These are the questions for the final exam. Read the instructions carefully. And follow
the directions.
There is a handout of the prompts, so read over that one and choose then write your
responses. You may copy and paste the text of your responds in the appropriate text
box.
For expedited scoring, the responses will be given three designations:
a few points (0-25% of points for that answer) = this answer needs an example
from the poem(s) and/or more analysis/insight;
some points (26% – 75% of points for that answer) = this answer needs more
analysis/insight or one more example;
most of the points (76% – 100% of points for that answer) = this answer is a good
to excellent response.
Respond to each of the following prompts. For Questions 1 though 8 you are required to
respond to just one of the prompts. Question 9 requires that you respond to two
(2) prompts. And Question 10 has just the one, so answer it as it is the sole prompt.
So there will be a total of 11 responses, with Question 9 having two responses.
Each response should use sufficient examples from the poem(s) referred to in the
prompt in order to respond to that prompt. Except for Question 10–which requires
analysis and insight, mostly on your part.
Write as much as is needed to respond to the prompts being responded to.
There are also two bonus questions; however, you do not need to respond to those.
Respond to the bonus questions only if you want to.
Prompt 1
Respond to one (1) of the following:
a. In Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken”–how is the idea of choice thought
about by the speaker?
b. In Robert’s Frost’s “Mending Wall”–what do fences really do to neighbors?
Prompt 2
Respond to one (1) of the following:
c. How does Hamlet’s speech, from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, connect to
Frost’s “Out, Out–“?
d. Using examples from at least two poems by Robert Frost, what does the poet
assert about the frailty of life?
Prompt 3
Respond to one (1) of the following:
e. In Richard Blanco’s “Papa’s Bridge”–what are the two bridges referred to?
f. Describe the nature of the relationship between the boy and his father in
Theodore Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz.”
Prompt 4
Respond to one (1) of the following:
g. Compare and Contrast fathers as depicted in Robert Hayden’s “Those Winter
Sundays” and Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy.”
h. In Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy”–what is the relationship the speaker has with her
father and how did it affect the speaker’s life?
Prompt 5
Answer one (1) of the following:
i. In Elizabeth Bishop’s “At the fishhouses”–what is it about the place and how is
it a way of explaining life?
j. What is it about Chicago, as depicted in Carl Sandburg’s “Chicago”?
Prompt 6
Answer one (1) of the following:
k. How are Octavio Paz’s “Daybreak” and “Nightfall” reflective of life itself?
l. In Emily Dickinson’s “Because I could not stop for Death”–what is the speaker
shown and what is the larger lesson of the poem?
Prompt 7
Respond to one (1) of the following:
m. Why didn’t Emily Dickinson give names to her poems (list & explain three
possibilities)?
n. For what purposes did Emily Dickinson use the dash (list & explain three
reasons)?
Prompt 8
Answer one (1) of the following:
o. In Shelley’s “Ozymandias”–who is Ozymandias and what became of his
aggrandizement?
p. In Yeats’s “Sailing to Byzantium”–why is that country not for old men and what
does become of the old man speaker?
Prompt 9
Answer two (2) of the following:
q. In Langston Hughes’s “The Negro Speaks of Rivers”–what is it about rivers?
r. In Langston Hughes’s “The Weary Blues”–what are the weary blues and how
does one deal with them?
s. How are Langston Hughes’s “Song for a Dark Girl” and “I, Too” similar?
t. What is the theme for English B in Langston Hughes’s “Theme for English B”?
Prompt 10
Answer the following:
From Octavio Paz’s “Daybreak”—what is meant by eucalyptus / campgrounds of
the clouds?
Bonus 1
This is a bonus question: you do not have to respond to it. But if you do, and
respond well, an additional 8 points is up for grabs—
In Pablo Neruda’s “The United Fruit Co.”–how is the main theme of the poem tied
to the whole of the western hemisphere, historically and in our modern times?
Bonus 2
This is a second bonus question, about Shakespeare’s sonnets; you do not have
to answer it but if you do then it is worth up to 18 additional points (eighteen
because his Sonnet 18 is one of my favorite written works of all time and the one I
have committed to memory; also, I do this because I forgot to write a question
about Shakespeare’s sonnets for the exam). So here is the question (and it is a
totally serious question, but it is also totally subjective)–
Why Shakespeare?
