美国文学史习题(最新整理)

 I.Multiple choice. Please choose the best answer among the four items. (10 x 1’= 10’)1.In American literature, the 18th century was the age of Enlightenment. ____B__ was the dominant.A. humanism B. rationalismC. romanticism D. evolution2.The short story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” is taken from Irving’s work named ____B__.A. The Leatherstocking TalesC. The AutobiographyB. The Sketch BookD. The History of New York3.Which of the following is not the characteristic of American Romanticism?AA. Rationalism B. inner selfA. optimistic B. pessimisticA. short, clear sentencesC. ordinary American speechC. personal feelings D. individualismC. conservative D. ironicB. abundance of local imagesD. highly refined language4.The short story “Rip Van Winkle” reveals the __C__ attitude of its author.5.Stylistically, Henry James’ fiction is characterized by ___D__.6.Transcendentalist doctrines found their greatest literary advocates in ___B__ and Thoreau.A. Jefferson B. EmersonC. Freneau D. Mark Twain7.Which is regarded as the “Declaration of Intellectual Independence”?AA. The American Scholar B. English TraitsA. The Gilded AgeC. The Adventures of Tom SawyerA. Ezra Pound B. Robert FrostC. Oversoul D. Self-reliance8.____D is considered Mark Twain’s greatest achievement.B. Innocent AbroadD. Adventures of Huckleberry FinnC. Walt Whitman D. Hemingway9.___C__ is not among those greatest figures in “Lost Generation”.10.Naturalism is evolved from realism when the author’s tone in writing becomes less serious and less sympathetic but more ironic and more ___D_.A. rational 1-5，BBACD II.B. humorous6-10 BADCDC. optimistic D. pessimisticMultiple choice. Please choose the best answer among the four items. (10 x 1’= 10’)11.______ is the father of American Literature. D1A. Benjamin Franklin B. Philip FreneauC. Paine D. Washington Irving12._____ is a fantasy tale about a man who somehow stepped outside the main stream of life. AA. “Rip Van Winkle”C. “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”A. Thoreau B. EmersonB. “The Pioneers”D. “The Fall of the House of Usher”C. Hawthorne D. Whitman13._____ was the most leading spirit of the Transcendental Club. B14.Which of following is NOT a typical feature of Mark Twain’s language? CA. vernacular B. colloquialC. elegant D. humorous 15.From Thoreau’s jail experience, came his famous essay, _____ which states his belief that no man should violate his conscience at the command of a government. CA. Walden B. Nature C. Civil Disobedience D. Common Sense 16.Which is regarded as the “Declaration of Intellectual Independence”? AA. The American Scholar B. English TraitsC. Oversoul D. Self-reliance17.Most of the poems in Whitman’s Leaves of Grass sing of the “en-mass” and the ____ as well. CA. nature B. self-relianceC. self D. life18.What did Fitzgerald call the 1920s? CA. The Roaring 20s B. The Gay 20sC. The Jazz Age D. The Lost Generation19.Naturalism is evolved from realism when the author’s tone in writing becomes less serious and less sympathetic but more ironic and more ____. DA. rational B. humorousC. optimistic D. pessimistic20.For Melville, as well as for the reader and ____, the narrator, Moby Dick is still a mystery, an ultimate mystery of the universe. C A. Ahab B. Stubb1-5 C. Ishmael D. Starbuck D A B C C 6-10 A C C D C II. Identify Works as Described Below (1’×15 =15’): 1.The novel has a sole black protagonist who tells his own story but whose name in unknown to us. a.Native Son b.Uncle Tom’s Cabin c.Invisible Man d. Go Tell It on the Mountains 2.The main conflict of the play is the protagonist’s false value of fine 2appearance and popularity with people and the cruel reality of the society in which money is everything.

a.A Street Car Named Desire b. The Hairy Ape c.Long Day’s Journey into Night d. Death of Salesman

3.It is an autobiographical play and Edmund in the play is based on the playwright himself.

a. Long Day’s Journey into Night b. Henderson the Rain King c. The Hairy Ape d. The Glass Menageries

4.The novel tells of how a black man kills a white woman by accident and how the society is responsible for the murder.

a.Native Son b.Uncle Tom’s Cabin c.Invisible Man d. Go Tell It on the Mountains

5._________ is one of the best works in American literature about the Second World War.

a.A Farewell to Arms b.The Catcher in the Rye c.The Red Badge of Courage d. The Naked and the Dead

6. The novel by Hemingway is the best of its kind about World War I.a.A Farewell to Arms b.The Sun Also Rises

c.The Old Man and the Sea d. The Naked and the Dead

7.The novel is about how a family of farmers cannot survive in Oklahoma and

travel to California to seek a living and how they suffer hunger in California.a.The Grapes of Wrath b. U.S. A.c.Babbitt d. The Adventures of Augie March8.It is a trilogy including The 42nd Parallel, 1919, and The Big Money, with such techniques as biographies, newsreels and camera eye.

a.Babbitt b. Light in August c. U.S.A. d. The Grapes of Wrath

9.It is a novel which uses the stream of consciousness technique and whose

title is taken from Shakespeare’s Macbeth.a. Absolom, Absolom! b. The Sound and the Fury c.A Farewell to Arms d. The Great Gatsby

10. It is a naturalistic work about how a country girl is seduced and how she

becomes a famous actress and how her lover falls into a beggar and finally commits suicide.

a.An American Tragedy b. Sister Carrie c. McTeague d.Maggie, A Girl of the Streets

11. The novel is set on the Mississippi with the protagonist telling us the story in

the local dialect. It is a representative work of local colorism.

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a.Sister Carrie b.The Adventures of Tom Sawyerc. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn d.The Portrait of a Lady

12.The novel is a psychological study of a soldier (Henry Fleming)’s reactions in

the Civil War.

a.An American Tragedy b. Sister Carrie c.The Red Badge of Courage d. McTeague

13. The poem is written in free verse in 52 cantos with the theme of the

universality and equality in value of all people and all things.a.Cantos b. The Raven c. Song of Myself d.Chicago

14. The novel is about how a group of people on a whaling ship kill a great

whale but themselves are killed by the whale, with the conflict between man and his fate.

a.The Octopus b. Moby-Dick c. The Rise of Silas Lapham d. Leaves of Grass

15. It is a philosophical essay in 8 chapters plus an introduction mainly

concerned with the four uses of nature.

a. Walden b. Nature c. The Scarlet Letter d. The American ScholarI.Choose the Best Answer for Each of the Following (1’×15=15’):

1.An English ship brought 102 people from Plymouth, England on September 16, 1620 and arrived in the present Provincetown harbor on November 21 in the same year. This ship was named ____________.

a. The Pilgrims b. Mayflower c. America d. Titanic

2._________ is father of American drama and in his dramatic career he wrote 49 plays.

a. Tennessee Williams b. Eugene O’Neill c. Arthur Miller d. Elmer Rice3._________ was the first American writer to write entirely American literature. a. Anne Bradstreet b. Washington Irving c. Mark Twain d. Ernest Hemingway

4. _______ was the leader of American transcendentalism. a. Benjamin Franklin b. Washington Irving

c. Ralph Waldo Emerson d. Henry David Thoreau

5._______was the greatest woman poet in American literature and she wrote about 1,700 short lyric poems in her life time.

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a. Pearl S. Buck b.Harriet Bicher Stowe c. Emily Dickenson d. Walter Whitman

6._________ is father of the detective story and of psychoanalytic criticism.

a. Washington Irving b. Ralph Waldo Emerson c. Walt Whitman d. Edgar Allan Poe

7.William Dean Howells is concerned with the middle class life; ______ writes about the upper class society, and Mark Twain deals with the lower class reality.

a. Stephen Crane b. Frank Norris c. Theodore Dreiser d. Henry James8. Which of the following is a naturalistic writer?

a. William Dean Howells b. Mark Twain c. Ernest Hemingway d.Theodore Dreiser

9. His writings are characterized by simple, colloquial language and deep thoughts. He is______.

a. Ernest Hemingway b. William Faulkner c. F. Scott Fitzgerald d. Mark Twain

10. He wrote 18 novels all set in Jefferson Town, Yoknapatwapha County in the

deep south. He is ______.

a. William Faulkner b. John Steinbeck c. Ernest Hemingway d. Mark Twain

11. ________is Jewish in origin and in many of his novels the American Jews

are major characters.

a. Sinclair Lewis b. Saul Bellow c. Norman Mailer d. Jerome David Salinger

12._________ is often regarded as the greatest American woman poet and she wrote over 1,700 short lyric poems in her life time.

a. Anne Bradstreet b. Robert Frost c. H.D. d. Emily Dickinson 13.________ is father of American drama and won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1936.

a. John Steinbeck b. William Faulkner c. Eugene O’Neill d. Arthur Miller

14. He was the first black American to write a book about black life with great

impact on the consciousness of the nation and his masterpiece is one of the three classics about black Americans. Who is he?

a.Richard Wright b. Harriet Beecher Stowe c. Langston Hughes d.

Ralph Ellison

15. Hemingway wrote about American compatriots in Europe whereas ________

wrote about the Jazz age, life in American society.

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a.William Carlos Williams b. William Faulkner c. John Steinbeck d. F. Scott FitzgeraldI.Choose the Best Answer for Each of the Following (1×15 %):

2.The American Civil War broke out in 1861 between the Northern states and the South states, which are known respectively as the ______and the______.a. N, S b. Revolutionaries, Reactionaries c. Union, Confederacy d. Slavery, Anti-Slavery

2._____________was praised by the British as the “Tenth Muse in America”.

a.Anne Bradstreet b. Edward Taylorc. Thomas Paine d. Philip Freneau

3.Mark Twain was a representative of ________ in American literature. a. transcendentalism b. naturalism c. local colorism d. imagism4. _______ was the leader of American transcendentalism. a. Benjamin Franklin b. Washington Irving

c. Ralph Waldo Emerson d. Henry David Thoreau

5.The greatest American poet and the first writer of free verse is ____________. a. Washington Irving b.Ezra Pound c. Walt Whitman d. Emily Dickinson

6._________ is father of the detective story and of psychoanalytic criticism.

a. Washington Irving b. Ralph Waldo Emerson c. Walt Whitman d. Edgar Allan Poe

7.Henry James is concerned with the upper class life; ______ writes about the middle class society, and Mark Twain deals with the lower class reality.

a. Stephen Crane b. Frank Norris c. Theodore Dreiser d. William Dean Howells

8. Which of the following is a naturalistic writer?

a. William Dean Howells b. Mark Twain c. Ernest Hemingway d.Theodore Dreiser

9. ________’s writings are characterized by simple, colloquial language and deep thoughts.

a. Ernest Hemingway b. William Faulkner c. F. Scott Fitzgerald d. Mark Twain

10. ______ wrote 18 novels all set in Jefferson Town, Yoknapatwapha County

in the deep south. .

a. William Faulkner b. John Steinbeck c. Ernest Hemingway d.

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Mark Twain

11. ________is Jewish in origin and in many of his novels the American Jews

are major characters.

a. Sinclair Lewis b. Saul Bellow c. Norman Mailer d. Jerome David Salinger

12._________ is often regarded as the greatest American woman poet and she wrote over 1,700 short lyric poems in her life time.

a. Anne Bradstreet b. Robert Frost c. H.D. d. Emily Dickinson 13.________ is father of American drama and won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1936.

a. John Steinbeck b. William Faulkner c. Eugene O’Neill d. Arthur Miller

14. _______ was the first black American to write a book about black life with

great impact on the consciousness of the nation and his masterpiece is one of the three classics about black Americans. b.Richard Wright b. Harriet Beecher Stowe c. Langston Hughes d. Ralph Ellison

15. ________ first used the “Jazz age” as the title of a collection of short stories

a. F. Scott Fitzgerald b. William Faulkner c. John Steinbeck d. Ernest Hemingway II. Identify Works as Described Below (1×15 %):

6.The play is about a stoker whose identity as a human being is not recognized by his fellow human beings and who tries to find affinity with a monkey in the zoo and is finally killed by the animal.a. The Hairy Ape b. Henderson the Rain King c. Long Day’s Journey into Night d. The Glass Menageries7.The protagonist in this play is a crippled girl named Amanda.

a.A Street Car Named Desire b. The Hairy Ape c.Long Day’s Journey into Night

d.The Glass Menageries

8.The hero of this novel tells about his own story to us but his name is unknown.

a.Native Son b.Uncle Tom’s Cabin c.Invisible Man d. Go Tell It on the Mountains

4. It is an autobiographical play and Edmund in the play is based on the

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playwright himself.

a. Long Day’s Journey into Night b. Henderson the Rain King c. The Hairy Ape d. The Glass Menageries

5.The novel tells of how a black man kills a white woman by accident and

how he is finally arrested and tried and sentenced to death.

a.Native Son b.Uncle Tom’s Cabin c.Invisible Man d. Go Tell It on the Mountains

6._________ is one of the best works in American literature about the Second

World War.

a.A Farewell to Arms b.The Catcher in the Rye c.The Red Badge of Courage

d. The Naked and the Dead

6. The novel by Hemingway is the best of its kind about World War I.a.A Farewell to Arms b.The Sun Also Rises

c.The Old Man and the Sea d. The Naked and the Dead

10.The novel is about how a family of farmers cannot survive in Oklahoma and

travel to California to seek a living and how they suffer hunger in California.b.The Grapes of Wrath b. U.S. A.c.Babbitt d. The Adventures of Augie March11.It is a trilogy including The 42nd Parallel, 1919, and The Big Money, with such techniques as biographies, newsreels and camera eye. b.Babbitt b. Light in August c. U.S.A. d. The Grapes of Wrath12.It is a novel which uses the stream of consciousness technique and whose

title is taken from Shakespeare’s Macbeth.a. Absolom, Absolom! b. The Sound and the Fury c.A Farewell to Arms d. The Great Gatsby

10. It is a naturalistic work about how a country girl is seduced and elopes with

Hurstwood and how she becomes a famous actress and how her lover falls into beggary and finally commits suicide.

a.An American Tragedy b. Sister Carrie c. McTeague d.Maggie, A Girl of the Streets

11. It is a novel with 135 chapters plus an epilog; in it a group of people on a

whaling ship kill a great whale but they themselves are killed by the whale in the end, except Ishmael the narrator who survives by adhering to a coffin.b.Sister Carrie b.The Adventures of Tom Sawyerc. Moby Dick d. The Portrait of a Lady

12.The novel is a psychological study of a soldier (Henry Fleming)’s reactions in

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the Civil War, in which wound is called the red badge which symbolizes courage.

a.An American Tragedy b. Sister Carrie c.The Red Badge of Courage d. McTeague

13. The poem is written in free verse in 52 cantos with the theme of the

universality and equality in value of all people and all things.a.Cantos b. The Raven c. Song of Myself d.Chicago

14. The novel is about how a man falls economically and socially but who rises

morally because he gives up the opportunity to sell his factory to an English Syndicate, which would otherwise mean a ruin to that syndicate.

a.The Octopus b. The Rise of Silas Lapham c. Moby-Dick d. Leaves of Grass

15. It is a speech delivered at Harvard University. It is often hailed as the

“declaration of intellectual independence” in America.

a. The American Scholar b. Nature c. The Scarlet Letter d. Walden II. Match the following (1×20%)

A. Match Works with Their Authors1.Hugh Selwyn Mauberly2.Walden

3. Autobiography 4. The Scarlet Letter5.Leaves of Grass6.The Raven

7. The Rise of Silas Lapham

8. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer9. Long Day’s Journey into Night 10. The Old Man and the Sea

a.Mark Twain b . Ernest Hemingway c. Eugene O’Neill d. William Dean Howells e. Edgar Allan Poe f. Walt Whitman g. Nathaniel Hawthorne h. Benjamin Franklin i.Henry David Thoreau j. Ezra Pound

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k.Thomas Jefferson l. T.S. Eliot

B. Match the Characters with the works in which they appear.1.Hester Prynne 2.Mrs. Touchett 3.Frederick Henry 4.Benjy Compson5.the Joads 6.General Edward Cummings7.Holden Caulfield 7.Bigger Thomas8.Yank 9.Happya.The Portrait of a Lady c. The Hairy Ape e.The Sound and the Fury g. The Naked and the Dead i. Native Son k.Invisible Man

b. The Scarlet Letter d. A Farewell to Arms f. The Grapes of Wrath h. The Catcher in the Rye j. Death of a Salesman l.Catch-22

III. Match the following (1’×20=20’)

A. Match works with their authors1.Nature

2.Rip Van Winkle 3. Nature

4. The Scarlet Letter5.Leaves of Grass6.The Raven

7. The Rise of Silas Lapham

8. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn9. Cantos

10. The Old Man and the Sea

a.Ezra Pound b. Ernest Hemingway c. Mark Twain d. William Dean Howells e. Edgar Allan Poe f. Walt Whitman

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g. Nathaniel Hawthorne i.Washington Irving k.T.S. Eliot h. Ralph Waldo Emerson j. Waldo Emerson l. Robert Frost

B. Match characters with the works in which they appear.2.Captain Ahab and Starbuck 2.Isabel Archer3.Frederic Henry and Catherine 4.Benjy Compson5.the Joads 6.General Edward Cummings7.Holden Caulfield 8.Bigger Thomas9.The Tyrones 10.Willy Lomana.The Portrait of a Lady c. Death of a Salesman e.The Sound and the Fury g. The Naked and the Dead i. Native Son k.Absalom, Absalom

b. Moby-Dick

d. A Farewell to Arms f. The Grapes of Wrath h. The Catcher in the Rye

j. Long Day’s Journey into Night l. The Old Man and the Sea

V. Essay Questions (30%; choose only ONE of the following three topics and write a short essay of at least 300 words. Note: [1]Your essay should have at least 3 paragraphs; you are not simply to make a list of facts.[2] You may give a title to your essay, but you are required to indicate which of the 3 topics it belongs to. [3]You are not to write on a topic of your own.

1.To the best of your knowledge, analyze and make comments on Emerson’s Nature

2.Comment on any American poet you like.

3.Analyze and/or comment on any one of the American novels or plays you have read.

V. Essay Questions (30%; choose only ONE of the following three topics and write a short essay of at least 300 words. Note: [1]Your essay should have at

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least 3 paragraphs; you are not simply to make a list of facts.[2] You may give a title to your essay, but you are required to indicate which of the 3 topics it belongs to. [3]You are not to write on a topic of your own.)4.Make comments on an American novel we have discussed in this course.5.Comment on an American poet.6.Describe how your knowledge of American literature is improved after taking this course.. IV. Please answer the following questions briefly. (2 x 10’ = 20’)1.Why do people think Franklin is the embodiment of American dream?2.What is “Lost Generation”? V. Discussion. (1 x 20’ = 20’)State your own interpretations of Hemingway’s iceberg theory of writing?IV. Please answer the following questions briefly. (2 x 10’ = 20’)3.What is Hawthorne’s style? Explain the style with examples.4.At the end of the 19th century, there were three fighters for Realism. Who are they? What are their differences?________True or False. (10 x 2’= 20’)1. American literature is the oldest of all national literature.2. Thomas Jefferson was the only American to sign the 4 documents that created the US.3. All his literary life, Hawthorne seemed to be haunted by his sense of sin and evil.4. Most of the poems in Leaves of Grass are about human psychology.5. Hurstwood is a character in Dreiser’s An American Tragedy.6. Faulkner’s region was the Deep North, with its bitter history of slavery, civil war and destruction.7. Placed in historical perspective, Howells is found lacking in qualities and depth. But anyhow he is a literary figure worthy of notice.8. Faulkner’s works have been termed the Yoknapatawpha Saga, “one connected story”.9. As a moral philosophy, transcendentalism was neither logical nor systematical.10. Emily Dickinson expresses her deep love in the poem “Annabel Lee”.121-5 F F T F F 6-10 F F T F FII. Decide whether the statements are True or False. (10 x 2’= 20’)1. Early in the 17th century, the English settlements in Virginia and began the main stream of what we recognize as the American national history.2. American Romantic writers avoided writing about nature, medieval legends and with supernatural elements.3. As a moral philosophy, transcendentalism was neither logical nor systematical.4. “Young Goodman Brown” wants to prove everyone possesses kindness in heart.5. Henry James was a realist in the same way as one views the realism of Twain or Howells.6. The American realists sought to describe the wide range of American experience and to present the subtleties of human personality.7. Frost’s concern with nature reflected his deep moral uncertainties.8. Faulkner’s works have been termed the Yoknapatawpha Saga, “one connected story”.9. Roger Chillingworth is a character in Dreiser’s An American Tragedy.10. After the Civil War, the Frontier was closing. Disillusionment and frustration were widely felt. What had been expected to be a “Golden Age” turned to be a “Gilded” one.1-5 T F T F T 6-10 F T T F T 13