2004年4月自考英美文学选读试题
课程代码：00604
全部题目用英文作答，并将答案写在答题纸相应位置上，否则不计分。
PART ONE （40 POINTS）
Ⅰ.Multiple Choice (40 points in all, 1 for each)
Select from the four choices of each item the one that best answers the question or completes the statement. Write your correct answer on the answer sheet.
1.“And we will sit upon the rocks, /Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks,/By shallow rivers to whose falls/Melodious birds sing madrigals.” The above lines are taken from ______.
A. Milton’s Paradise Lost B. Marlowe’s “The Passionate shepherd to His Love”
C. Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” D. John Donne’s “The Sun Rising”
2.The English Renaissance period was an age of ______ .
A. poetry and drama B. drama and novel
C. novel and poetry D. romance and poetry
3.Here are four lines taken from Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene: “But on his brest a bloudie Crosse he bore,/The deare remembrance of his dying Lord,/For whose sweete sake that glorious badge he wore,/And dead as living ever him adored.” Who is the “dying Lord” discussed in the above lines?
A. Beowulf B. King Arthur C. Jesus Christ D. Jupiter
4.In Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, Antonio could not pay back the money he borrowed from Shylock, because ______.
A. his money was all invested in the newly-emerging textile industry
B. his enterprise went bankrupt
C. Bassanio was able to pay his own debt
D. his ships had all been lost
5. Which of the following statements best illustrates the theme of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18?
A. The speaker eulogizes the power of Nature.
B. The speaker satirizes human vanity.
C. The speaker praises the power of artistic creation.
D. The speaker meditates on man’s salvation.
6. In English poetry, a four-line stanza is called ______.
A. heroic couplet B. quatrain C. Spenserian stanza D. terza rima
7. “Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,/Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;/Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile /The short and simple annals of the poor.”
The above lines are taken from .
A. Alexander Pope’s Essay on Criticism
B. Coleridge’s “Kubla Khan”
C. John Donne’s “The Sun Rising”
D. Thomas Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard”
8. By making the truth-seeking pilgrims suffer at the hands of the people of Vanity Fair, John Bunyan intends to show the prevalent political and religious ______of his time.
A. persecution B. improvement C. prosperity D. disillusionment
9. The 18th century witnessed a new literary form－the modern English novel, which, contrary to the medieval romance, gives a ______ presentation of life of the common people.
A. romantic B. realistic C. prophetic D. idealistic
10. As a whole, ______is one of the most effective and devastating criticisms and satires of all aspects in the then English and European life— socially, politically, religiously, philosophically, scientifically, and morally.
A. Moll Flanders B. Gulliver’s Travels
C. Pilgrim’s Progress D. The School for Scandal
11. An honest, kind-hearted young man, who is full of animal spirit and lacks prudence, is expelled from the paradise and has to go through hard experience to gain knowledge of himself and finally to have been accepted both by a virtuous lady and a rich relative .
The above sentence may well sum up the theme of Fielding’s work .
A. Jonathan Wild the Great B. Tom Jones
C. The Coffe-House Politician D. Amelia
12. In Sheridan’s The School for scandal, the man who wins the hand of his beloved as well as the inheritance of his rich uncle is ______ .
A. Charles Surface B. Joseph Surface
C. Sir Peter Teazle D. Sir Benjamin Backbite
13. Which of the following works best represents the national spirit of the 18th-century England?
A. Robinson Crusoe B. Gulliver’s Travels
C. Jonathan Wild the Great D. A Sentimental Journey
14. Shelley’s masterpiece, Prometheus Unbound, is a verse drama, which borrows the basic story from ______ .
A. the Bible B. a German legend
C. a Greek play D. One Thousand and One Nights
15. In the first part of the novel Pride and prejudice, Mr. Darcy has a (n) ______ of the Bennet family .
A. high opinion B. great admiration
C. low opinion D. erroneous view
16. In Byron’s poem “Song for the Luddites,” the word “Luddite” refers to the ______ .
A. workers who destroyed the machines in their protest against unemployment
B. rising bourgeoisie who fights against the aristocratic class
C. descendents of the ancient king ,Lud
D. poor country people who suffered under the rule of the landlord class
17. Mr. Micawber in David Copperfield and Sam Well in Pickwick Papers are perhaps the best ______ characters created by Charles Dickens.
A. comic B.tragic C. round D.sophisticated
18. A typical feature of the English Victorian literature is that writers became social and moral ______ , exposing all kinds of social evils.
A. revolutionaries B. idealists C. critics D. defenders
19. “Is it not sufficient for your infernal selfishness, that while you are at peace I shall writhe in the torments of hell?”(Heathcliff uttered the sentence in the death scene of Catherine from Chapter XV of Wuthering Heights.) The word “hell” at the end of the quoted sentence refers to ______ .
A. Heaven B. Hades C. the next world D. this world
20. A typical Forsyte, according to John Galsworthy, is a man with a strong sense of ______ ,who never pays any attention to human feelings.
A. justice B. humor C. morality D. property
21. “He was silent with conceit of his son. Mrs. Morel sniffed, as if it were nothing.”(Sons and Lovers by D.H.Lawrence)From the above quotation, we can see that Mrs. Morel’s attitude to her husband is ______ .
A. sincerely warm B. genuinely kind
C. seemingly angry D. merely contemptuous
22. A boy makes a quest of his idealized childish love through painful experience up to the point of losing his innocence and coming to see the drabness and harshness of the adult world.
The above sentence may well sum up the major theme of ______.
A. Eliot’s poem The love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
B. Bernard shaw’s play Mrs. Warren’s Profession
C. Joyce’s story Araby
D. Lawrence’s story The Horse Dealer’s Daughter
23. Linguistically, compared with the writings of Mark Twain, Henry James’s fiction is noted for his ______.
A. frontier vernacular B. rich colloquialism
C. vulgarly descriptive words D. refined elegant language
24. Which of the following statements about Washington Irving is NOT true?
A. Literary imagination should breed in a land rich in the past culture.
B. He is preoccupied with the Calvinistic view of original sin and the mystery of evil.
C. His stories are among the best of the American literature.
D. Some of his works are based on the materials of the European legendary tales.
25. Which of the following is NOT one of the main ideas advocated by Emerson, the chief spokesman of New England Transcendentalism?
A. As an individual, man is divine and can develop and improve himself infinitely.
B. Nature exercises a healthy and restorative influence on human beings.
C. There exists an emotional communication between an individual soul and the universal “Oversoul.”
D. Evil and sin are ever present in human heart and will pass on from one generation to another.”
26. Whitman’s poems are characterized by all the following features EXCEPT ______ .
A. the strict poetic form B. the free and natural rhythm
C. the easy flow of feelings D. the simple and conversational language
27. “Then all collapsed, and the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago.” In the quoted sentence, the author might imply that ______.
A. nothing changes in the 5000 years of human history
B. man’s desire to conquer nature can only end in his own destruction
C. nature is evil as it was 5000 years ago
D. nature has the ultimate creative power
28. “Standing on the bare ground,—my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space ,—all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eye-ball. I am nothing. I see all. The currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or particle of God.”
The above passage is taken from ______.
A. Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin B. Cooper’s “Leatherstocking Tales”
C. Emerson’s “Nature” D. Dreiser’s Sister Carrie
29. Which of the following works best illustrates the Calvinistic view of original sin?
A. Stowe’s Uncle Ton’s Cabin B. James’s The Portrait of a Lady.
C. Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms D. Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.
30. Beside symbolism, all the following qualities EXCEPT ______are fused to make Melville’s Moby-Dick a world classic.
A. narrative power B. psychological analysis
C. speculative agility D. optimistic view of life
31. In all his novels Theodore Dreiser sets himself to project the ______ American values. For example, in Sister Carrie, there is not one character whose status is not determined economically.
A. Puritan B. materialistic
C. psychological D. religious
32. In Daisy Miller, Henry James reveals Daisy’s ______ by showing her relatively unreserved manners.
A. hypocrisy B. cold and indifference
C. grace and patience D. Americanness
33. The raft with which Huck and Jim make their voyage down the Mississippi River may symbolize all the following EXCEPT ______.
A. a return to nature
B. an escape from evils, injustices, and corruption of the civilized society
C. the American society in the early 19th century
D. a small world where people of different colors can live friendly and happily
34. Emily Grierson, the protagonist in Faulkner’s story “A Rose for Emily,” can be regarded as a symbol for all the following qualities EXCEPT______.
A. old values B. rigid ideas of social status
C. bigotry and eccentricity D. harmony and integrity
35. As a Modernist poet ,Pound is noted for his active involvement in the ______ .
A. cubist school of modern painting
B. Imagist Movement
C. stream-of-consciousness technique
D. German Expressionism
36. The statement that a boy’s night journey to an Indian village to witness the violence of both birth and death provides all the possibilities of a learning experience may well sum up the major theme of ______ .
A. Faulkner’s story “A Rose for Emily”
B. Hemingway’s story “Indian Camp”
C. Irving’s story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”
D. James’s story “Daisy Miller”
37. Which of the following plays by O’Neill can be read autobiographically?
A. The Hairy Ape B. The Emperor Jones
C. The Iceman Cometh D. Long Day’s Journey Into Night
38. When we say that a poor young man from the West tried to make his fortune in the East but was disillusioned in the quest of an idealized dream, we are probably discussing about ______’s thematic concern in his fiction writing.
A. Henry James B. Scott Fitzgerald
C. Ernest Hemingway D. William Faulkner
39.After his experiences in the forest, Young Goodman Brown returns to Salem ______.
A. desperate and gloomy B. renewed in his faith
C. wearing a black veil D. unaware of his own sin
40. According to Mark Twain, in river towns up and down the Mississippi, it was every boy’s dream to some day grow up to be ______.
A. Methodist preacher B. a justice of the peace
C. a riverboat pilot D. a pirate on the Indian ocean
PART TWO (60POINTS)
Ⅱ.Reading comprehension(16 points,4 for each)
Read the quoted parts carefully and answer the questions in English. Write your answer in the corresponding space on the answer sheet.
41. “One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.”
Questions:
A. Identify the poem and the poet.
B.What does the word “sleep” mean?
C. What idea do the two lines express?
42. “Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendor, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne’er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! The very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!”
(William Wordsworth’s sonnet: “Composed upon Westminster Bridge” September 3, 1802)
Questions:
A. What does the word “glideth” in the fourth line mean?
B. What kind of figure of speech is used by wordsworth to describe the “river”?
C. What idea does the fourth line express?
43. “With Blue—uncertain stumbling Buzz—
Between the light—and me—
And then the Windows failed—and then
I could not see to see—”
Questions:
A. Identify the poem and the poet.
B. What do “Windows” symbolically stand for?
C. What idea does the quoted passage express?
44. “‘Is dying hard, Daddy?’
‘No, I think it’s pretty easy, Nick, It all depends.”’
Questions:
A. Identify the work and the author.
B. What was Nick preoccupied with when he asked the question?
C. Why did the father add “It all depends” after he answered his son’s question?
Ⅲ. Questions and Answers(24 points in all, 6 for each)
Give brief answers to each of the following questions in English. Write your answers in the corresponding space on the answer sheet.
45. It is said that B. Shaw’s play, Mrs. Warren’s Profession, has a strong realistic theme, which fully reflects the dramatist’s Fabianist idea. Try to summarize this theme briefly.
46. Emily Bronte used a very complicated narrative technique in writing her novel Wuthering Heights. Try to tell Bronte’s way of narration briefly.
47. “In your rocking-chair, by your window dreaming, shall you long, alone. In your rocking-chair, by your window, shall you dream such happiness as you may never feel.” The two sentences are taken from Theodore Dreiser’s novel, Sister Carrie. What idea can you draw from the “rocking-chair”?
48. The literary school of naturalism was quite popular in the late 19th century. What are the major characteristics of naturalism?
Ⅳ. Topic Discussion(20 points in all, 10 for each)
Write no less than 150 words on each of the following topics in English in the corresponding space on the answer sheet.
49. Discuss the possible theme in W.B. Yeats’s “The Lake Isle of Innisfree” and how that theme is presented in the poem.
50. “My faith is gone!” cried he (Goodman Brown), after one stupefied moment. “There is no good on earth; and sin is but a name. Come, devil! For to thee is this world given.”
Comment on this passage from Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown”.
