自考英美文学选读00604考前串讲(3).doc

英美文学考前串讲（3）

Chapter 2 The Neoclassical Period

I. Choose the right answer:

1. ____brings Henry Fielding the name of the "Prose Homer".
A.The Pilgrim’s Progress
B.Tom Jones
C.Robison Crusoe
D.Colonel Jack
Answer: B (P122)

2. Alexander Pope worked painstakingly on his poems
and finally brought to its last perfection ______Dryden
had successfully used in his plays.
A.the heroic couplet
B.the free verse
C.the blank verse
D.the Spenserian stanza
Answer: A (P92)

3. Of all the 18th century novelists ___was the first to set out,
both in theory and practice, to write specially a "comic epic in prose."
A.Henry Fielding
B.Daniel Defoe
C.Jonathan Swift
D.John Bunyan
Answer: A (P120)

4. ____is the most successful religious allegory in the English language.
A.Genesis A
B.The Holy War
C.The Pilgrims progress
D.Exodus
Answer: C (P85)

5. In which of the following works can you find the proper names
"Lilliput", "Brobdingnag", "Houyhnhnm" and "Yahoo"?
A.The Pilgrim’s Progress
B.The Faririe Queene
C.Gulliver’s travels
D.The School of Scandel
Answer: C (P108)

6. "As shades more sweetly recommend the light,
So modest plainness sets off sprightly wit;
For works may have more wit than does’em good
As bodies perish through excess of blood."
In the above lines, Pope tries to sat that_______.
A.more wit will make better poetry
B.plainness is more important than wit in poetry
C.too much wit will destroy good poetry
D.plainness will make wit dull
Answer: C (P93-94)

7. The Rape of the Lock by Alexander Pope is written in the form
of a mock______, which describes the triviality of high society
in a grand style.
A.epic
B.elegy
C.sonnet
D.ode
Answer: A (P92)

8. Which of the following is NOT a typical feature of
Samuel Johnson’s language style?
A.His sentences are long and well structured.
B.His sentences are interwoven with parallel words.
C.He tends to use informal and colloquial words.
D.His sentences are complicated, but his thoughts are clearly expressed.
Answer: C (P132)

9. "The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave,
Awaits alike the inevitable hour.
In the above quoted passage, Thomas Gray intends to say
that great family, power, beauty and wealth___________.
A.will never make people lead to the same destination----paths of glory.
B.will inevitably make people realize their glorious dreams
C.are the very best things to lead people to their glories
D.will never prevent people from reaching their final destination---grave.
Answer: D (P154)

10. ____has been regarded by some as "Father of the English novel"
for his contribution to the establishment of the form of the modern novel.
A.John Bunyan
B.Henry Fielding
C.Daniel Defoe
D.Johnathan Swift
Answer: B (P121)

11. ____was very much concerned with the theme of the vanity
of human wishes and tried to awaken men to this folly
and hoped to cure them of it through his writing.
A.Samuel Johnson
B.Jonathan Swift
C.Richard Brinsley Sheridan
D.Thomas Gray
Answer: A (P132)

12. ____was the only important dramatist of the 18th century,
in his plays, morality is the constant theme.
A.Alexander Pope
B.Richard Brinsley Sheridan
C.Samuel Johnson
D.George Bernard Shaw
Answer: B (P136)

13. As the representative of the Enlightenment, Pope was one
of the first to introduce___to England.
A.Rationalism
B.Criticism
C.Romanticism
D.Realism
Answer: A (P91)

14. The Rivals and ____are generally regarded as important links
between the masterpiece of Shakespeare and those of Bernard Shaw.
A.The School for Scandal
B.The Duenna
C.Widower’s Houses
D.The Doctor’s Dilemma
Answer: A (P137)

15. ____is a sharp satire on the moral degeneracy(道德沦丧) of the
aristocratic-bourgeois society in the 18th century England.
A.The Rivals
B.Gulliver’s Travels
C.Toms Jones
D.The School for Scandal
Answer: D (P138)

16. The poem "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" by Thomas Gray
is regarded as the most representative work of _____.
A.The Metaphysical School
B.The Graveyard School
C.The Gothic School
D.The Romantic School
Answer: B (P152)

17. _______, written in heroic couplet by Pope, is considered
manifesto of English Neoclassicism.
A.An Essay of Dramatic Poetry
B.An Essay on Criticism
C.The Advancing of learning
D.An Essay on Freedom
Answer: B (P93)

18. ______is a typical feature of Swift’s writings.
A.Elegant style
B.Causal narration
C.Bitter satire
D.Complicated sentence structure
Answer: C (P107)

19. In the following writings by Henry Fielding,
which brings him the name of the "Prose Homer"?
A.The Coffee---House Politician.
B.The Tragedy of Tragedies.
C.The History of Tom Jones, A Foundling.
D.The History of Amelia.
Answer: C (P120)

20. "Hold! See whether it is or not before you go to the
door----I have a particular message for you if it should be my brother."
The two sentences are found in ________.
A.The School for Scandal
B.The Rivals
C.The Critic
D.The Scheming Lieutenant
Answer: A (P139)

21. In terms of Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, which is wrong?
A.The author employs metaphor in this poem.
B.The author excessively expresses his personal melancholy.
C.Here he reveals his sympathy for the poor and the unknown.
D.He mocks the great ones who despise the poor and bring havoc on them.
Answer: B (P152-153)

22. 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.
Answer: A (P108)

II. Read the quoted part and answer the questions:

1. "Words are like leaves;
and where they most abound,
Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.
False eloquence, like the prismatic glass,
Its gaudy colors spreads on every place;
The face of Nature we no more survey,
All glares alike, without distinction gay."

Questions:
1) Identify the author and the passage;
2) Name the devices used in the passage with examples;
3) Explain "Words….found".
4) What is the mainly implied idea of the passage?

参考答案：
1) The passage is from Pope’s "An Essay on Criticism". (P94)

2) In the passage the author used "Simile" the device,
e.g. "Words are like leaves" and "false eloquence,
like the prismatic glass’ etc.

3) The sentence means: Where/When too many words are used,
they seldom express much sense.

4) The passage implies authors shouldn’t stress too much
the artificial use of Conceit or the external beauty of language,
they should pay special attention to True Wit, which is best
set in the plain style. (just as too many leaves will cover the fruits,
too gaudy/ showy glass will hide the face the Nature,
too false and eloquent language will hide the Wit in the articles.)

2. "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 boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave,
Awaits alike the inevitable hour.
The paths of glory lead but to the grave."

Questions:
1) Identify the author and the works;
2) What does "the inevitable hour"?
3) Explain the first stanza;
4) What does the whole passage imply.

参考答案：
1) This is Thomas Gray’s "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard".
托马斯·格雷的《写在教堂墓地的挽歌》(P154)

2) "The inevitable hour" means time of death. (P156)

3) The first stanza means: The men with ambition and high position
shouldn’t laugh at the ordinary people for their simple life and hard work.

4) In the passage, the poet reflects on the death----no matter how poor or wealthy,
or how important and humble, every is equal before death, the author gives
much sympathy to the poor and unknown (P153)

III. Questions and answers:
1.Please analyze the Neoclassical period and the characters of the literature.

参考答案：
1)The Neoclassical period is about 1660-1798, also known as
"the Age of Enlightenment" or "the age of Reason".

2)Its background was:
a.It was an age full of conflicts and difference of values;
b.It was an age of fast development for English to become
the first powerful capitalist country in the world;
c.It was an age of economic development, in which bourgeois/middle class grew rapidly.

3)In essence, the Neoclassical Period was a progressive intellectual movement.

4)The Enlighteners believed in self-restraint, self-reliance and hard work;They celebrated reason/rationality, equality and science.
They advocated universal education, which could make people
rational and prefect, they believed.

5)In literature, The Enlightenment Movement brought about a
revival of interest in the ancient Greek and Roman classical works; the
works at the time, heavily didactic and moralizing; having fixed laws and rules for every type of the literature; among which prose and the modern English novel predominated the age. (At the end of the age sentimentalism and Gothic Novel appeared.) 6) The age was an important age with the remarkable authors Pope, Defoe, etc.

2.Please cite examples from "Gulliver’s Travels" to explain briefly
how did Swift criticized and allude to the government and the society.

参考答案:
1)In the first part of the "Gulliver’s Travels",
Swift described the tricks and practices in the competition
held before royal members to allude to the fact that the success
of the officials was not for their wisdom and excellence but for
their skills in the games;

2)In the part 4 of the book, Swift made horses with reason and good qualities.
The citizens who are "hairy, wild, low and despicable brutes,
who resemble human beings not only in appearance but also in almost every way" to criticize/satirize all respects of the English and European life,
and urge people to consider the nature of the human and life. (P108-109)

3. People always say that: "As a member of the middle class,
Defoe spoke for and to the members of his class" .
How do you understand this sentence? Please explain it with the character of him.

参考答案：
1) In most of his works, Defoe gave his praise to the hard-working,
sturdy middle class and showed his sympathy for the lower-class people.
Robinson Crusoe was such a character.

2) Robison goes out to sea, gets shipwrecked and marooned/landed on a lonely island, struggles to live for 24 years there and finally is saved by a ship and returns to England. During the period Robinson leads a harsh and lonely life and survives by growing corps, taming animals, etc. growing from a naive young man into a hardened man.

3) With a great capacity for work, inexhaustible energy (精力充沛),
courage and persistence in overcoming difficulties（在克服困难方面持之以恒）, in struggling against nature, Crusoe becomes the prototype / representative of the empire builder, the pioneer colonist. （他是大英帝国缔造者的完美典范，同时也是殖民者的先驱）．

4) In the novel, Defoe glorified human labor and the puritan fortitude
which the middle class praised highly, so he can be regarded as a
spokesman of the bourgeois. (P98-100)