View a FREE sample

This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Section 1: "The Gift Outright," Lines 1-16.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What is the antecedent of "it" in the phrase "it was ourselves" (line 9)?
(a) "What we still were unpossessed by" (line 6).
(b) "Still colonials" (line 5).
(c) "What we now no more possessed" (line 7).
(d) "Something we were withholding" (line 8).

2. Which term most accurately describes the meter of "The Gift Outright"?
(a) Free verse.
(b) Blank verse.
(c) Ballad meter.
(d) Heroic verse.

3. What does line 12 make clear is the "Gift" in the title "The Gift Outright"?
(a) Freedom from England.
(b) Surrender and salvation.
(c) The land Americans live on.
(d) Americans themselves.

4. To what event does the phrase "more than a hundred years/ Before we were her people" obliquely refer?
(a) Columbus's voyage.
(b) The Pilgrims' first landing.
(c) The American Civil War.
(d) The American Revolution.

5. According to the poem's second sentence, how did "we" find "salvation"?
(a) By finding the courage to fight England.
(b) By dedicating ourselves to the Christian God.
(c) By fully surrendering ourselves to the land.
(d) By realizing our own weakness.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is alluded to in the phrase "the land vaguely realizing westward" (line 14)?

2. What technique is used in the phrase "unstoried, artless, unenhanced" (line 15)?

3. What techniques are used in the lines "Possessing what we still were unpossessed by,/ Possessed by what we now no more possessed" (lines 6-7)?

4. What is the implied antecedent of "our" and "we" in lines 1 and 2?

5. What techniques are used in the lines "She was ours/ In Massachusetts, in Virginia" (lines 3-4)?

(see the answer key)

This section contains 277 words (approx. 1 page at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample