500+ Literary Criticism – (300-400 Questions)

301. What does Sidney say about the observance of the three Dramatic Unities in Drama?

 A-It is not necessary to observe them

B-He Favours the observation

C- They must be observed

 D-None of these

Ans: b

302. Dryden wrote ‘An Essay of Dramatic Poesy’ is this?

A- A poetical Work

B- An Interlocution

C-A drama

 D-An Essay

Ans: d

303. In Dryden’s Essay of Dramatic Poesy there is four interlocutors representing four

different ideologies. Which of them expresses Dryden’s own views?

A- B-Lisideius

B-Eugenius

C-Crites

D-Neander

Ans: d

304. Is Dryden’s Essay of Dramatic Poesy a work of

 A- Interpretative Criticism

 B-Legislative Criticism

C- Comparative Criticism

 D-Textual Criticism

Ans: b

305. Who called Dryden the Father of English Criticism?

A- Dr. Johnson

B-Coleridge

C-Matthew Arnold

D-Joseph Addison

Ans: a 

306. Poetic Diction was taken to be the standard language for poetry in

 A-The Neo-classical Age

 B-The Victorian Age

 C-The Elizabethan Age

 D-The Romantic Age

Ans: a

307. “The tragic-comedy which is the product of the English theatre is one of the most

monstrous inventions that ever entered into a poet’s thought” Whose view is this?

A- Dr.Johnson’s

B-Joseph Addison’s

C-John Dryden’s

D-Alexander Pope’s

Ans: a

308. Which of the following critics preferred Shakespeare’s Comedies to his Tragedies?

A- B-Pope

B-Dryden

C-Dr. Johnson

D-None of these

Ans: c

309. Wordsworth’s Preface to the Lyrical Ballads is believed to be the Preamble to Romantic

Criticism. In which year was it published

A-1800

B-1789

C-1879

D-1875

Ans: a 

310. Who is the author of “Biographia Literaria”?

 A- William Hazlitt

 B-P.B Shelley

 C-Dr. Johnson

 D- S T Coleridge

Ans: d

311. In the Life of which poet did Dr. Johnson apply the term Metaphysical School of Poetry?

 A-Donne

 B-Milton

 C-Cowley

 D-None of these

Ans: a

312. “I write in meter because I am about to use a language different from that of prose” Who

says this

 A -Coleridge

B-Byron

C-Keats

D-None

Ans: c

313. Which of the following critics has most elaborately discussed the concept of Imagination?

A-Freud

B- Walter Pater

C-Ruskin

D- S.T Coleridge

Ans: d

314. Who says that “Poets are the unacknowledged legislator of the world?

 A- Shelley

 B-Walter Peter

 C-Matthew Arnold

 D-T. S Eliot

Ans: a

315. Who has divided literature into two broad divisions- the literature of power and literature

of knowledge.

A- De Quincey

B-Matthew Arnold

C- F.R Leavis

D-T. S Eliot

Ans: b

316. Who is the author of The Sacred Wood?

 A- T.S Eliot

 B- I. A Richards

A- Walter Pater

D-Matthew Arnold

Ans: a 

317. Who called Shakespeare’s Hamlet an artistic failure?

 A-I.A Richard

 B-F.R Leavis

 C-Aldous Huxley

 D- T.S Eliot

Ans: d 

318. Matthew Arnold is the author of one of the following works. Which of the following?

 A-What is a classic

 B-Appreciations

C-Essays in Criticism

D-The English Comic Writers

Ans: a 

319. Who was the author of “Lives of the Poets”?

A- T S Eliot

 B – William Epson

 C-Philip Sidney

 D-Dr Samuel Johnson

Ans: d

320. “ Poetry is the art of uniting pleasure with truth, by calling imagination to the help

of reason” Who says this?

A- Dr Johnson

B-Ben Jonson

C-John Milton

D-William Wordsworth

Ans: d

321.………………defines poetry as “spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”

A- Wordsworth

B- Coleridge

C- P B Shelly

D- Keats

Ans: a

322. Who says poetry can be defined as the “expression of the imagination”?

A –Wordsworth

B-Shelly

C-Coleridge

D-Mathew Arnold

Ans: c

333. Who is generally called “the first modern critic’ of the western world?

A- Mathew Arnold

B-Wordsworth

C-I A Richards

D-William Empson

Ans: c

334. “The true and right meaning of the words classic and classical is the class of very best

poetry” Who says?

A- Shelly

B-Keats

C-Mathew Arnold

D-Wordsworth

Ans: c

335. …………………. in Sanskrit means embellishment whereas the root alam denotes

perfection

A- Alamkara

B-Rasa

C-Vynjana

D-Vakrokti

Ans: a

336. ………………is generally regarded as the corner stone of Indian Aesthetics

A- Alamkara

B-Rasa

C-Vibhava

D-Anubhava

Ans: b

337. According to ………….. Rasa is evoked when the Vibhavas, Anubhavas and

Vyabhicaribhavas are combined

A-Abhinavagupta

B-Mamatta

C-Bharata

D-Anandavardhana

Ans: a

338. Negative Capability is a term first used by English Romantic poet

A- John Keats

B-P B Shelly

C-Byron

D-Wordsworth

Ans: a 

339. In criticism, ………….is a metaphor used by Aristotle in the Poetics to describe the

effects of true tragedy on the spectator.

A- Anagnorisis

B-Catharsis

C-Imitation

D-Ethos

Ans: b

340. ………………….is the literal meaning of the word we use in general communication like

sharing factual information.

A-Sense

B-Feelings

C-Tone

D-Intention

Ans: a

341. In which essay T S Eliot put forward the idea of ‘dissociation of sensibility’?

A- Tradition and Individual Talent

B-Hamlet and his Problems

C-The Metaphysical Poets

D-Poetry and Drama

Ans: a

342. ………………is an important concept developed by formalists.

A-Literariness

B-Imitation

C-Touchstone method

D-psychoanalysis

Ans: a

343. What is mimesis?

(a) A reversal

(b) An imitation

(C) A satire

(d) A poetic metaphor

(e) A spectacle

Ans: b

344. What is the main function of literary theory?

(a) To understand the importance of the formal elementS of literary structure

(b) To formulate relationships among an author, a reader, and a literary work

(c) To understand the role of sexuality, gender, rate and ethnicity in literary study

(d) To evaluate the role of historical context in the interpretation of iterature

(e) All of the above answers are correct

Ans: b

345. Which of the following best describe the difference between literary criticism and literary theroy?

(a) Literary criticism is concerned only with the meaning ofa literary

work, while literary theory is concerned only with the structure of a

literary work.

(b) Literary criticism draws upon research derived from sources outside

literature, while literary theory draws upon sources within a text.

(c) Literary critiçism is concerned with how characters in a text act, while

literary theory is concerned with why characters act.

(d) Literary theory is concerned with the method used to interpret a

work, while literary criticism is the application of literary theory.

(e) All of the above answers are correct

Ans: b

346. Plato used the word mimesis in Relation to literature with the meaning?

(a) Copying

(b) Criticism of life

(c) Representation

(d) Interpretation

Ans: c

347. The most important element of a

tragedy, in aristotle’s view, is

(a) Catharsis

(b) Plot

(c) Characters

(d) Diction

Ans: b 

348. WHO MADE A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN POETRY’ AND ‘POEM

(A) Coleridge

(B) Addison

(C) Arnold

(D) None

Ans: a

349. WHO WAS THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS DISCIPLE OF SOCRATES?

(A) Sophocles

(B) Plautus

(C) Plato

(D) Critus

Ans: c

350. Aristotle Lays Out Elements Of

Tragedy

(a) 2

(b) 6

(c) 8

(d) 10

Ans: c 

351. Elements are: plot, character,

diction, thought, and song.

(a) Theme

(b) Story

(c) Spectacle

(d) Review 

Ans: b

352. An Appendix on Poetic Diction was added to the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads in

a. 1800

b. 1802

c. 1805

d. 1815

Ans: b

353. 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

Ans: c

354. Dr. Johnson showed his distrust towards:

a. Reason and truth

b. Taste and beauty

c. Nature and test of time

d. None of these

Ans: b

355. Johnson defended Shakespeare’s use of

a. Comedy

b. Tragedy

c. Tragi-comedy

d. None of these

Ans: c

356. ‘Lives of the Poets’ gives us biographical and critical studies of:

a. 94 poets

b. 52 poets

c. 102 poets

d. 56 poets

Ans: c

357. The Essay Supplementary was added to the_____ edition of the Preface

a. 1800

b. 1802

c. 1805

d. 1815

Ans: b

358. 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

Ans: b

359. 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”

Ans: a

360. 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

Ans: b

361. Eliot was the editor of the Journal

a. Criterion

b. Scrutiny

c. The Egoist

d. None of these

Ans: a

362. Richards appreciated Eliot’s The Wasteland for its

a. Aesthetic quality

b. Lack of fixed beliefs

c. Psychological impact

d. Powerful imagery

Ans: c

363. The essay, “Wanted: An Ontological Critic”, was written by

a. John Crowe Ransom

b. Yvor Winters

c. Joel Spingarn

d. I. A. Richards

Ans: b

364. The essay “Hamlet and His Problems” is famous for its concept of

a. Dissociation of sensibility

b. Objective correlative

c. Art emotion and Life emotion

d. Metaphysical wit

Ans: a

365. The founder of the journal Kenyon Review was

a. John Crowe Ransom

b. Yvor Winters

c. Joel Spingarn

d. I. A. Richards

Ans: d

366. The magazine founded by John Crowe Ransom was:

a. The Fugitive

b. Scrutiny

c. Criterion

d. Kenyon Review

Ans: a

367. In classical Greek, catharsis meant……. 

Options:

1. Purgation or cleansing

2. Dirt and defilement

3. Tragic turn

4. Spite and revenge

Ans: a

368. Choose the correct comments on Aristotle’s Poetics

1. Tragedy is addressed to an inferior public

2. Epic is superior to tragedy

3. Tragedy is superior to epic

4. Epic is addressed to a cultivated audience

a. 1,2&3 only

b. 2,3&4 only

c. 1,3 &4 only

d. 1 &3 only

Ans: d

369. Choose the correct statements about Longinus ‘On the Sublime’

1. Longinus believes that in Odyssey, Homer couldn’t preserve the sustained energy of the Iliad. 

2. Throughout the treatise Longinus harshly criticizes the prose style of Plato

3. Longinus regards extreme conciseness of expression as thr hallmark of sublimity. 

4. According to Longinus, Sapho has an exceptional skill in taking up the most striking emotions to combine them into a single whole.

a. 1, 3 and 4 

b. 2 and 3 

c. 2, 3 and 4

d. All the above

Ans: a

370. For ST Coleridge, is “the arbitrary bringing together of things that lie remote and forming them into a unity “.

a. Primary Imagination

b. Secondary Imagination

c. Fancy

d. Poetic Diction

Ans: c

371. Who among the following is generally regarded as  the “Father of the Alamkara school of Sanskrit poetics “? 

a Abhinav Gupta

 b Viswanatha 

c Mammata 

d Bhamaha

Ans: d

372. Name the author of Essay on Criticism

a. Pope

b. Dryden

c. Swift

d. John Gay

Ans: a

373. The two great romantic poets behind the creation of Lyrical Ballads are

a. Wordsworth and Coleridge

b. Keats and Wordsworth

c. Collins and Gray

d. Byron and Shelley

Ans: a

374. To Aristotle ‘catharsis’ means

a. Fall from high estate in life

b. Purgation of the emotions

c. To correct manners

d. To refine the conduct

Ans: b

375. The hamartia, the anagnorisis and the peripeteia are the three key elements in

a. A plot

b. An ode

c. A lyric

d. An epic

Ans: a

376. Who proposed the ‘Touchstone’ method for literary evaluation? 

a. Mathew Arnold

b. T. S Eliot

c. I. A Richards

d. F. R Leavis

Ans: d

377. By the term ‘dissociation of sensibility’ Eliot meant

a. The unification of thought and feeling

b. The unification of thought and intellect

c. The unification of intellect and reason

d. The unification of emotions and fellings

Ans: c

378. A Defence of an Essay of Dramatic Poesy was written by

a. Philip Sidney

b. John Milton

c. John Dryden

d. Samuel Butler

Ans: c

379. I. A Richards pioneered the technique called

a. Practical criticism

b. Descriptive analysis

c. Historical criticism

d. Interpretive evaluation

Ans: a

380. The design of the collaborators was to include in it two different kinds of poetry; in the one ” the incidents and agents were to be in part at least, Supernatural’, in the other, ‘subjects were to be chosen from ordinary life’.

 Who made this comment and on which book ?

a Wordsworth on the lyrical ballads

b Coleridge on the lyrical balleds 

c Coleridge on the Ancient Mariner 

d Wordsworth on the prelude

Ans: a

381. Which romantic prose writer has been called ‘the critic’s critic’? 

a lamb 

b De Quincey

c Hazlitt 

d landor

Ans: b

382. According to Aristotle, which are the objects that tragedy imitates? 

a. Plot, character and thought

b. Diction and song

c. Spectacle

d. Plot and action

Ans: a

383. ‘Delight is the chief, if not the only end of Poesy; instruction can be admitted but in the second place; for poesy only instructs as it delights’. According to whom is this the function of poetry? 

a. Philip Sidney 

b. John Dryden 

c. Joseph Addison 

d. Dr. Johnson

Ans: a

384. Who defined poetry as ‘the criticism of life’? 

a. S. T Coleridge

b. Walter Pater

c. P. B Shelley

d. Matthew Arnold

Ans: d

385. ‘Objective Correlative’ is used by Eliot to explain how a feelings and emotions should not be separated in poetry. 

b. the poet should depersonalize his creation. 

c. the writer succeeds in evoking the right emotions in the reader/spectator.

d. to trigger objective thinking in the reader

Ans: c

386. Give the other term for ” when man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact and reason” 

a. Objective correlative 

b. Dissociation of sensibility 

c. Negative capability 

d. Stream of consciousness

Ans: c

387. What is the subtitle of Wordsworth’s The Prelude? 

a. Growth of a Poet’s Mind

b. Philosophy of a Poem 

c. Nature, Man and Society

 d. Poetic imagination

Ans: a

388. Harold Bloom put forth the theory……… based on Oedipus Complex.

a. Diachronic Approach 

b. The Anxiety of Influence

c.Diegesis

d. Hermeneutics

Ans: b

389. ………might be described as a moral or philosophical critic who argues that works must have “high seriousness”

 a Eliot

b Derrida

c Arnold 

d CS Lewis

Ans: c

390. Who introduced the term objective correlative in formalist criticism ?

a. TS Eliot 

b. Arnold 

c. Virginia woolf 

d. CS Lewis

Ans: a

391. …….. is Virginia Woolf’s contribution to feminist criticism. 

a. The voyage out 

b. A room of one’s own 

c. Between the Acts 

d. The common reader

Ans: b

392. In an Essay of Dramatic Poesy whom does John Dryden refer to as ‘the most learned and judicious writer which any theatre ever had’? 

(a) John Webster 

(b) William Shakespeare

(c) Ben Johnson 

(d) Christopher Marlowe

Ans: a

393. In an Essay of Dramatic Poesy whom does John Dryden refer to as ‘the most learned and judicious writer which any theatre ever had’?

(a) John Webster

(b) William Shakespeare

(c) Ben Johnson

(d) Christopher Marlowe

Ans: a

394. Tradition and Individual Talent is a critical essay by

(a) Shelley 

(b) Dryden

(c) Eliot 

(d) Derrida

Ans: c

395. In whose opinion Longinus ‘classicism was touched with romance’?

(a) Abercrombie 

(b) Scott James

(c) Wimsatt 

(d) Atkins

Ans: a

396. What is the other title of An Apologie for poetrie given to it by another publisher?

(a) Poetics 

(b) Essay on Criticism

(c) The Defence of poesie 

(d) None of these

Ans: c

397. Who has Longinus advised to imitate in poetry?

(a) Rules and regulations

(b) Great classical masters

(c) Contemporary literature

(d) Nature and art

Ans: b 

398. The two types of sublime are

(a) excellence and grandeur

(b) harmony and rhythm

(c) epic and tragedy

(d) true and false

Ans: a

399. In which work has Dryden made the masterly appreciation of Chaucer?

(a) The Spanish Friar

(b) Preface of the Fables

(c) The essay on satire

(d) Essay on dramatic poesy

Ans: b

400. Which is the perfect modern English play according to 

Dryden?

(a) Silent women 

(b) Duchess of Malfi

(c) Macbeth 

(d) Volpone

Ans: d