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CLEP American Literature

Subjects : clep, literature
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
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  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. Unorthodox writers who hung around the bars and coffee houses of San Francisco's North Beach.






2. Wrote 'The House of Mirth -' and 'The Age of Innocence' most famous for 'Ethan Frome' Noted use of indirection and allusion. First women to win a Pulitzer for 'The Age of Innocence' Main themes were upper-class life and the constraints it placed on b






3. Famous for writing - marriages - divorces and media hype. Wrote 'The Executioner's Song.'






4. A stanza.






5. Wrote 'Portnoy's Complaint.' Work reflects the changing attitude of Jews living in post-World War II America.






6. Friedrich Nitezche's belief in the 'will to power' as the primary force of society and the individual.






7. Wrote 'The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man' and 'Lift Every Voice and Sing -' (The Black National Anthem)






8. End : occurs when words at the ends of lines of poetry rhyme. Internal: occurs when words within a sentences share the same sound - such as 'Each narrow cell in which we dwell.'






9. Involves a speaker who addresses an unseen audience. Usually takes place at a crucial moment in the speaker's life.






10. (Colonial Period) 1. God is King and Ruler. 2. Our duty in this world is to see that God's will prevails.3. Man is depraved from birth. 4. Few will be saved. Damned are damned despite their best efforts. Belief in Covenant Theology : God's covenant w






11. (Colonial Period) Best-known Southern colonial writer. Famous for 'The History of the Dividing Line' and 'The Secret Diary of William Byrd of Westover'






12. Wrote 'The Invisible Man' - Considered a landmark achievement in American literature






13. Wrote 'Songs of Jamaica' - Poetry and 'Harlem Shadows' (first great literary achievement of the Harlem Renaissance. Much of his poetry evokes the rich heritage of Jamaica.






14. Local Colorist Wrote 'The Country of the Pointed Firs' Famous for use of idiomatic language - conservative values and imagery and vivid descriptions of rural New England.






15. Written by Cottonn Mather - to justify the execution of 19 women during the Salem Witch Trials.






16. Chicago School - Work bridges folk poetry and modernist poems. Used music and strong rhythm - Wrote 'The Congo'






17. A long narrative that represents characters in a high position who take part in a series of adventures of significance.






18. A group of lines in a poem. - Lines of poems are grouped into _______s - just as sentences of prose are grouped into paragraphs.






19. Wrote Catcher in the Rye






20. Recluse - agoraphobic - Didn't title her poems. All are designated by numbers. Paved the way for the Imagist movement of the 1920s. Considered on of the founders of Modern American Poetry. Concrete imagery - forceful language - and unique style usher






21. Wrote gold-rush stories like 'The Luck of Roaring Camp' and 'The Outcasts of Poker Flat'; never matched up to his previous fame local colorist






22. Ben Franklin paid his passage to America. First Pamphlet was Common Sense : credited with getting the colonists to see the 'advantage - necessity - and obligation' of breaking with Britain. Followed by a series of pamphlets - collectively called 'An






23. A line or group of lines repeated at the end of a poem or song. Refrains reinforce the main point and create musical effects.






24. Won the Pulitzer and Nobel Prize - Works focused on the South - Wrote 'As I Lay Dying -' 'Sanctuary -' and 'The sound and the Fury.' Experimented with Stream of Consciousness writing. Considered the most innovative novelist of his time.






25. Key intellectual and philosophical voice of 19th-century America. Key player in the transcendentalist movement. First to define what made American poetry American - it is verse that celebrates ordinary experience rather than the epic themes of the pa






26. Naturalist - Wrote 'McTeague - a Story of San Francisco'






27. Considered the greatest humorist of 19th century American Literature. Wrote 'The Adventures of Tom Sawyer' and 'The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.' Master of 'Local Color' writing. Used vernacular - exaggeration and deadpan narrator to create humor.






28. A group of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of poetry.






29. Typically referred to as the greatest American novelist (next to Mark Twain) of the second half of the 19th century. Main theme of his work was the innocence and exuberance of America compared to the corruption and wisdom of Europe. Wrote 'The Portra






30. Created new poetic forms and subjects to fashion a distinctly American type of poetic expression. Rejected conventional themes - traditional literary references - allusions - and rhymes. Used long lines to capture rhythms of natural speech - free ver






31. An organization of the leading transcendentalists living around Boston. They were interested in new developments in theology - philosophy - and literature. Major writers: Ripley - Emerson - Alcott - Fuller - Hawthorne - Thoreau - Channing - Hedge - P






32. Third US President Referred to as the 'Sage of Monticello'Drafted the Declaration of Independence.






33. Anne Bradstreet - Michael Wigglesworth - Edward Taylor






34. Genius; called the 'Black Keats' - Worked within traditional poetic forms rather than jazz rhythms. Wrote ' Copper Sun -' and 'The Ballad of the Brown Girl.'






35. Chicago School : Verses often concern ordinary - everyday people; realistic poems and dramatic emphasis attract a large audience. Wrote 'Chicago -' and a biography of Abraham Lincoln. Poems describe everyday Americans - have a positive tone - use sim






36. Won 4 Pulitzers - Top 20th Century Poet - Wrote 'The Road Not Taken -' ' Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening -' and 'Mending Wall'






37. Applying the evolutionary 'survival of the fittest' concept to a world marked by struggle and competition. (Promulgated by Herbert Spencer - a best-selling sociologist of the late 19th Century.






38. Writings interweave sexual and racial concerns; what it means to be black and homosexual in America in the 2nd half of the 20th Century.






39. Words that carry a strong emotional overtones.






40. Ezra Pound and T.S Eliot






41. Wrote 'Grapes of Wrath -' 'Of Mice and Men -' and 'East of Eden -' and 'Winter of Our Discontent.' Awarded Nobel Prize for Literature - Pulitzer and and the National Book Award.






42. Wrote 'Richard Cory' - Created poems dealing with historic myths and characters. Known primarily for short - ironic characteristics of ordinary individuals. Won 3 Pulitzers : 'Collected Poems -' 'The Man Who Died Twice -' and 'Tristram'






43. American novelist - essayist - social critic - painter and spoken performer. Most of his works are autobiographical. Frequently experimented with drugs. He wrote the 'Naked Lunch' and the 'Cities of Red Night'






44. First Black female poet to win a Pulitzer. Best known for her poems 'The Bean Eaters' and 'We Real Cool.'






45. First great writer of psychological fiction; obsessed with sin and guilt. 'The Scarlet Letter' - 'Young Goodman Brown' - Claimed his work was romance and therefore not required to be realistic.






46. The belief that 'true' Americans were those of earlier Anglo-Saxon descent - and that this 'race' was under threat from the growing influx of Central European and Asian immigrants.






47. A false science that argued tat different human races possessed distinguishing traits that determined their particular behavior and achievement in society.






48. Wished to return to more primitive principles - to simplicity - sobriety - religious earnestness - and personal self-control. Aim was to purify church of England from 'Popery' - Persecuted harshly by Charles I and Archbishop of Canterbury William Lau






49. Wrote 'The Souls of Black Folk' - Founder of the NAACP






50. Local Colorist Great Niece of Harriet Beecher Stowe. Wrote 'The Yellow Wallpaper'