英美文学选读试题

I. Multiple Choice（40 points in all, 1for each）

Select from the four choices of each item the one that best answer the question or completes the statement. Write the corresponding letter on the Answer Sheet.

1. The sentence \"Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?\" is the beginning line of one of Shakespeare’s ___.

A. comedies B. tragedies C. sonnets D. histories

2. The major concern of ______fiction lies in the tracing of the psychological development of his characters and in his energetic criticism of the dehumanizing effect of the capitalist industrialization on human nature.

A. Charles Dickens’s B. D. H. Lawrence’s

C. Thomas Hardy’s D. John Galsworthy’s

3. Daniel Defoe describes____ as a typical English middle-class man of the eighteenth century, the very prototype of the empire builder or the pioneer colonist. A. Tom Jones B. Gulliver

C. Moll Flanders D. Robinson Crusoe 4. \"She lived unknown, and few could know When Lucy ceased to be;

But she is in her grave, and, oh, The difference to me?\"

The word \"me\" in the last line of the above stanza quoted from Wordsworth’s poem \"She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways\" may possibly refer to ____.

A. the poet B. the reader C. her one-sided lover D. everybody 5. _____ is a typical feature of Swift’s writings.

A. Bitter satire B. Elegant style

C. Casual narration D. Complicated sentence structure

6. The statement \"It reveals the dehumanizing workhouse system and the dark, criminal underworld life\" may well sum up the main theme of Dickens’s____ . A. David Copperfield B. Bleak House C. Great Expectations D. Oliver Twist

7. \"Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? ... And if God had gifted me with some beauty, and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you.\"

The above quoted passage is most probable taken from_____ .

A. Pride and Prejudice B. Jane Eyre C. Wuthering Heights D. Great Expectations

8. The short story “Araby” is one of the stories in James Joyce’s collection_____.

A. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man B. Ulysses C. Finnegans Wake D. Dubliners

9. In William Blake’s poetry, the father (and any other in whom he saw the image of the father such as God, priest, and king) was usually a figure of____ . A. benevolence B. admiration C. love D. tyranny

10. After reading the first chapter of Pride and Prejudice, we may come to know that Mrs. Bennet is a woman of____ .

A. simple character and quick wit

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B. simple character and poor understanding C. intricate character and quick wit

D. intricate character and poor understanding

11. “For a week after the commission of the impious and profane offence of asking for more, Oliver remained a close prisoner in the dark and solitary room ...”(Dickens, Oliver Twist) What did Oliver ask for?

A. More time to play. B. More food to eat.

C. More book to read. D. More money to spend. 12. Christopher Marlow’s “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love” is a (n)_____ . A. pastoral lyric B. elegy C. folk song D. epic

13. In Hardy’s Wessex novels, there is a apparent____ touch in his description of the simple and beautiful though primitive rural life.

A. humorous B. romantic C. nostalgic D. sarcastic

14. In which of the following works can you find the proper names “Lilliput,” “Brobdingnag,” “Houyhnhnm,” and “Yahoo”?

A. James Joyce’s Ulysses. B. Charles Dickens’s Bleak House. C. Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels. D. D. H. Lawrence’s Women in love.

15. We can perhaps describe the west wind in Shelley’s poem \"Ode to the West Wind\" with all the following terms except____ .

A. tamed B. swift C. proud D. wild

16. “When the evening is spread out against the sky Like a patient etherized upon a table.”(T. s. Eliot, “The Love song of J. Alfred Prufrock”) What does the image in the quoted lines suggest? A. Violence. B. Horror. C. Inability. D. Indifference.

17. Which of the following qualifies does NOT feature Jane Austen's style?

A. Austen's main literary concern is about human beings in their personal relationships.

B. Everything in Austen's novel results in an observation, of a quiet, uneventful and contented life of the English country.

C. Austen is a great realist and her characters are from all walks of life.

D. Austen's works show clearly her firm belief in the predominance of reason over passion.

18. The work that presented, for the first time in English literature, a comprehensive realistic picture of the medieval English society and created a whole gallery of vivid characters from all walks of life is most likely______.

A. William Langland’s Piers Plowman B. Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales C. John Gower’ Confession Amantis D. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

19. \" Damn the fool! There he is’, cried Heathcliff, sinking back into his seat. ’Hush, my darling! Hush, hush, Catherine! I’ll stay. If he shot me so, I’d expire with a blessing in my lips.’\" The novel from which the passage is taken must be _________. A. Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice

B. Charles Dickens’s The Old Curiosity Shop C. Samuel Richardson’s Pamela

D. Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights

20. James Joyce is the author of all the following novels except ______.

A. Dubliners B. Jude the Obscure

C. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man D. Ulysses

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21. Naturalism is evolved from realism when the author’s tone in writing becomes less serious and less sympathetic but more ironic and more ____.

A. rational B. humorous C. optimistic D. pessimistic

22. \"He was afraid of her -the small, severe woman with graying hair suddenly bursting out in such frenzy. The postman came running back, afraid something had happened. They saw his tripped cap over the short curtains. Mrs. Morel rushes to the door.\" The above passage is taken from _________.

A. Charlotte Bronte’s The Professor B. Charles Dickens’s Domebey and Son C. D. H. Lawrence ’s Sons and Lovers D. John Galsworthy’s The Forsyte Saga

23. Tess of the D’Urbervilles, one of Thomas Hardy’s best known novels, portrays man as ________.

A. being hereditarily either good or bad

B. being self-sufficient

C. having no control over his own fate

D. still retaining his own faith in a world of confusion

24. Romance, which uses narrative verse or prose to tell stories of _____ adventures or other heroic deeds, is a popular literary form in the medieval period.

A. Christian B. Knightly

C. Greek D. Primitive 25. \"Bassanio: Antonio, I am married to a wife

Which is as dear to me as life itself;

But life itself, my wife, and all the world, Are not with me esteem’d above thy life; I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all, Here to the devil, to deliver you.

Portia: Your wife would give you little thanks for that, If she were by to hear you make the offer.\"

The above is a quotation taken from Shakespeare’s comedy The Merchant of Venice. The quoted part can be regarded as a good example to illustrate ______.

A. dramatic irony B. personification C. simile D. symbolism

26. \"If Winter comes, can spring be far behind?\" is an epigrammatic line by ______. A. J. Keats B. W. Blake C. W. Wordsworth D. P. B. Shelley

27. The Victorian Age was largely and age of ______, eminently represented by Dickens and Thackeray.

A. poetry B. drama

C. prose D. novel

28. Which of the following is NOT a typical feature of Modernism?

A. To elevate the individual and inner being over the social being. B. To put the stress on traditional values.

C. To portray the distorted and alienated relationships between man and his environment. D. To advocate a conscious break with the past.

29. \"And we will sit upon the rocks, /Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks, /By shallow rivers to whose falls/ Melodious birds sing madrigals.\" The above lines are probably taken from ______. A. John Milton’s Paradise Lost B. John Donne’s \"The Sun Rising\"

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C. Shakespeare’s \"Sonnet 18\"

D. Marlowe’s \"The Passionate Shepherd to His Love\"

30. The Romantic writers would focus on all the following issues EXCEPT the ____ in the American literary history.

A. individual feelings B. idea of survival of the fittest

C. strong imagination D. return to nature II. Reading Comprehension (20 points in all, 10 for each)

Read the quoted parts carefully and answer the questions in English. Write your answers in the corresponding space on the answer sheet.

31. \"In pursuance of this determination, little Oliver, to his excessive astonishment was released from bondage, and ordered to put himself into a clean shirt. He had hardly achieved this very unusual gymnastic performance when Mr. Bumble brought him, with his own hands, a basin of gruel and the holiday allowance of two ounces and a quarter of bread. A very tremendous sight, Oliver began to cry very piteously. thinking, not unnaturally, that the board must have decided to kill him for some useful purpose ,or they never would have begun to fatten him up in this way.\" Questions:

(1) . Why Oliver was released from the bondage? (2). Interpret the theme of the passage.

32. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date:” Questions:

(1)．Identify the poet and the poem from which the quoted lines are taken. (2)．What is the theme of the poem?

III. Questions and Answers (20 points in all, 5 for each)

Give a brief answer to each of the following questions in English. Write your answers in the corresponding space on the answer sheet.

33. How do you know the naturalistic idea of Hardy?

34. \"The first shot I made among these creatures, I killed a she-goat which had a little kid by her which she gave suck to, which grieved me heartily; but when the old one fell, the kid stood stock still by her till I came and took her up, and not only so, but when I carried the old one with me upon my shoulders, the kid followed me quite to my enclosure, upon which I laid down the dam, and took the kid in my arms, and carried it over my pale, in hopes to have it bred up tame, but it would not eat, so I was forced to kill it and eat it myself; these two supplied me with flesh a great while, for I ate sparingly; and saved my provisions (my bread especially) as much as possibly I could.\"

This is a very significant sentence with great details that reveals the character of Robinson Crusoe.

What aspects of Crusoe’s character are revealed then?

35. Jane Eyre is the greatest governess image in the literature history，can you analyze the character of her？

36. What philosophical ideas influenced Modernism?

IV. Topic Discussion (20 points in all, 10 for each)

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Write no less than 150 words on each of the following topics in English in the corresponding space on the answer sheet.

37. How do you know about Renaissance? Give a summery about English literature in the period.(150words)

38. In Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen explored three kinds of motivations of marriage the middle-class people had in the second half of the 18th century. Try to make a brief discussion about them with specific examples from the novel.

Make comments on Austen’s attitude towards these motivations.(150Words)

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