What is the purpose of the lines in Part V of "The Dry Salvages" from "To communicate with Mars, converse with spirits," to "Whether on the shores of Asia, or in the Edgware Road"?

4. What is meant in Part III of "Little Gidding" by "not less of love but expanding / Of love beyond desire, and so liberation / From the future as well as the past"?

5. What does the speaker mean in Part III of "The Dry Salvages" when he states that, "the future is a faded song, a Royal Rose or a lavender spray / Of wistful regret for those who are not yet here to regret"?

6. What is meant in Part III of "Little Gidding" by "We cannot revive old factions / We cannot restore old policies / Or follow an antique drum"?

7. What is signified by the statement, in the final part of "Little Gidding," that "the end of all our exploring / Will be to arrive where we started / And know the place for the first time"?

8. Why is the "strong brown god" of Part I of "The Dry Salvages" "almost forgotten / By the dwellers in cities"?

9. What is the "real destination" of the sailors, as described at the end of Part III of "The Dry Salvages"?

10. What is meant by the phrase, in Part V of "Little Gidding," "Every poem [is] an epitaph"?

(see the answer keys)

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