AP Literature Unit 5 Progress Check: MCQ

Which choice best describes the use of a literary device in line 4 ?

B - A metaphor characterizes the night as a graceful, pervasive presence.

Which line contains an example of personification?

D - Line 29 ("The billows . . . sleep")

Within the context of the entire poem, the use of "I stood" in line 1 and again in line 33 serves which function?

A - It reinforces the poem's focus on an experience that captivates the speaker.

In addressing his baby son, the speaker alludes to Keats's poem in lines 25-26 ("And interpreters . . . beauty") in order to make which point?

A - Poets formerly helped readers feel that they understood the world around them.

The allusion in "Faint glories of the crown that Phoebus wears" (line 36) emphasizes the

A - radiance of light exuding through the darkness

In context, the description of modern poets as "unfortunate fellows / And . . . Atlas" (lines 27-34) suggests that the speaker believes their predicament is

E - trivial because it is self-created

This passage is excerpted from a novel published in 2011. After attending a concert in New York City, the narrator has accidentally exited onto a fire escape and discovered that he cannot reenter the building through the same door.

Now, I faced solitude of a rare purity. In the darkness, above the sheer drop, I could see the lights of Forty-second Street flashing in the visible distance. The railings of the fire escape, which were probably precarious at the best of times, were slicked with water and inimical1 to the grip. I moved carefully, taking step after premeditated step. The wind pushed around the building noisily, and I took some grim comfort in the idea that, if I were to fall from that height, there was no question of being maimed: death would be instant. The thought calmed me, and I stepped and slid down the metal steps, a few modest inches at a time. My high-wire act continued for long minutes in the darkness. And then I saw that the fire escape went only halfway down the building, ending abruptly at another closed door. The rest of the way down to the ground, some two flights, was air alone. But luck was with me: this second door had a handle. I tried it and it opened, into a hallway. Before I entered the door, holding it open with relief and gratitude, it occurred to me to look straight up, and much to my surprise, there were stars. Stars! I hadn't thought I would be able to see them, not with the light pollution perpetually wreathing the city, and not on a night on which it had been raining. But the rain had stopped while I was climbing down, and had washed the air clean. The miasma2 of Manhattan's electric lights did not go very far up into the sky, and in the moonless night, the sky was like a roof shot through with light, and heaven itself shimmered. Wonderful stars, a distant cloud of fireflies: but I felt in my body what my eyes could not grasp, which was that their true nature was the persisting visual echo of something that was already in the past. In the unfathomable ages it took for light to cross such distances, the light

Toward the middle of the second paragraph, the comparison between the stars and "a distant cloud of fireflies" (sentence 6) is best described as

E - a lively metaphor that emphasizes the narrator's initial delight at being able to see stars in the city

The juxtaposition of adjectives in lines 9-15 ("and in . . . shining") cumulatively creates a sensory impression of

E - darkness with an interval of light

Overall, the passage can best be interpreted as an account of a

E - transcendent experience

e metaphor in the first paragraph comparing the narrator's situation to a "high-wire act" emphasizes which of the following?

A - The danger of the narrator's current predicament

In the following poem, published in 1935, the speaker addresses his infant son.

A Poet to His Baby Son Tiny bit of humanity, Blessed with your mother's face, And cursed with your father's mind. I say cursed with your father's mind,5Because you can lie so long and so quietly on your back, Playing with the dimpled big toe of your left foot, And looking away, Through the ceiling of the room, and beyond. Can it be that already you are thinking of being a poet? 10Why don't you kick and howl, And make the neighbors talk about "That damned baby next door," And make up your mind forthwith To grow up and be a banker15Or a politician or some other sort of go-getter Or—?—whatever you decide upon, Rid yourself of these incipient1 thoughts About being a poet. For poets no longer are makers of songs,20Chanters of the gold and purple harvest, Sayers of the glories of earth and sky, Of the sweet pain of love And the keen joy of living; No longer dreamers of the essential dreams,25And interpreters of the eternal truth, Through the eternal beauty. Poets these days are unfortunate fellows. Baffled in trying to say old things in a new way Or new things in an old language,30They talk abracadabra In an unknown tongue, Each one fashioning for himself A wordy world of shadow problems, And as a self-imagined Atlas,235Struggling under it with puny legs and arms, Groaning out incoherent complaints at his load. My son, this is no time nor place for a poet; Grow up and join the big, busy crowd That scrambles for what it thinks it wants40Out of this old world which is—as it is— And, probably, always will be. Take the advice of a father who knows: You cannot begin too young Not to be a poet.

The image of the "blurred yellow rectangle of a taxicab" in the final paragraph helps dramatize which aspect of the scene?

B - The dizzying height from which the narrator regards the city streets

An interpretation stating that the speaker feels awed when experiencing the hours of night would be most fully supported by the poem's

B - references to the magical effects of night

In the context of the first stanza, "Tiny" (line 1) emphasizes the speaker's feeling that his son is a

B - small part of a larger world

In context, "lace-work" (line 14) is best understood to refer to the

C - intricate patterns of overlapping leaves and branches

In the fourth sentence of the passage ("I moved . . . step"), the word "premeditated" indicates that the narrator

C - is being very cautious as he navigates the fire escape

The allusion to Atlas in line 34 primarily serves to suggest that modern poets

C - possess an exaggerated sense of their own importance

The passage emphasizes a parallel between the narrator's unexpected experience of finding himself outside the building and his

C - sense of temporarily existing outside everyday time and space

In lines 1-3 ("I stood . . . world"), personification primarily has the effect of

C - transforming a natural process into a series of intentional actions

The two three-line stanzas in lines 1-3 and in lines 42-44 have the effect of framing the poem as

D - a concise and counterintuitive message

In lines 37-39 ("And soon . . . Love"), personification portrays the Earth as

D - gradually exhibiting a sense of pleasure

In line 29, "old" refers to a language that is

D - inadequate to express modern thoughts

In the second sentence of the final paragraph, the image of the "human race itself" being "extinguished" most clearly serves to associate humanity with

D - long-dead stars

Which lines most fully support an interpretation that the speaker feels the nonpoets of the modern world have a misguided perspective?

E - Lines 38-39 ("Grow up . . . wants")

In referring to Times Square as a "neon inferno" in the final paragraph, the narrator emphasizes both the brightness of Times Square's lights and

E - the garish appearance it has compared to the sky above it

This poem by an American writer was published in 1895.

Night 1 I stood and watched the still, mysterious Night, Steal from her shadowy caverns in the East, To work her deep enchantments on the world. Her black veil floated down the silent glens,5 While her dark sandalled feet, with noiseless tread, Moved to a secret harmony. Along The brows of the majestic hills, she strung Her glorious diamonds so stealthily, It never marred their dreams; and in the deep, 10Cool thickets of the wood, where scarce the Day Could reach the dim retreat, her dusky hand Pinned on the breast of the exhaling flower, A glittering gem; while all the tangled ferns And forest lace-work, as she moved along, 15Grew moist and shining. Who would e'er have guessed, The queenly Night would deign to stoop and love A little flower! And yet, with all her stealth, I saw her press her damp and cooling lip 20Upon the feverish bosom of a Rose; At which a watchful bird poured sudden forth A love-sick song, of sweet and saddest strain. Upon the ivied rocks, and rugged crags On which the ocean billows break, she hung 25Her sombre mantle; and the gray old sea That had been high in tumult all the day, Became so mesmerized beneath her wiles, He seemed a mere reflection of herself. The billows sank into a dimpled sleep; 30Only the little tide-waves glided up To kiss the blackness of the airy robe That floated o'er them. Long I stood and watched The mystic, spell-like influence of Night; 35Till o'er the eastern hills, came up the first Faint glories of the crown that Phoebus* wears. And soon, the Earth, surprised to see the work That Night had wrought, began to glow and blush, Like maidens, conscious of the glance of Love. 40While she, — the dark Enchantress, — like to one Who decorates her bower with all things fair, Wherewith to please her lover, but yet flees At his approaching step, — at the first gleam That li