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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Introduction: What is Literature?.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What genre of writing does Eagleton provide that is an example of writing that is NOT considered to be literature?
(a) Romance.
(b) Comics.
(c) Young Adult.
(d) Science fiction.

2. How many decades, according to Eagleton, has there been a "striking proliferation of literary theory" since the publication of the Russian formalist's pioneering essay?
(a) Two.
(b) One.
(c) Five.
(d) Six.

3. According to Eagleton, when did the Russian formalists emerge?
(a) After WWI.
(b) During the Russian Revolution.
(c) Before WWII.
(d) Before the Bolshevik Revolution.

4. What kind of language does Eagleton say people think of literature as?
(a) Difficult.
(b) Strange.
(c) Dull.
(d) Ordinary.

5. Eagleton argues that if literature includes much factual writing, it also excludes "quite a lot of" what?
(a) Biography.
(b) Nonfiction.
(c) Fiction.
(d) Autobiography.

Short Answer Questions

1. Who silenced the Russian formalists, according to Eagleton?

2. According to Eagleton, formalism is the application of what to the study of literature?

3. According to Eagleton, why did the Russian formalists NOT see a literary work as a vehicle for ideas, reflection of reality, or transcendental truth?

4. According to the Russian critic Roman Jakobson, literature represents "organized ______committed on ordinary _______."

5. For Eagleton, hostility toward theory means what?

(see the answer key)

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