LITERATURE: PHILIPPINES AND THE WORLD

Post Test
1. Paradise Lost is considered among the greatest epics in English. Which of the following was the basis for
this epic poem?
a. treachery of Judas Iscariot c. fall from God’s grace
b. the passion of Christ d. sinning of Adam and Eve

2. Which of the following is NOT an example of Gothic literature?

a. Dracula c. Frankenstein
b. Lord of the Rings d. A tell-tale Heart

3. What nationality was Robert Louis Stevenson, writer of ‘Treasure Island’?

a. English
b. Welsh
c. Irish
d. Scottish

4. The following taboo phrases were used by which writer?

“I fart at thee”, “shit on your head’, “ dirty bastard”
a. Ernest Hemingway
b. Henry James
c. Ben Johnson
d. Arnold Bronte

5. In the book ‘The Lord of the Rings’, who or what is Bilbo Baggins?
a. man
b. hobbit
c. wizard
d. dwarf

6. Name the title of the book which featured Mowgli.

a. The Jungle Book
b. Tom Sawyer
c. Peter Pan
d. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

7. How many lines does a sonnet have?

a. 12
b. 13
c. 14
d. 15

8. Who was the author of the famous storybook ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’?
a. H.G. Wells
b. Lewis Carroll
c. Mark Twain
d. E.B. White

9. “While a cold hand snatched you away like a kite-

I should have come home”
What is expressed in these lines?
a. Regret
b. Sadness
c. Love
d. Loss

10. Two versions of Robert A. Heinlein’s novel “Stranger in a Strange Land” have been published: the
edited version first published in 1961 and the original fulllength (60,000 words longer) published
posthumously in 1991. From what does the title derive?
a. The play “Antony and Cleopatra” by William Shakespeare
b. The book “Utopia” by Sir Thomas More
c. The novel “Gulliver’s Travels” by Jonathan Swift
d. The Old Testament Book of Exodus

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11. Southern American poet, novelist and literary critic Robert Penn Warren wrote “All the King’s Men
in 1946. The novel won the 1947 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. On what is the book’s title based?
a. A verse in the nursery rhyme “Humpty Dumpty”
b. William Shakespeare’s play “Richard III”
c. Oscar Wilde’s short story “The Young King”
d. Joyce Kilmer’s poem “Kings”

12. Who wrote this line? “Where ignorance is bliss, it is folly to be wise”.
a. Robert Browning
b. Thomas Grey
c. Rudyard Kipling
d. Edgar Allan Poe

13. Which Bronte writer authored “Jane Eyre”?

a. Charlotte
b. Emily
c. Cristina
d. Anne

14. In which century were Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales written?

a. 14th
b. 15th
c. 16th
d. 17th

15. Which novel, eventually published in 1945, was rejected by a New York publisher stating ‘it is
impossible to sell animal stories in the USA’?
a. Animal Farm
b. Black Beauty
c. Watership Down
d. The Tale of Peter Rabbit

16. What does the lamb in “The Lamb” symbolize?

Little Lamb who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Gave thee life, and bid thee feed,
By the stream and o’er the mead;
a. faith and loyalty c. innocence and purity
b. weakness and hopelessness d. helplessness and dependence

17. ‘The Good Earth’ was rejected fourteen times, before being published and going on to win the Pulitzer
Prize. Who was the author?
a. Pearl S. Buck c. Edith Wharton
b. John Steinbeck d. Henry Miller

18. “I prefer a government run like hell by Filipinos rather than one run by foreigners”. Who said this
famous statement?
a. Apolinario Mabini
b. Emilio Aguinaldo
c. Jose Rizal
d. Manuel L. Quezon

19. The plot development of the Ramayana.

a. Circular
b. En medias res
c. Linear
d. Pyramid

20. What is the first heroic narrative of world literature?

a. Bhagavad-Gita
b. Odyssey
c. Ramayana
d. Gilgamesh

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21. Who among these writers is famous for using exploits of great heroes?
a. Juan C. Laya
b. Carlos Bulosan
c. Manuel Arguilla
d. F. Sionel Jose

22. What type of sonnet is exemplified in the following lines?

How do I love thee, let me count the ways

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace
a. Elizabethan
b. English
c. Petrarchan
d. Spenserian

23. “She was a Phantom of Delight…”. Classify this statement.

a. Metaphor
b. Simile
c. Idioms
d. Synonym

24. What is the English translation of Rabindranath Tagore’s “Gitanjali?”

a. Song of songs
b. Devotional songs
c. Patriotic hymns
d. Song offerings

25. What figure of speech is used in the line “I wandered lonely as a cloud”
a. Personification
b. Alliteration
c. Metaphor
d. Simile

26. The line from the Koran ‘woe to every backbiter, defamer” talk of ___________
a. Sorrow for those who oppose the opinion of their fellow
b. Punishment for those who give unsolicited advice
c. Anguish for those who defend unrighteousness
d. Misery for all who talk ill for others

27. Who was the first Asian to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature.
a. Yasunari Kawabata
b. Rabindranath Tagore
c. Wole Soyinka
d. Po Chu-I

28. What insight is suggested by this haiku from Basho?

“Poverty’s child
He starts to grind the rice -
And gazes at the moon”

a. Nature has a soothing effect on the human spirit.

b. The poor dreams and are hopeful of better things in life.
c. Child labor is a reality in many Asian nations
d. Life is never-ending routine of work and leisure.

29. Leopold Sedar Senghor was a leading figure in which of the following movement?
a. Harlem Renaissance
b. Negritude
c. Transcendentalists
d. African Freedom Writers

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30. The South African novelist and short story writer whose major themes are on exile and alienation, won
the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1991.
a. Ousmane Sembene
b. Nadine Gordimer
c. Bessie Head
d. Barbara Kimenye

31. This novel is based on the pilgrimage of the Bhuddist monk Xuangzang to India in search of sacred
texts.
a. The Tale of Genji
b. Record of a Journey to the West
c. Dream of the Red Chamber
d. On Learning to be an Indian

32. This excerpt from Soyinka’s Telephone Conversation indicates the universal issue of _________.
“ARE YOU DARK? OR VERY LIGHT?” Revelation came.
“You mean- like plain or milk chocolate?” Her assent was clinical, crushing its light Impersonality. Rapidly,
wave length adjusted, I chose, “West African sepia.” – and as an afterthought, “Down in my passport.”

a. gender discrimination
b. colonial mentality
c. human rights violation
d. racial discrimination
33. The Hindu concept of ‘duty, virtue, morality and even religion’.
a. dharma c. maya
b. artha d. kama

34. In which Jane Austen novel do the following lines appear?

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want
of a wife.”
a. Mansfield Park
b. Northanger Abbey
c. Pride and Prejudice
d. Sense and Sensibility
35. Which novel by Thomas Hardy begins with the hero selling his wife and daughter to a sailor who is
on his way to Canada.
a. Return to the Native
b. Tess of d’Urberville
c. Under the Greenwood Tree
d. The Mayor of Casterbridge
36. In what Shakespearean play do the following lines appear?
“All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.”
a. Hamlet
b. Romeo and Juliet
c. A Midsummer Night’s Dream
d. As You Like It
37. What is the title of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s ‘Tale of Horror’?
a. Bleak House
b. Frankenstein
c. Heart of Darkness
d. Tell-Tale heart

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 38. Identify the poem from which the lines are taken:

“I love thee with a love I seemed to lose with my lost saints-

I love thee with breath, smiles, tears, of all my life!
And if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death”

a. Sonnet 53
b. Sonnet 43
c. Sonnet 15
d. Sonnet 14
39. Irving Stone’s ‘Lust for Life’ was rejected sixteen times, with one rejection stating ‘a long, dull,
novel about an artist’. Which artist did the book feature?
a. Sigmund Freud c. Michelangelo
b. John Noble d. Vincent Van Gogh

40. Who is presented as the most honest and moral of Chaucer’s pilgrims?
a. The Knight c. The Reeve
b. The Parson d. The Wife of Bath

41. Out of the following four pilgrims, which is the most corrupt?
a. The Sergeant /Man of Law c. The Reeve
b. The Wife of Bath d. The Pardoner

42. He translated “The Fall of Princes” from French.

a. William Langland c. Geoffrey of Monmouth
b. Sir Thomas Malory d. John Lydgate

43. What work contains these lines:

“There hurls in at the hall-door an unknown rider . . .
Half a giant on earth I hold him to be.”

a. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight c. Piers Plowman

b. Morte D’arthur d. Canterbury Tale

44. The theme of the Rubaiyat is

a. Always look forward to a new day c. Grasp pleasure while you can
b. Never give in to death easily d. Create your own world and beautify it

45. What is “True Learning” as exemplified in this quotation:

“Only one who burst with eagerness do I instruct. Only one who bubbles with excitement do I enlighten”.

a. Learning makes human beings a follower of instructions

b. Learning involves patience and tenacity
c. Learning has the ability to make a man
d. Learning is coupled with commitment and passion

46. The Age of Modernism in Philippine literature corresponds to what period in its colonial history?
a. The Japanese Period
b. The American Regime
c. The Spanish Period
d. The Period of Re-orientation

47. What sound device is exemplified in the first two lines of Poe’s ‘The Raven’?
“Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, ‘Lenore’?
This I whispered and an echo murmured back the word, ‘Lenore’!
Merely this and nothing more.”
a. Anaphora
b. Onomatopoeia
c. Assonance
d. Alliteration

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 48. What figure of speech is exemplified in the following lines from Shakespeare’s ‘As You like It’?
“Blow, blow thou winter wind,
Thou are not so unkind as man’s ingratitude”
a. Allusion
b. Apostrophe
c. Personification
d. Metaphor

49. Who did Abraham Lincoln call “the little woman who started the Civil War”?
a. Rosa Parks
b. Sojourner Truth
c. Harriet Beecher Stowe
d. Zora Neale Hurston

50. Name the first novel in Spanish written by a Filipinno.

a. Ninay
b. Mi Madre
c. Pag-ibig sa Tinubuang Lupa
d. A La Patria
51. The pre-war writer of local color who excelled in presenting the simple life of the Ilocano peasants is
a. Arturo Rotor
b. Francisco Icasiano
c. Amador Daguio
d. Manuel Arguilla

52. The literature of the earlier Medieval Ages reflected clearly the life and civilization of a Heroic Age.
The primary virtues emphasized were_________________.
a. valor and honesty
b. valor and loyalty
c. honesty and truthfulness
d. loyalty and truthfulness

53. Which poetic style is most associated with Robert Browning?

a. The sonnet
b. The lyric ballad
c. The ode
d. The dramatic monologue

54. Who is the first African Nobel laureate for literature?

a. Camara Lays
b. Ngugi Wa Thiong’O
c. Wole Soyinka
d. Chinua Achebe

55.Which of the following best describes Machiavelli’s “The Prince”?

a. children’s story about a lonely prince who inhabits a small planet
b. a dialogue on the perfect qualities of a courtier
c. a military history of the city of Florence
d. a handbook on how to obtain and keep political power

56. Which narrative poem in French literature is an idealization of feudal society in the early 13th
century?
a. Song of the Roland
b. Iliad
c. Divine Comedy
d. Aenid

57. The verse narrative of the suffering and death of Christ is the ____________________.
a. Doctrina Christiana
b. Cenaculo
c. Pasyon
d. Ulod

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58. Which of the following is an example of folk narrative?
a. Riddle
b. Proverbs
c. Metrical romance
d. Epic

59. What is the main idea of this haiku by Basho?

So soon to die,
And no sign of it showing –
Locust cry
a. Beauty of nature c. permanence of things
d. transitoriness of life d. reality of death

60. Which of the following selections is a frame story?

a. Decameron c. The Necklace
b. Aladdin and the Magic Carpet d. Panchatantra

61. Chinua Achebe’s novel, the title of which is an epigraph from Yeat’s The Second Coming, is a lament
over the disintegration of Nigerian society represented by Okonkwo, once a respected chieftain who
looses his leadership with the coming of the British colonizers.
a. Things Fall Apart c. A Man of the People
b. No longer at Ease d. Arrow of God

62. What is the theme of this African proverb?

“On the way to one’s beloved there are no hills”
a. Real love knows no boundaries c. Obstacles make a relationship strong
b. Sacrifice is the gauge of true love d. True love is tested by difficulties

63. The following lies from Robert Browning’s My Last Duchess exemplify what poetic strategy?
That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive. I call
That piece a wonder, now: Fra Pandolf’s hands
Worked busily a day, and there she stands.
Will’t please you sit and look at her?
a. Aside c. Monologue
b. Dialogue d. Soliloquy

64. In “To The Virgins to Make Much of Time,” what is the person’s main message?
a. Be wise in marriage to make life more worthwhile
b. Marry now, or you may never have another chance
c. Gather the rosebuds now, before the roses bloom
d. Choose only lovers who, like roses, are of the highest order

65. What do the novels of Bronte, Elliot and Dickens reveal about fiction produced during the Victorian
period?
a. They closely represent the real social life of the times
b. The novels were long and full of psychological musings
c. They concentrate on the effect of industrialization on cities
d. They were largely produced by upper middle-class women

66. What do the following lines from Wordsworth’s Psalm of Life reveal about heroes and heroism?
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time
a. Anybody can be a hero c. Heroes are easy to find
b. Heroes are often forgotten d. It is easy to do heroic acts.

67. What is the plot development of Ramayana?

a. circular c. linear
b. en medias res d. pyramid

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Read this excerpt from Diop’s Africa then answer questions 73-74.
Africa, my Africa
Africa of proud warriors
In ancestral savannas,
Africa of whom my grandmother sings,
On the banks of the distant river
I have never known you

68. Which description best describes the persona’s perception of Africa?

a. free and beautiful c. primitive and uncivilized
b. old and defeated d. mythical and elusive

69. What is the dominant tone of the poem?

a. regretful and frustrated c. sad and disdainful
b. angry and bitter d. invigorated and proud

70. What do the following lines from William Blake exhort?

To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour

a. to appreciate even the smallest of things

b. to be extremely imaginative and creative
c. to believe in fantasy like a child
d. to be strong and faithful to God

71. Which is a short narrative poem intended to be sung?

a. Romance
b. Lyric
c. Ballad
d. Epic

72. What do these thoughts of Dushyanta reveal about his character?

“A tranquil spot! Why should I thrill? / Love cannot enter there-“
a. indecisive c. rational
b. emotional d. ambivalent

73. In Aenid, though Aenas suffers an unhappy life and miserable death, what is his greatest consolation?
a. His protection by the gods
b. The future glory of his sons
c. His love affair with Dido
d. His being compared with Achilles and Odysseus

74. The true epic of India that contains the mythology and religion of the Hindu is ___________.
a. Mahabharata
b. Panchatantra
c. Ramayana
d. Dhammapada

75. Most of Keats’ poems express his interests in ____________________________.

a. beauty
b. art
c. history
d. religion
76. What historical event serves as the setting of Tolstoy’s War and Peace?
a. The Napoleonic invasion of Russia
b. The Bolshevik Revolution
c. The French Revolution
d. The Crimean War

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77. How did Coleridge’s poem Kublai Khan come to exist?
a. It is a written response to Coleridge’s desire to travel
b. It is a collection of dreams stimulated by drugs.
c. It is an attempt to memorialize Coleridge’s travels.
d. It is written for the Lord Byron

78. What literary type begins with the following lines:

“In the beginning there were Malakas and Maganda…”
a. Legend c. Creation myth
b. Supernatural tale d. Folktale

79. What is the main idea of the haiku?

A. Cycle of life C. Reality of death
B. Beauty of nature D. Transistoriness of Life

80. “ Sunset and evening star

and one clear call for me
and may there be no moaning of the bar
When I put out to sea. “

Who is the speaker in the poem?

a. A traveler c. A dying man
b. A captain of the ship d. A fisherman

81. A distinct feature of poetry during the age of modernism is _______________.

a. free verse
b. rhyme
c. blank verse
d. measure
82. Which of the following is NOT a lyric poem?
a. Ode
b. Elegy
c. Sonnet
d. Ballad

83. What is usually the topic of the Filipino folk epic?

a. Heroic deeds
b. Religious events
c. Evil spirits
d. Courtship practices
84. The Hebrew prophet, Jesus, was born under the reign of which Roman emperor?
a. Hadrian c. Augustus
b. Claudius d. Marcus Aurelius

85. _______________ is a 700-verse Hindu scripture in Sanskrit which literally means ‘Song of God’.
a. Bhagavad Gita c. Rigveda
b. Dhammapada d. Upanishads

86. What rhetorical device is used in this line from the Ramayana?
“Dearly loved, devoted Sita! Daughter of a royal line.”
a. onomatopoeia c. assonance
b. alliteration d. consonance

87. A collection of sayings ranging from brief statements to more extended dialogues between Confucius
and his students.
a. Analects c. Book of Changes
b. Tao-Te Ching d. Manyusho

88. Who among the following is NOT an Elizabethan dramatist?

a. Marlowe
b. Johnson
c. Dante
d. Shakespeare

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89. The earliest form of Japanese drama performed on an almost bare stage by a small but elaborately
costumed cast of actors wearing masks is called ____________.
a. No c. Jorori
b. Kabuki d. Kyogen

90. The ethical concept suggests a sense of obligation or indebtedness which explains the sense of
patriotism and nationalism of the Japanese is
a. giri c. seppuku
b. no d. kami

Read the following excerpted dialogue from “Injustice Done to To Ngo” then answer questions 14-15.
Donkey Chang: You’ve poisoned my father, Tou Ngo. Do you want to settle it in court
or out of the court?
Tou Ngo: What do you mean ‘settle it in court or out of court’?
Donkey Chang: If you want to settle in court, I’ll take you there to be tried and cross-
examined and put to the torture. With a delicate body like yours you’ll
find it hard to bear that. You’re bound to confess to having poisoned
my father. If you want to settle out of court, you’de better become my
wife just as quick as you can. It’ll be doing you a favor.
Tou Ngo: I have not poisoned your father. I’ll go to court with you.

91. What does Donkey Chang’s attitude show of him as a man?

a. He has so much masculine pride c. He feels that he is the savior
b. He belittles the strength of women d. He regards women as objects

92. What does line 9 reflect about Tou Ngo’s character?

a. She is picky with men c. She is a very strong woman
b. She is unafraid of suffering d. She is truly innocent

93. Which is NOT true about French literature?

a. It comprises of literature written in French by citizens of France
b. In includes literature written in French, by citizens of other nations
c. It emerged from literatures written in dialects which evolved from Latin
d. It gave rise to the birth of fabliaux

94. Which of the following is not a tragedy?

a. Iliad c. Oedipus Rex
b. Medea d. Electra

95. What figure of speech is exemplified below?

The wind stood up and gave a shout. He whistled on his two fingers
a. Allusion c. Onomatopoeia
b. Metaphor d. Personification

96. Which Filipino food expert wrote extensively on Filipino Cuisine and theater?
a. Pura Santillan Castrence
b. Gilda Cordero Fernando
c. Doreen Gamboa Fernandez
d. Carmen Guerrero Nakpil
97. The writer acknowledged to have introduced modernism in Philippine poetry in English is
a. Jose Garcia Villa
b. Hilario Francia Jr.
c. Angela Manalang Gloria
d. Cirilo Bautista

98. The literary awards which started in 1950 is the

a. Commonwealth Literary Awards
b. Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Literary Awards
c. Republic Cultural Heritage Awards
d. Stonehill Awards

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99. Which writers’ organization tried to create a wide reading public for Filipino writers by printing low-
cost books?
a. The Veronicans
b. Barangay Writers Project
c. Philippine Book Guild
d. Philippine Writers League

100. Aliguyon, the most notable Ifugao hero immortalized in the epic Hudhud has been written as a long
poem by
a. Amador T. Daguio
b. Manuel A. Viray
c. Ricaredo Demetillo
d. Vidal A. Tan

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