Letters from NYC

What's YOUR Poetic IQ

I took the General Poetic Knowledge Quiz and this is what I scored:

11 out of a possible 11 correct... [Doing a happy dance w/arms up in the air] Woohoo!

According to poetry.com, this means that I "have an excellent grasp of poetic form, structure, and technique. People at this level have generally taken advanced-level study in literature or have completed advanced poetry courses. They have often spent considerable time writing, developing their own poetic "voice," and their own techniques. People at this level, particularly if they can apply their knowledge of poetic form and structure to their own work, are considered among the most talented of poetic artists."

[blushing a bit] Awww, shucks! It's nice to know that I didn't waste my time (or money) in taking all those literary courses in college!

If you feel like taking the quiz, and testing your poetic knowledge (like HARVEY or one of the Llama Butchers will surely do) click here. Because the test is difficult, I have posted it in the extended entry along with the correct answers and explanation, as a sort of crash course in poetry. Enjoy!

Your general poetic knowledge is determined by your answers to the objective multiple-choice questions and is presented below. This test of general poetic knowledge does not measure your creativity or have anything to do with your present ability or future potential to write good poetry. It assesses your technical knowledge of poetic structure, form, and technique.

The answers to individual questions are as follows:

1. Consider the following poem:

To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time
Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today,
Tomorrow will be dying.

The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun,
The higher he's a-getting,
The sooner will his race be run,
And nearer he's to setting.

The age is best which is the first,
When youth and blood are warmer;
But being spent, the worse and worst
Times still succeed the former.

Then be not coy, but use your time,
And while ye may, go marry;
For having lost but once your prime,
You may forever tarry.
Robert Herrick, 1591-1674

What is the theme of Herrick's poem?

a. Marriage is most successful when a couple is young.
b. Youth is best spent in ease; there is time enough in later years to accomplish our goals.
c. We must take advantage of the opportunities afforded in our youth because youth is fleeting.
d. Everything eventually dies, thus, nothing we do is truly important.

Answer = C
The theme of Herrick's poem is carpe diem--seize the day. The narrator pleads with the virgins to make the most of their youth. Youth, declares the narrator, is the best age, but once youth is gone, it and all the opportunities afforded by youth are never to be regained. Option B is exactly opposite of Herrick's intended message.

2. "A cement mixer collided with a prison van on the Kingston Pass. Motorists are asked to be on the lookout for 16 hardened criminals" is an example of a:

a. symbol
b. homonym
c. paradox
d. pun

Answer = D
These sentences provide an example of a pun. A pun is a word or phrase, sometimes referred to as a play on words, that suggests multiple meanings or interpretations. The pun in this example is "hardened"; it suggests that the criminals have become stone-like because of the cement and that they are also pitiless and unfeeling. A symbol is an image that stands for or represents something else. A homonym is a word that has the same sound and the same spelling as another word. A paradox is a statement that contains seemingly contradictory elements or appears contradictory to common sense, yet can be true when viewed from another angle.

3. Choose the line that best concludes the following poem. Consider rhythm, rhyme, and meter.

The little town and river grew as one
And played as children on the valley floor
In stormy weather if they scrapped for fun

a. They always liked each other again soon as they did before
b. This only made them like each other more
c. It was because it often rained without measure
d. They did so only when it would pour

Answer = B
Each line of the excerpt is written in iambic pentameter: five iambs per line. An iamb is a metrical foot of two syllables; the first syllable is unstressed and the second syllable is stressed. The only answer choice also written in iambic pentameter is B.

4. In the following excerpt from "Doc Hill," written by Edgar Lee Masters, who is the speaker?

I went up and down the streets
Here and there by day and night,
Through all hours of the night caring for the poor who were sick.
Do you know why?
My wife hated me, my son went to the dogs.

a. Doc Hill
b. Edgar Lee Masters
c. Mrs. Hill
d. An omniscient narrator who does not appear in the poem

Answer = A
The answer must be Doc Hill. The use of "I" eliminates the possibility of an omniscient narrator who does not appear in the poem. Likewise, the mention of "my wife" in the last line eliminates Mrs. Hill as an answer choice. While Edgar Lee Masters wrote this poem, one should never assume that the narrator of a poem is also the poet. The narrator is Doc Hill, a character invented by Masters, who recounts his life through this verse.

5. "A litany of little linnets alighted on the lamppost" is an example of:

a. dissonance
b. consonance
c. alliteration
d. refrain

Answer = C
The repetition of the "L" sound at the beginning of several words in this sentence indicates alliteration. Consonance is also a repetition of consonant sounds, but the consonant repeated appears at the end of words, rather than at the beginning. Dissonance is the mingling of harsh, inharmonious sounds that are grating to the ear. To the contrary, the alliteration used in this example creates a pleasant, rhythmic sound. A refrain is a phrase or line, generally important to a poem's topic, that is repeated word for word at regular intervals throughout the poem.

6. Identify the rhyme scheme in the following poem:

If We Must Die
If we must die, let it not be like hogs
Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs,
Marking their mock at our accursed lot.
If we must die, O let us nobly die,
So that our precious blood may not be shed
In vain; then even the monsters we defy
Shall be constrained to honor us though dead!
O kinsmen! We must meet the common foe!
Though far outnumbered let us show us brave,
And for their thousand blows deal one deathblow!
What though before us lies the open grave?
Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack,
Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!
Claude McKay, 1889-1948

a. aabbccddeeffgg
b. ababcdcdefefgg
c. aabbaabbcdcdee
d. aabbaabbccddee

Answer = B
Rhyme scheme is determined by assigning the same letter to lines that rhyme with one another. Thus, line 1 ("If we must die, let it not be like hogs") and line 3 ("While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs") are assigned the letter "a." In the same manner, lines 2 and 4 are assigned the letter "b," lines 5 and 7 are assigned the letter "c," and so on.

7. A poem must contain which of the following?

a. rhyme
b. stanzas
c. meter
d. none of the above

Answer = D
A poem need not contain rhyme, meter, or more than one stanza. Free verse, for instance, relies upon natural speech rhythms to convey meaning; few, if any, formal elements are used.

8. Consider the following poem:

Symphony in Yellow
An omnibus across the bridge
Crawls like a yellow butterfly,
And, here and there, a passer-by
Shows like a little restless midge.

Big barges full of yellow hay
Are moored against the shadowy wharf,
And like a yellow silken scarf,
The thick fog hangs along the quay.

The yellow leaves begin to fade
And flutter from the Temple elms,
And at my feet the pale green Thames
Lies like a rod of rippled jade.
Oscar Wilde, 1854-1900

What literary device is used in every stanza?

a. metaphor
b. hyperbole
c. personification
d. simile

Answer = D
A simile is used in every stanza of Wilde's poem. A simile is a comparison between unlike objects using the words "like" or "as." Lines 7 and 8, "And, like a yellow silken scarf, / The thick fog hangs along the quay," provide a good example of a simile. A metaphor is more than a comparison; it equates one object or idea with another. Charles Simic's statement, "Poetry is an orphan of silence," is an example of metaphor. Hyperbole is language characterized by extreme exaggeration ("I could eat a horse."). Personification is a literary technique used to endow inanimate or inhuman objects with human traits. "The wind whistled a tune" would be an example of personification.

9. An antonym for frigid is:

a. cold
b. tepid
c. sweltering
d. freezing

Answer = C
An antonym is a word that is opposite in meaning to another word. Since "frigid" means extreme cold, its antonym is "sweltering," which means extreme heat. "Cold" and "freezing" have meanings similar to "frigid." "Tepid" only means lukewarm, which is not exactly opposite in meaning to "frigid."

10. Consider the following poem:

On My First Son
Farewell, thou child of my right hand, and joy;
My sin was too much hope of thee, loved boy:
Seven years thou wert lent to me, and I thee pay,
Exacted by thy fate, on the just day.
O could I lose all father now! For why
Will man lament the state he should envy,
To have so soon 'scaped world's and flesh's rage,
And, if no other misery, yet age?
Rest in soft peace, and asked, say, Here doth lie
Ben Jonson his best piece of poetry.
For whose sake henceforth his vows be such
As what he loves may never like too much.
Ben Jonson, 1572-1637

In what style is Jonson's poem written?

a. blank verse
b. sonnet
c. rhyming couplets
d. rhyming tercets

Answer = C
A couplet consists of two rhyming lines, usually of ten syllables each. "Farewell, thou child of my right hand, and joy; / My sin was too much hope of thee, loved boy" is the first example of a rhyming couplet in Jonson's poem. Blank verse is unrhymed iambic pentameter. A sonnet consists of 14 lines written in iambic pentameter, usually containing one octave and a sestet, or three quatrains and a couplet. A tercet consists of three rhyming lines that work as a unit.

11. Consider the following poem:

When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer
When I heard the learn'd astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,
When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,
When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,
Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.
Walt Whitman, 1819-1892

Whitman's poem is written in what style?

a. sonnet
b. haiku
c. free verse
d. terza rima

Answer = C
Whitman is considered the father of free verse poetry. Rather than employing rhyme or meter, Whitman uses natural speech rhythms to endow his poetry with musicality. A sonnet is a 14-line poem of iambic pentameter, usually broken into an octave and a sestet or three quatrains and a couplet. A haiku is a Japanese poem of only three lines; the first and third lines of a haiku have five syllables while the second line has seven. Terza rima consists of tercets written in iambic pentameter with an interlocking rhyme scheme.

Your General Poetic Knowledge Score is 11 out of a possible 11.

0-3 You do not yet possess enough knowledge of general poetic terms, structure, forms, and techniques to be considered knowledgeable in this form of literature. An Educational course on general poetic techniques would benefit you greatly.

4-7 You have a good knowledge of general poetic terms, structure, forms, and techniques. People at this level have generally taken basic or advanced level poetry courses, or have spent considerable time in studying this form of literary endeavor. Improvement from this level can be achieved relatively easy as you already have a good basic foundation of knowledge.

8-11 You have an excellent grasp of poetic form, structure, and technique. People at this level have generally taken advanced-level study in literature or have completed advanced poetry courses. They have often spent considerable time writing, developing their own poetic "voice," and their own techniques. People at this level, particularly if they can apply their knowledge of poetic form and structure to their own work, are considered among the most talented of poetic artists.

Posted by Michele at May 13, 2005 12:04 AM