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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Upon what does the poem's speaker's head rest in After Death?

2. In the final stanza of Echo, the speaker's life is described as being cold in what?

3. What creeps through the lattice near the poem's speaker in After Death?

4. In Dream Land, towards what direction does the poem's subject face?

5. What does the poem's speaker have that cousin Kate does not in the poem of the same name?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is ironic and somewhat paradoxical about the new-life brought on by Spring in the poem of the same name?

2. Why would the speaker not plant summer flowers and wait, as described in the first stanza of Another Spring?

3. For what reason does the speaker ostensibly envy the rose and bird in A Summer Wish?

4. Who is Ruth, as used in the last line of Sweet Death?

5. What is the "it" of May?

6. What is significant about the doves, lilies, and butterflies listed being in pairs in the second poem entitled Song?

7. What is "the one certainty," as proposed in the poem of the same name?

8. With what sort of temptations do the first two enemies beleaguer the second speaker in The Three Enemies?

9. Why does the poem's speaker find no apples in her apple tree in An Apple Gathering?

10. What sort of descriptions does the poem's speaker give to her mood and what characterizes these descriptions in A Birthday?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In A Bruised Reed Shall He Not Break, a poetic motif of one part changing the significance of the poem as a whole was unveiled. Where A Bruised Reed Shall He Not Break performs this change on a single word, deprecate, this poetic transformation can be seen in other poems as well, such as the final stanza in Cousin Kate, the last line in Spring, the sestet of any sonnet, and the last line of the second poem entitled Song. Choose a few poems that employ this motif and explicate in a carefully developed essay how they influence the reading of poetry. What do these poems demonstrate about poetry? What relation does the part have to the whole? What relation does the whole have to the part? How do the two effect one another? What do these effects reveal about the reading of poetry?

Essay Topic 2

Throughout a great deal of Rossetti's poetry, there is a connection drawn between life and love, between living and loving. This can be seen in At Home, A Triad, A Birthday, After Death, An End, and many others. Explicate in a thoroughly-developed analytical essay the significance of this connection. In what way are the two states or actions comparable? Why would one be linked with the other? What makes the two similar? How is this demonstrated in the various poems of Christina Rossetti? What does this connection reveal about human nature?

Essay Topic 3

A constant theme in Rossetti's poetry is the struggle of a speaker against despair. Compose an analytical essay which examines this theme overall. How is it portrayed in individual poems? How is it portrayed overall? What shapes does the struggle take? What prompts the feelings of despair? In what ways, if any, is the despair overcome? With what does the speaker struggle against despair; in other words, how does she try to conquer it? Give specific examples.

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