2002年上半年高等教育自學(xué)考試全國統(tǒng)一命題考試

英美文學(xué)選讀

（課程代號：0604）

PART ONE

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. Mark your choice by blackening the corresponding
letter [A], [B], [C] or [D] on the answer sheet.

1. Romance, which uses narrative verse or prose to tell stories of ____ adventures or other heroic deeds, is a popular literary form in the medieval period.
[A] Christian [B] knightly [C] Greek [D] primitive

2. Among the great Middle English poets, Geoffrey Chaucer is known for his production of____.
[A] Piers Plowman     [B] Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
[C] Confessio Amantis [D] The Canterbury Tales

3. Which of the following historical events does not directly help to stimulate the rising of the Renaissance Movement?
[A] The rediscovery of ancient Greek and Roman culture.
[B] The new discoveries in geography and astrology.
[C] The Glorious revolution.
[D] The religious reformation and the economic expansion.

4. 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.

5. "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 probably taken from ___.
[A] Spenser's The Faerie Queene
[B] John Donne's "The Sun Rising"
[C] Shakespeare's "Sonnet 18"
[D] Marlowe's "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love"

6. "Bassanio: Antonio, I am married to a wife
Which is as dear to me as life itself;
But life itself, my wife, and all the world,
Are not with me esteem'd above thy life;
I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all,
Here to the devil, to deliver you.
Portia: Your wife would give you little thanks for that,
If she were by to hear you make the offer."

The above is a quotation taken from Shakespeare's comedy The Merchant of Venice.
The quoted part can be regarded as a good example to illustrate ____.
[A] dramatic irony [B] personification
[C] allegory       [D] symbolism

7. The true subject of John Donne's poem, "The Sun Rising," is to____.
[A] attack the sun as an unruly servant
[B] give compliments to the mistress and her power of beauty
[C] criticize the sun's intrusion into the lover's private life
[D] lecture the sun on where true royalty and riches lie

8. Of all the 18^th century novelists Henry Fielding was the first to set out, both in theory and practice, to write specifically a "_____ in prose," the first to give the modem novel its structure and style.
[A] tragic epic [B] comic epic
[C] romance     [D] lyric epic

9. The Houyhnhnms depicted by Jonathan Swift in Gulliver's Travels are ____.
[A] horses that are endowed with reason
[B] pigmies that are endowed with admirable qualities
[C] giants that are superior in wisdom
[D] hairy, wild, low and despicable creatures, who resemble human beings not only in appearance but also in some other ways

10. Here are four lines from a literary work: "Others for language all their care express,/And value books, as women men, for dress." The work is _____.
[A] Thomas Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard"
[B] John Milton's Paradise Lost
[C] Alexander Pope's Essay on Criticism
[D] Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream

11. The phrase "to urge people to abide by Christian doctrines and to seek salvation through constant struggles with their own weaknesses and all kinds of social evils" may well sum up the implied meaning of ____.
[A] Gulliver's Travels [B] The Rape of the Lock
[C] Robinson Crusoe    [D] The Pilgrim's Progress

12. William Wordsworth, a romantic poet, advocated all the following EXCEPT
[A] the use of everyday language spoken by the common people
[B] the expression of the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings
[C] the use of humble and rustic life as subject matter
[D] the use of elegant wording and inflated figures of speech

13. Which of the following is taken from John Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Um"?
[A] "I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!"
[B] "They are both gone up to the church to pray."
[C] "Earth has not anything to show more fair."
[D] "Beauty is truth, truth beauty".

14. "If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?" is an epigrammatic line by _____.
[A] J.Keats [B] W. Blake [C] W. Wordsworth [D] P. B. Shelley

15. "Ode on a Grecian Um" shows the contrast between the ___ of art and the ____ of human passion.
[A] glory ... ugliness        [B] permanence ...transience
[C] transience ... sordidness [D] glory ... permanence

16. In the statement "-oh, God! would you like to live with your soul in the grave?" the term "soul" apparently refers to ____.
[A] Heathcliff himself   [B] Catherine
[C] one's spiritual life [D] one's ghost

17. The typical feature of Robert Browning's poetry is the _____.
[A] bitter satire     [B] larger-than-life caricature
[C] Latinized diction [D] dramatic monologue

18. The Victorian Age was largely an age of ____, eminently represented by Dickens and Thackeray.
[A] poetry [B] drama [C] prose [D] epic prose

19. ____ is the first important governess novel in the English literary history.
[A] Jane Eyre         [B] Emma
[C] Wuthering Heights [D] Middlemarch

20. The major concern of ______ fiction lies in the tracing of the psychological development of his characters and in his energetic criticism of the dehumanizing effect of the capitalist industrialization on human nature.
[A] D. H. Lawrence's [B] J. Galsworthy's
[C] W. Thackeray's   [D] T. Hardy's

21._____ is considered to be the best-known English dramatist since Shakespeare, and his representative works are plays inspired by social criticism.
[A] Richard Sheridan [B] Oliver Goldsmith
[C] Oscar Wilde      [D] Bernard Shaw

22. Which of the following is NOT a typical feature of Modernism?
[A] To elevate the individual and inner being over the social being.
[B] To put the stress on traditional values.
[C] To portray the distorted and alienated relationships between man and his environment.
[D] To advocate a conscious break with the past.

23. The Romantic writers would focus on all the following issues EXCEPT the ____
in the American literary history.
[A] individual feelings [B] idea of survival of the fittest
[C] strong imagination  [D] return to nature

24. Henry David Thoreau's work, ____, has always been regarded as a masterpiece of
New England Transcendentalism.
[A] Walden [B] The Pioneers
[C] Nature [D] Song of Myself

25. The famous 20-year sleep in "Rip Van Winkle" helps to construct the story in such a way that we are greatly affected by Irving's ____.
[A] concern with the passage of time
[B] expression of transient beauty
[C] satire on laziness and corruptibility of human beings
[D] idea about supernatural manipulation of man's life

26. Walt Whitman was a pioneering figure of American poetry. His innovation first of all lies in his use of ____, poetry without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme.
[A] blank verse [B] heroic couplet
[C] free verse  [D] iambic pentameter

27. The literary characters of the American type in early 19^th century are generally characterized by all the following features EXCEPT that they ____.
[A] speak local dialects
[B] are polite and elegant gentlemen
[C] are simple and crude farmers
[D] are noble savages (red and white) untainted by society

28. Hester Pryme, Dimmesdale, Chillingworth and Pearl are most likely the names of the characters in ___.
[A] The Scarlet Letter     [B] The House of the Seven Gablest
[C] The Portrait of a Lady [D] The Pioneers

29. "This is my letter to the World" is a poetic expression of Emily Dickinson's ___ about her communication with the outside world.
[A] indifference [B] anger [C] anxiety [D] sorrow

30. With Howells, James, and Mark Twain active on the literary scene, __ became the major trend in American literature in the seventies and eighties of the 19^th century.
[A] sentimentalism [B] romanticism
[C] realism        [D] naturalism

31. After The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Twain gives a literary independence to Tom's buddy Huck in a book entitled ____.
[A] Life on the Mississippi
[B] The Gilded Age
[C] The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
[D] A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

32. However, ____, the keynote of Daisy Miller's character, turns out to be an admiring but a dangerous quality and her defiance of social taboos in the Old World finally brings her to a disaster in the clash between two different cultures.
[A] experience  [B] sophistication
[CJ worldliness [D] innocence

33.Generally speaking, all those writers with a naturalistic approach to human reality tend to be ____.
[A] transcendentalists [B] idealists
[C] pessimists         [D] impressionists

34. Emily Dickinson wrote many short poems on various aspects of life. Which of the following is NOT a usual subject of her poetic expression?
[A] Religion and immortality. [B] Life and death.
[C] Love and marriage.        [D] War and peace.

35. In "After Apple-Picking," Robert Frost wrote: "For I have had too much / Of apple-picking: I am overtired/ Of the great harvest I myself desired." From these lines we can conclude that the speaker is___.
[A] happy about the harvest
[B] still very much interested in apple-picking
[C] expecting a greater harvest
[D] indifferent to what he once desired

36. Chinese poetry and philosophy have exerted great influence over ____.
[A] Ezra Pound   [B] Ralph Waldo Emerson
[C] Robert Frost [D] Emily Dickinson

37. The Hemingway Code heroes are best remembered for their
[A] indestructible spirit [B] pessimistic view of life
[C] war experiences       [D] masculinity

38. In The Emperor Jones and The Hairy Ape, O'Neill adopted the expressionist techniques to portray the ____ of human beings in a hostile universe.
[A] helpless situation       [B] uncertainty
[C] profound religious faith [D] courage and perseverance

39. In Hemingway's "Indian Camp", Nick's night trip to the Indian village and his experience inside the hut can be taken as ____.
[A] an essential lesson about Indian tribes
[B] a confrontation with evil and sin
[C] an initiation to the harshness of life
[D] a learning process in human relationship

40.Which of the following statements about Emily Grierson, the protagonist in Faulkner's story "A Rose for Emily," is NOT true?
[A] She has a distorted personality.
[B] She is physically deformed and paralyzed.
[C] She is the symbol of the old values of the South.
[D] She is the victim of the past glory.

PART TWO

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."Her eyes met his and he looked away. He neither believed nor disbelieved her, but he knew that he had made a mistake in asking; he never had known, never would know, what she was thinking. The sight of her inscrutable face, the thought of all the hundreds of evenings he had seen her sitting there like that, soft and passive, but so unreadable, unknown, enraged him beyond measure."

Questions:

A. Identify the writer and the work.
B. What does the phrase "inscrutable face" mean?
C. What idea does the quoted passage express?

42. "And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways."

Questions:

A. Identify the poem and the poet.
B. What does the phrase "butt-ends" mean?
C. What idea does the quoted passage express?

43. "God knows, ... I'm not myself-I'm somebody else-... and I'm changed, and I can't tell what's my name, or who I am."

Questions:

A. Identify the work and the author.
B. The speaker says he is changed. Do you think he is changed, or the social environment has changed?
C. What idea does the quoted sentence express?

44. "I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."

Questions:

A. Identify the poem and the poet.
B. What does the phrase "ages and ages hence" mean?
C. What idea does the quoted passage express?

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. As a rule, an allegory is a story in verse or prose with a double meaning: a surface meaning, and an implied meaning. List two works as examples of allegory. What is an allegory usually concerned with by its implied meaning?

46. Inspiration for the romantic approach initially came from two great shapers of thought. Who are the two? And what ideas they expressed inspire the romantic writers?

47. The white whale, Moby Dick, is the most important symbol in Melville's novel. What symbolic meaning can you draw from it?

48. Nature is a philosophic work, in which Emerson gives an explicit discussion on his idea of the Oversoul. What is your understanding of Emersonian "Oversoul"?

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. How is Romanticism different from Neoclassicism? Provide brief evidence from the literary works you know best.

50. Summerize the story of Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in about 100 words, and comment on the theme of the novel.