T.S. Eliot
Modernism
The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock
Preludes
Rhapsody on a Windy Night
100
What does the "T" in T.S. Eliot stand for: Thomas, Tyler or Terrance?
Thomas
100
Name any decade in the period when the Modernist literature movement flourished?
1900–1945
100
What is the name of the poem's speaker?
J. Alfred Prufrock (Eliot's archetype of the insecure, indecisive and alienated modern man)
100
How many sections (parts) does Preludes have?
Four
100
What time frame does Rhapsody primarily take place in?
Midnight to 4am
200
In which decade of the 19th century was T.S. Eliot born?
1880s (1888)
200
Which major historical event had a significant influence on Modernist writers?
WWI
200
Which famous Italian writer is quoted in the poem's epigraph?
S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma percioche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.
Dante Alghieri. (The epigraph roughly translates to: If I believed that my answer were to one who could ever return to the world, this flame would shake no more; but since no one ever returns alive from this depth, if what I hear is true, I answer thee without fear of infamy. Critical interpretation of this inclusion suggests that Prufrock is declaring from the outset his own personal, psychological hell)
200
At the end of Preludes Section 1, what starts the final line: "...steams and stamps"?
A lonely cab-horse
200
What is a dominant setting of the poem?
A dark, decaying street (any description along those lines)
300
What prestigious literary prize did T.S. Eliot win in 1948? (Hint: there are six of these given out annually)
Nobel Prize in Literature
300
What narrative technique, which presents a character's thoughts as they occur, is commonly associated with Modernist literature? [Hint:(6, 2, 13)]
Stream of consciousness
300
What object does Prufrock compare the evening sky to in the first stanza?
A patient lying on a table
300
In section 2 of Preludes, what 'd' adjective describes the "shades // In a thousand furnished rooms"?
Dinghy
300
In stanza 3 of Rhapsody, within the fragmented structure of the text, Eliot mentions several objects that are seemingly connected to the image of the "woman // Who hesitates toward you in the light of the door" from the previous stanza. Which is not an object mentioned in the stanza: branch, child or spring?
Child (although a child is mentioned later in the text:
A crowd of twisted things;
A twisted branch upon the beach
Eaten smooth, and polished
As if the world gave up
The secret of its skeleton,
Stiff and white.
A broken spring in a factory yard,
Rust that clings to the form that the strength has left
Hard and curled and ready to snap.)
400
Which university did Eliot attend for his undergraduate studies? (Hint: found in the American state abbreviated to 'MA')
Harvard
400
Commonly used in Modernist literature, what is the technique when a text references another text?
Allusion
400
Which Renaissance artist does Prufrock mention when he says, "In the room the women come and go..."?
Michelangelo
(In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo)
400
Also used to describe the fog in The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, what colour is used to describe the soles of the subject's feet in Section 3 of Preludes?
Yellow (Or clasped the yellow soles of feet - this stands alongside the subject's other physical details, symbolising the moral decay and filth that define their existence in the modern city)
400
In Rhapsody, what imagery is used to describe the food-stuff that the cat devours?
Rancid butter
Half-past two,
The street lamp said,
"Remark the cat which flattens itself in the gutter,
Slips out its tongue
And devours a morsel of rancid butter."
500
Eliot left a rich legacy of literature, before finally succumbing to emphysema in the 1960s. What UK city did he pass away in?
London (Kensington)
500
Name one key characteristic of Modernist literature.
Experimental form, fragmentation, stream of consciousness, ambiguity, alienation (or answers/explanations along those lines)
500
What central fear prevents Prufrock from acting decisively throughout the poem?
Judgment, rejection, social embarrassment
500
In Section 4 of Preludes, Eliot describes the stagnant and repetitive nature of the movement of city dwellers during the afternoon-evening: Or trampled by insistent feet // At four and five and six o’clock - what language technique is used for rhythmic effect to cumulatively list the hours of the day?
Polysyndeton (through the use of "and" rather than commas ",")
500
In the opening stanza of Rhapsody, what two words, an adjective and a noun, fill in the blanks? The first adjective refers to the idea of inevitability; the noun, a flower often symbolising love and beauty, is subverted by Eliot through his Modernist sentiment:
Every street lamp that I pass
Beats like a _________ drum,
And through the spaces of the dark
Midnight shakes the memory
As a madman shakes a dead ________
Fatalistic, geranium
Every street lamp that I pass
Beats like a fatalistic drum,
And through the spaces of the dark
Midnight shakes the memory
As a madman shakes a dead geranium