World Lit Final Exam Quizzes

We learn from the ever-useful introduction in the Norton anthology that our tragically brief reading from Evliya Çelebi's Book of Travels, regarded as the most important work of Ottoman literature, is excerpted from a ____ volume work.

10.

The memorable (if somewhat unwieldy) title of today's story is:

A biblical allusion.

We learn in the Norton introduction to Montaigne's life that he lived at a tumultuous time in France's history, a period marked by civil war between religious factions. Which of these best describes Montaigne's own position with respect to the ongoing Catholic and Protestant conflict?

A careful and humane thinker, he remained neutral and unfanatical, admiring Henry of Navarre's willingness to switch from one faith to another in order to secure peace.

Anyone wishing to follow Tolstoy's example where marital relationships are concerned may want to offer what opportunity to his or her young spouse?

A chance to read detailed diary accounts of all one's youthful sexual exploits.

Which of these does Gilgamesh NOT encounter on his wanderings following the death of Enkidu?

A dog-headed goddess of death.

Early in the essay, Woolf cautions her reader not to take everything she writes at face value. "Lies," she acknowledges, "will flow from my lips, but there may perhaps be some truth mixed up with them; it is for you to seek out this truth and to decide whether any part of it is worth keeping. If not, you will of course throw the whole of it into the waste-paper basket and forget all about it." This should serve to help make us aware that Judith Shakespeare, of whom she writes in ch. 3, was:

A hypothetical woman for whom there is no historical evidence, but one whose imagined story Woolf tells in order to help her reader understand the plight of intelligent women, both in the past and to some extent in her own time, as well, who were denied the opportunity to develop their own artistic genius.

Ivan's visit to the physician reminds him of . . .

A lawyer examining a defendant in court.

We learn that Allende's first novel began as . . .

A letter to her dying grandfather.

What a lovely coincidence that one of our words this week is Young Turk! If you'll go and have a look at the Oxford English Dictionary definition, which you can access through the OBU Library website (https://obu.edu/library/dictionaries/), you'll find that a Young Turk can mean all but which of the following?

A melancholy, overly romantic person.

Venerable and calm, with all its treasures safe locked within its breast, it sleeps complacently and will, so far as I am concerned, so sleep for ever. Never will I wake those echoes, never will I ask for that hospitality again, I vowed as I descended the steps in anger. To the steps of which institution does she refer?

A university library.

Gilgamesh mourns fiercely for his dead friend, and does not give up his body for burial until what happens?

A worm falls out of the corpse's nose.

The following describes the funeral of _________: Then the daughters of the Old Man of the Sea Stood all around you and wailed piteously, And they dressed you in immortal clothing. And the Muses, all nine, changed the dirge, Singing responsively in beautiful voices. You couldn't have seen a dry eye in the army, So poignant was the song of the Muses. For seventeen days we mourned you like that . . .

Achilles.

Putting one index finger to the lip, we learn, was for Turks and other Muslims a common gesture of:

Admiration.

We heard in class today Ngugi Wa Thiong'o describe loss of language in terms of ___________.

Alienation.

For what is the "little fish" in the following passage a metaphor? It was thus that I found myself walking with extreme rapidity across a grass plot. Instantly a man's figure rose to intercept me. Nor did I at first understand that the gesticulations of a curious-looking object, in a cut-away coat and evening shirt, were aimed at me. His face expressed horror and indignation. Instinct rather than reason came to my help, he was a Beadle; I was a woman. This was the turf; there was the path. Only the Fellows and Scholars are allowed here; the gravel is the place for me. Such thoughts were the work of a moment. As I regained the path the arms of the Beadle sank, his face assumed its usual repose, and though turf is better walking than gravel, no very great harm was done. The only charge I could bring against the Fellows and Scholars of whatever the college might happen to be was that in protection of their turf, which has been rolled for 300 years in succession they had sent my little fish into hiding.

An idea that had begun to form in her mind.

Wollstonecraft offers the lovely and (hopefully) memorable metaphor of "the graceful ivy, clasping the oak that supported it" to describe ________________.

An ideal image of marriage that is, she argues, appealing but almost always illusory, since few men or women are as strong and dependable as oaks.

Although few question his importance or genius as a poet and essayist, Eliot's reputation has suffered in recent decades in consequence of the ___________ remarks and implications in some of his speeches and poems.

Anti-Semitic.

The Norton introduction to Gilgamesh compares it to Homer's Odyssey, but notes that one significant difference is that Gilgamesh . . .

Appears to have been conceived from the outset as a literary rather than oral work.

The Psalms, we learn . . .

Are a collection of poems probably composed by various authors in different time periods.

Evliya Çelebi's account of his time in Vienna comes from his time spent there . . .

As part of a diplomatic delegation.

Markuk, "resolving to make artful things," decides to make humankind from the blood of a slain god. How does he intend to use these humans?

As servants to the gods.

"It's a good thing I'm a bit of an athlete. Another man might have been killed, but I merely knocked myself, just here; it hurts when it's touched, but it's passing off already—it's only a bruise." Thus Ivan describes the injury he sustained while ____________.

Attempting to show an upholsterer how he wanted his curtains hung.

T.S. Eliot is considered . . .

Both an American and a British poet.

Why does she compare women to soldiers?

Both, she argues, are victims of incomplete, poorly organized educations.

In the "Wife of Bath's Prologue," her attitude toward virginity could best be characterized as:

Cheerfully dismissive. She acknowledges that celibacy is fine for those inclined to such a life, but frankly explains that she is cut out for loving.

Which of these did Evliya not encounter in Vienna?

Chinese street musicians playing hauntingly familiar Turkish melodies.

To give a sense of the hollow futility of modern life, and of the monotonous, directionless plodding of the life he has led, the poetic persona in The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (which is to say, Prufrock himself) laments that he has "measured out his life" with what?

Coffee spoons.

Understanding the historical context in which Genesis was redacted (probably the 5th century BC, when the people of Judah were in exile in Babylon) helps us recognize that it was, among other things, very likely an attempt to . . .

Consolidate Jewish identity in the middle of an alien culture.

In any case, we also learned that the great Sumerian epic poem Gilgamesh (which we'll be reading for the rest of this week), which had been handed down through spoken word for untold generations, was finally written down in __________, a language whose name derives from a Latin word meaning wedge, of all things.

Cuneiform.

Which of these best sums up the sort of persona that The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock depicts?

Deeply sensitive, vulnerable,alienated, and perhaps despairing.

Which of these best describes the nature of author Ngugi Wa Thiong'o's primary critique of Christianity in this story?

Despite its potential for emancipatory (i.e. liberating) energy as the religion of the poor and meek, it is also the religion of the colonizer, and is, in its inauthentic version, useful for giving an air of respectability to the soulless pursuit of prosperity at the expense of economic justice.

Ivan's daughter reacts with displeasure to his illness because she is . .

Devoted to pleasure.

The wedding feast for the knight and his new wife . . .

Did not take place.

Careful readers of footnote will have added a new word to their wordhoard: telluric. When Allende describes a landslide as "telluric vomit," what sort of vomit does she mean to evoke?

Earthy.

The editors explain that they include Robert Crumb's graphic-novel version of Genesis in order to remind us that "the Hebrew Bible is—for all its theological and philosophical profundity—a very ___________ book."

Entertaining.

We learned in class on Wednesday that "wise Penelope" is an example of a poetic convention called ________.

Epithet.

Our word today is Yiddish, but since this is a bonus section—and one of my making, at that—I'm going instead with a term from last week: yellow journalism. The term owes its origins to an 1895 issue of the New York World that featured a cartoon of a child in a yellow dress ('The Yellow Kid'). The then-novel use of color printing was an experiment intended to attract customers, but the term "yellow journalism" has come to denote reporting that is:

Exaggerated and sensationalist.

Based on what you read from the introduction, you should be able to infer that postcolonial writers are those who:

Explore through essays and stories the harmful consequences of European imperialism and colonization for indigenous people.

The indigenous Brazilians he describes reserve their fiercest punishment for ___________, who are "cut into a thousand pieces" if caught.

False prophets.

It is true that Eliot deplored the ugliness and barrenness of the modern culture of his day. Is it also true that he tried to show through his poetry that humanity needed to abandon its futile search for spiritual or transcendent meaning and focus instead on material (i.e. political, economic, non-spiritual) solutions?

False.

Odysseus, in his fury, spares no one who clasps his knees and begs for mercy.

False.

One of the reasons for Realism's significance was that for the very first time, artists aimed to represent truth about the world.

False.

To the extent that this poem describes a religion as well as an account of humankind's origins, that religion could be accurately described as monotheistic.

False.

Among the societal forces that Wollstonecraft holds responsible for reducing the agency and status of women are those people who write on the subject of ____________.

Female education and manners.

How, finally, is the cycle of violence ended?

Forceful divine intervention.

According to the Norton introduction to T.S. Eliot, his contribution to the philosophical, artistic, and literary movement known as Modernism was most influenced by his exposure to:

French Symbolic poetry.

As careful, observant readers, you have no doubt noticed that one of the ways the bourgeois pretentiousness of these characters frequently manifests itself is through their use of ___________ phrases.

French.

"Health, strength, and vitality in other people were offensive to him, but Gerasim's strength and vitality did not mortify but soothed him." Based on your careful reading, which of the following is the best explanation for why Ivan finds Gerasim's presence comforting?

Gerasim is honest.

To whom does Enkidu address the rather astonishing blessing below? "For your sake may the wife and mother of seven be abandoned."

Gilgamesh.

Praskovya Fedorovna asks Ivan, "Jean, my dear, do this for me. It can't do any harm and often helps. Healthy people often do it." What is she proposing that he do?

Give confession and take communion.

According to the editors of the Norton, a strong case can be made that ______ is the most vivid and complex character of the book of Genesis.

God.

Interesting, isn't it, that the knight's punishment for RAPE comes down to deciding which version of "happily ever after" he's going to choose. Something to talk about in class, probably, but pending that, what choice does the knight make?

He chooses to let his wife choose.

"They laid upon themselves a curse (if they broke their oath), With water and oil they swore, they touched their throats. They granted him exercise of kingship over the gods, They established him forever For lordship of heaven and netherworld. Thus do the other gods appoint Marduk the highest god of all (and, in so doing, fulfill what the Norton introduction suggests is part of the agenda of this poem, which may be, among other things, propaganda for Marduk and thus for the city of Babylon, of which he was patron). What, according to the poem, is the primary reason for Marduk having won this honor?

He has defeated the monster Tiamat and created the world.

It pays to come to class! What did we discover together in class Monday that was unusual about the sculpture of Moses?

He has horns.

"In the morning when he saw first his footman, then his wife, then his daughter, and then the doctor, their every word and movement confirmed to him the awful truth that had been revealed to him during the night." What was this revelation, "the sole solution of all the riddles of life and death," which he had earlier dismissed "as something quite impossible"?

He has not lived as he ought to have lived.

What is the effect of the Mau Mau uprising on Wariuki?

He reaps minor economic benefits by cooperating with the colonialists.

What is King Gilgamesh's custom at the weddings of his subjects in Uruk?

He, rather than the groom, takes the first wedding night with the bride.

"There are secrets between us no one else knows," muses cautious Penelope, and she does not fully accept that Odysseus is who he claims to be until he has proven it by showing that he knows a secret about ____________.

His bed.

What did the hungry Esau bargain away to his brother in trade for a bowl of stew?

His birthright.

We learn that the word Babylon means:

Houses of the great gods.

"When Ivan Ilyich came home and entered his study he found his brother-in-law there—a healthy, florid man—unpacking his portmanteau himself. He raised his head on hearing Ivan Ilyich's footsteps and looked up at him for a moment without a word. That stare told Ivan everything." Everything about what?

How visibly ill Ivan has become.

Were you surprised to see sarcasm (not to mention some insults that might almost be at home in a Monty Python movie) even in such an ancient text as this one? There is surely some sarcasm perceivable in the first line of the following passage: How well-advised they are, the fool Gilgamesh and the yokelman! Why have you come here to me? Come now, Enkidu, small-fry, who does not know his father, Spawn of a turtle or tortoise, who sucked no mother's milk! Who speaks these lines?

Humbaba.

Isaac's wife, Rebekah, pregnant with twins, utters a phrase that Robert Alter translates as, " . . . Then why am I . . . ??" Assiduous readers of footnotes will recollect that this statement:

Is somewhat ambiguous and open to interpretation.

To whom does Gilgamesh address this not-terribly-flattering speech? You are a brazier that goes out when it freezes, A flimsy door that keeps out neither wind nor draught, A palace that crushes a warrior, A mouse that gnaws through its housing, Tar that smears its bearer, Waterskin that soaks its bearer, Weak stone that undermines a wall . . .

Ishtar.

Woolf's criticism of Professor Trevelyn's History of England is primarily that . . .

It includes nothing of the ordinary but vital details of the lives of real women.

What is the one requirement that Douglas Jones and his wife make for Wariuki, should he wish to marry their daughter?

It must be a church wedding (and thus an expensive one).

In the brief introduction to Ngugi Wa Thiong'o's work, we learn what remarkable facts about his 1980 novel, Devil on the Cross?

It was the first novel written in the Kikuyu language, spoken by about six million Kenyans. He wrote it using toilet paper as stationary. He wrote it in jail, as a political prisoner.

Carefully read the following passage: "In his work itself, especially in his examinations, he very soon acquired a method of eliminating all considerations irrelevant to the legal aspect of the case, and reducing even the most complicated case to a form in which it would be presented on paper only in its externals, completely excluding his personal opinion of the matter, while above all observing every prescribed formality." Which of the following most fully and accurately describes what Tolstoy is trying to show us here about Ivan Ilyich?

Ivan is living a socially-correct and outwardly praiseworthy life, but he lacks his own ideas and moral compass.

Attention to a story's setting, as we have repeatedly discussed, is crucial to readerly understanding, appreciation, and pleasure. Which of these best describes this story's setting?

Kenya, mid 20th century.

Assiduous readers of footnotes (which I've encouraged you all several times in class to be) will have learned that the high peak of Mount Nimush on which Utanapishtum's boat comes to rest as the flood subsides is thought by some to be Pir Omar Gudrun in ___________.

Kurdistan.

To whom is the following speech addressed? Well, old-timer, you certainly know how to garden. There's not a plant, a fig tree, a vine or an olive, Not a pear tree or leek in this whole garden untended. But if I may say so without getting you angry, You don't take such good care of yourself. Old age Is yard, yes. But unwashed, scruffy and dressed in rags?

Laertes.

Who is the only one to draw blood before the violence between Odysseus's family and the vengeful families of the slain suitors comes to an end?

Laertes.

Without attention to context, both temporal and geographical, one cannot fully enjoy a story. What was the setting of "The Women's Swimming Pool?"

Lebanon.

A Room of One's Own began as a . . .

Lecture that Woolf was invited to give at a women's college.

We learn in the Norton's Intro to Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Literature that the word "Literature" comes from the Latin for what?

Letters.

In the story, Ivan Ilyich's friends react to his death in ways that might surprise us. At Ivan's funeral service, Peter Ivanovich's overwhelming desire is to:

Make it to his usual card game.

Evliya's title "Çelebi":

Marks him as educated.

"The women" in The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock who "come and go" through drawing rooms, speak idly and pretentiously of what as they stroll?

Michelangelo.

The editors of the Norton Anthology point out that one obvious difference between the Bible and most works of literature is that . . .

No single author composed the Bible.

Those of you who so kindly graced us with your presence in class on Monday now know that 1066 is an important historical watershed for England, for it was the year of the _________________, which had tremendous political and also linguistic consequences.

Norman (French) Conquest and the Battle of Hastings.

If you read with care to the end of the introductory passage on Ancient Near Eastern and Mediterranean cultures (6-8), you will have learned that religious observation in those cultures was _________ linked with morality and orthodoxy [i.e. correct religious beliefs].

Not always.

How interesting to learn that only one of the writing systems from the ancient Near East survived and influenced other languages, including ancient Hebrew. Which of these was it?

Phoenician.

Montaigne was, among other things, master of brief, highly-quotable epigrams. Which of the following is NOT among the remarks we encountered in today's reading?

Pray as though everything depended on God. Work as though everything depended on you.

The nineteenth-century literary and artistic movement that was motivated by industrial and political revolution was called:

Realism.

Ivan's feelings toward his wife in the early days of his illness could be described as:

Revulsion, alienation, and hatred.

"Enkidu was too slow, he could not run as before, But he had gained reason and expanded his understanding" (Tablet I.193-94) What has Enkidu encountered or experienced that leaves him in this condition?

Sex.

The narrator's grandmother anxiously scolds her, "If any man were to see you, you'd be done for, and so would your mother and father and your grandfather [ . . . ] and I'd be done for more than anyone because it's I who agreed to this and helped you." What does grandmother mean by "done for"?

She means that their souls would be jeopardized.

Alisoun (for that is her name), tells the pilgrims that her fifth husband, "hit me so that deaf I went." What provoked his violence?

She tore a page from his beloved book of stories of wicked wives.

Astute readers that you are, and no doubt attuned by your Contemporary World course to the importance of the divide between the Shiite and Sunni branches of Islam, you hopefully took note of the fact that Hanan Al-Shaykh is herself __________.

Shiite.

Well, obviously, no quiz over this story would be complete if I didn't winkle out of you (that is, "to extract with difficulty," though perhaps you won't find it so difficult) the answer the tale finally provides to its own big question. So, what do women want?

Sovereignty over their husbands or lovers.

Once we have finished reading this poem, I look forward to hearing whether you agree with the editors concerning its meaning, which they conclude is . . .

Tantalizingly ambiguous.

After Odysseus and Penelop have (finally) made love, what do they do?

Tell each other stories.

We learn from the Introduction that Eliot's wonderful phrase, "Fragments I have stored against my ruins," refers to the many esoteric references he makes in his poetic masterpiece ____________, which includes a series of allusions to, among a great number of other things, the Arthurian legend of the Fisher King and the Holy Grail.

The Waste Land.

Whether you've ever wondered, or perhaps just realized that you've never even thought about, about how certain texts get their names, the Babylonian creation epic Enuma Elish provides an illuminating instance of how scholars can go about assigning titles to things that were never officially titled by their creator. In this case, the title comes from:

The epic's first line of text.

"So they took their stand / There on the threshold, breathing fury, / Four of them against the many who stood in the hall. / And then Athena was with them, Zeus' daughter . . ." (XXII.212-215) The four men include all but which of the following?

The goatherd Melanthius.

God tells Noah to take pairs of animals on the ark, but a little later in the story, God tells Noah to take seven pairs of each animal. The editors of the Norton mention this as an example of:

The kind of textual discrepancy that has led most Bible scholars to reject the traditional belief that Moses wrote Genesis, in favor of the explanation that the text as it has come down to us was pieced together from several different narratives.

What causes Gilgamesh to utter the following lament? For whom, Ur-Shanabi, have my hands been toiling? For whom has my heart's blood been poured out? For myself I have obtained no benefit, I have done a good deed for a reptile!

The loss of a magical plant that would have granted him immortality.

A common logical fallacy is the genetic fallacy (also known as the fallacy of origins or fallacy of virtue) is a fallacy of irrelevance where a conclusion is suggested based solely on someone's or something's history, origin, or source rather than its current meaning or context. This fallacy could be said to apply to the reception of Mary Wollstonecraft's writing which, we learn in her brief bio in the Norton, was largely spurned for over a century because . . .

The news emerged that she had given birth to a child "out of wedlock." (Let's just pause, by the way, to appreciate this phrase. "Gettin' hitched" is one thing; "gettin' locked" sounds considerably less appealing.)

We learn from the introduction that Allende makes use of the style of writing known as magic realism, developed and associated most closely with Latin American writers, in order to comment on the problems of the contemporary world. Based on your reading of, "And of Clay Are We Created," identify which of the following issues is not among its foremost concerns.

The stifling effects of sexual taboos on Latin American women.

"Don't cry. I don't hurt anymore. I'm fine," Auzucena said when dawn came. "I'm not crying for you," Rolf Carle smiled. "I'm crying for myself. I hurt all over." What pain is the journalist experiencing?

The trauma of old memories concerning his family and WWII.

"And he could no longer forget It, but could distinctly see it looking at him from behind the flowers . . . . He would go to his study, lie down, and again be alone with It: face to face with It. And nothing could be done with It except to look at it and shudder." What is It?

The truth of his approaching death.

What is Wollstonecraft describing when she writes, "the regal homage which they receive is so intoxicating, that till the manners of the times are changed, and formed on more reasonable principles, it may be impossible to convince them that the illegitimate power, which they obtain, by degrading themselves, is a curse . . ."?

The way in which women enjoy being admired for beauty and charm, at the expense of cultivating both power and intelligence.

We learn from the introduction that Hanan Al-Shaykh's novels (the first of which she published at the tender age of 25) and plays have drawn critical attention for all but which of these?

Their shockingly iconoclastic (if it makes any sense to use that term for a religion that abjures icons, as Islam does) criticism of Muslim orthodoxy.

According to the opening of the "Wife of Bath's Tale," why have elves and fairies disappeared from England?

There's no room for them what with all the begging friars walking about!

Despite the rather focused title of his essay, "Of Cannibals" roams through quite a few ideas. Which of the following best characterizes its overall theme?

Though not necessarily praising the customs he describes, Montaigne seeks to understand and even appreciate what he sees as the underlying nobility of the people who practice them--and to critique some of the aspects of his own culture to which his fellow European Christians are blind.

Montaigne is known as the father of the essay form. The word "essay" as we now think of it didn't really exist when he first began undertaking his very personal, written reflections on various topics. The word comes, we learn, from the French essayer, meaning ________________.

To attempt or try.

What is Wariuki's "one consuming passion," which he nurses "like one nurses a toothache with one's tongue"?

To contemptuously flaunt his success before the men who had humiliated him.

From the editors of the Norton Anthology we also learn that pre-literate people tended to value stock phrases or clichés, traditional sayings, proverbs, and repetition over originality and neatly organized storytelling.

True.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary (which you can access through the OBU library website under "Research"--and I've given you an extra minute in the quiz for doing just that), the English word yogurt comes to us from which language?

Turkish.

In discussing translator Robert Alter's approach to making the text available to modern English speakers, the editors point out that the Old Testament tells its subtle and complex stories . . .

With a lot of repetition and a surprisingly limited vocabulary.

The Wife takes a narrative detour to relate the story of King Midas from the Metamorphosis of Ovid (a Roman poet) in order to demonstrate what chauvinistic (and most unchivalrous) point?

Women can't keep secrets.

You probably didn't need to consult the Oxford English Dictionary for Tuesday's WOD, but had you done so, you would have seen this example entry of its usage in a ribald novel by Rosaline Erskine: 1963 'R. Erskine' Passion Flowers in Italy xi. 144 The things that woman was doing to us . . . More truly [____] than you could believe. What is this word, which in Chinese philosophy is "the feminine or negative principle (characterized by dark, wetness, cold, passivity, disintegration, etc.) of the two opposing cosmic forces into which creative energy divides and whose fusion in physical matter brings the phenomenal world into being"?

Yin.

Which of our words this week comes to us from Australia and is slang for "an obnoxious or uncouth person" (often drunk; usually male)?

Yobo.