Literature Questions and Answers

Whom does Polonius send to France to spy on Laertes? Where does the ghost appear during the play?
Reynoldo. The castle ramparts and Gertrude’s bedchamber.

How did Claudius murder King Hamlet? Where is the university at which Horatio and Hamlet studied?
By pouring poison into his ear. Wittenberg.

Whose skull does Hamlet discover in the churchyard? Which of the following characters cannot see the ghost?
The former court jester’s. Gertrude.

Who escorts Hamlet on the voyage to England? Where do Hamlet and Laertes fight during Ophelia’s funeral?
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Inside the grave itself.

Which of the following characters survive the play? What does Hamlet claim to be able to tell the difference between when the wind is from the south?
Fortinbras, Horatio, and Osric. A hawk and a handsaw.

In whose history of Denmark did Shakespeare find background material for his play? How does Ophelia die?
Saxo Grammaticus. She drowns in the river.

Whose story does Hamlet ask the players to tell upon their arrival to Elsinore? Why, according to Polonius, has Hamlet gone mad?
Priam and Hecuba’s. He is in love with Ophelia.

Who is the last character to die in the play? How many characters die during the course of the play?
Hamlet. Eight.

Who speaks the famous “To be, or not to be” soliloquy? In what country do Rosencrantz and Guildenstern die?
Hamlet. England.

Why does Hamlet decide not to kill Claudius after the traveling players’ play? Who killed Fortinbras’s father?
Claudius is praying. Hamlet’s father.

Which character speaks the first line of the play? Which of Claudius and Laertes’ traps for Hamlet succeeds in killing him?
Bernardo. The poisoned sword.

Which character speaks from beneath the stage toward the end of Act I? Who returns Hamlet to Denmark after his exile?
The ghost. A group of pirates.

An Essay on Man
Man needs to figure things out for themselves and not depend on God. Man is a walking contradiction.

Literary Devices: An Essay on Man
metaphor: “He hangs between”
metaphor/ paradox: ” Chaos of thought and passion.”
metaphor: “The glory, jest and riddle of the world!”

Sonnet 116
If Shakespeare is wrong then he takes back everything he said about love and no man has ever loved before.

Literary Devices on Sonnet 116
ever-fixed mark= lighthouse
“It is the star to every wandering bark”= Love is the guiding north star to every lost ship.
Love’s actual worth remains a mystery it is too powerful.
Love is powerful enough to withstand anything.

Sonnet 130
Shakespeare describes his mistress by saying how unattractive she is, but in the end he still loves her.

Literary Devices: Sonnet 130
example of a parody
“Coral is far more red than her lips ‘ red”- metaphor

Chimney Sweeper/ Innocence
Tone:full of hope, optimistic
Rhyme Scheme: a,a,b,b
“like a lamb’s back”- simile

Chimney Sweeper/ Experience
Tone: melancholy, somber
“cloak of death”- metaphor
irony: “Are gone to praise God…who make a Heaven out of our misery”

The Tyger
describes the Tyger as a beauty and a beast.
Symbolism: Tyger: God’s power and creation
Blacksmith: God himself
“the stars threw down their spears”-personification
“In what furnace was thy brain?”-metaphor

The Lamb
tone: playful
Symbolism: the lamb is Jesus
Parallelism: “Little Lamb I’ll tell thee”
The lamb is blessed ed and was made by God.

English Sonnet
14 lines 3Quatrains
Cat, Bear, Bat, Hair= a,b,a,b,c,d,c,d,e,f,e,f,g,g
GG=couplet
ABAB= Quatrain
Volta=turn or change in tone (but,yet)

Italian Sonnet
ABBA ABBA= Octave
CDE CDE= Sestet

Lear is king of what country? Which one of Lear’s daughters is sent into exile?
Britain. Cordelia.

Which one of Lear’s counselors reprimands the king for exiling his daughter? When Lear visits Goneril, what does she demand of him?
Kent. That he send away some of his knights.

When they hear that Lear is coming to visit them, where do Regan and Cornwall go? Why is Kent thrown into the stocks?
To Gloucester’s castle. For beating Oswald with the flat of his sword.

When he flees from his father, how does Edgar disguise himself? When Lear tells Regan that Goneril has wronged him, what does Regan advise him to do?
As a common beggar. Go to Goneril and ask her forgiveness.

After he curses both Goneril and Regan, what does Lear do? Whom does Lear meet living in a little hovel on the heath?
He storms out of Gloucester’s castle, accompanied by the Fool. Edgar, in disguise.

Why is Gloucester accused of treason? Where does Gloucester send Lear and his attendants?
Because Edmund reveals letters showing that he knows of a French invasion. To Dover.

How is Gloucester punished for his “treason”?Who encounters Gloucester on the heath and offers to lead him to Dover?
He is blinded. Edgar.

Who is leading the army that lands at Dover? Why does Gloucester want to reach the cliffs of Dover?
Cordelia. He wants to throw himself over the cliffs.

To whom are both Goneril and Regan attracted? Before the battle between the French and English armies, to whose camp is Lear brought?
Edmund. Cordelia’s.

What happens to Lear and Cordelia during the battle? How does Regan die?
Edmund takes them captive. Goneril poisons her.

Who fights a duel with Edmund? What does Edmund reveal as he lies dying?
Edgar. That he ordered Cordelia killed.

What happens to Cordelia? What happens to Lear at the end of the play?
She is hanged in prison. He dies while weeping over Cordelia’s body.

The World is too much with us
We should look up to Nature
Don’t take Nature for granted.
The speaker wishes he were raised as a Pagan.
Human beings are too preoccupied with the materials and have lost touch with the spiritual and Nature.

The Rape of the Lock
mock epic: pokes fun at the society he lives in.
Belinda is seen as the hero.
Belinda’s hair being cut off was shown as the climax in the poem.
Puffs and Powders: used as her weapons to defeat the Baron.

Cain and Abel
God doesn’t accept Cain’s offering which leads to Cain murdering Abel.
God protects Cain by marking him.
related to Claudius.

Book of Job
wealthy and has 10 children.
Satan takes everything from Job, but Job remians faithful to God.
the wife tells Job to be unfaithful
the friends try to help him discover where he might have sinned.