LITERARY CRITICISM: CONSOLIDATED QUESTION BANK
MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESTIONS - Part I

Choose the best answer from the choices given:

1. The doctrine of ideas was propounded by
a. Longinus
b. Plato
c. Aristotle
d. Horace

2. The author of On the Sublime is:
a. Horace
b. Pope
c. Longinus
d. Johnson

3. Mimesis means
a. Imitation
b. Explanation
c. Justification
d. Imagination

4. According to Aristotle the least important element in tragedy is:
a. Plot
b. Character
c. Song
d. Spectacle

5. According to Aristotle, poetic imitation is an imitation of _______________________
a. Reality
b. Imagination
c. Ideals
d. Inner human action

6. Which of the following theories of Aristotle is considered as a reply to Plato’s charge against
tragedy that it devitalises human emotions
a. Katharsis
b. Hamartia
c. Spondaios
d. Anagnorisis

7. The word tragic flaw means ____________
a. To err or fail
b. To contemplate
c. To postpone
d. To avoid

8. Which of the following phrases is used with reference to Aristotle’s works
a. Cave image
b. Pythian enthusiasm
c. Acromatic
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d. Paradox

9. The term ‘purple patch’ was introduced by _______________________
a. Longinus
b. Horace
c. Aristotle
d. Sidney

10. An Apology for Poetry was a reply to
a. Stephen Gosson
b. Philip Sydney
c. William Shakespeare
d. Samuel Johnson

11. “I admire him (Jonson) but I love Shakespeare”. Whose words are these?
a. Matthew Arnold
b. Alexander Pope
c. John Dryden
d. T S Eliot

12. Preface to Shakespeare was written by
a. John Dryden
b. Alexander Pope
c. Ben Jonson
d. Samuel Johnson

13. Preface to Lyrical Ballads was a reaction against _____________ poetry:
a. Elizabethan
b. Metaphysical
c. Neoclassical
d. Victorian

14. An Appendix on Poetic Diction was added to the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads in
a. 1800
b. 1802
c. 1805
d. 1815

15. Coleridge’s chief contribution to literary criticism is
a. Lectures on Shakespeare and Milton
b. Criticism on Wordsworth
c. Biographia Literaria
d. Lectures on the poets of the 17th Century

16. Dr. Johnson showed his distrust towards:
a. Reason and truth
b. Taste and beauty
c. Nature and test of time
d. None of these

17. Dr. Johnson advocates the use of
a. Heroic couplet
b. Spenserian stanza
c. Blank verse
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d. None of these

18. Dr. Johnson considered _____________ superior to all the other kinds of poetry
a. Epic
b. Lyric
c. Sonnet
d. Ode

19. Johnson defended Shakespeare’s use of
a. Comedy
b. Tragedy
c. Tragi-comedy
d. None of these

20. ‘ Lives of the Poets’ gives us biographical and critical studies of :
a. 94 poets
b. 52 poets
c. 102 poets
d. 56 poets

21. The Essay Supplementary was added to the_____ edition of the Preface
a. 1800
b. 1802
c. 1805
d. 1815

22. T S Eliot described himself as a classicist in literature, a royalist in politics and an Anglo-Catholic
in religion in his book
a. After Strange Gods
b. For Lancelot Andrews
c. Sacred Wood
d. The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism

23. Eliot believed that only a person who believed in the doctrine of _______________ could
understand his writings.
a. Objective Correlative
b. Impersonality of poetry
c. Dissociation sensibility
d. Original sin

24. Which essay/ article/ book by T S Eliot is considered the “unofficial manifesto” of his criticism?
a. “Tradition and the Individual Talent”
b. The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism
c. “The Metaphysical Poets”
d. “The Function of Criticism”

25. In the essay “Tradition and the Individual Talent”, Eliot compares the mind of a poet to
a. A receptacle
b. A fountain
c. A catalyst
d. Sulphurous acid