The Windhover Quizzes

The Windhover Quiz

1 "The Windhover" is an example of which of the following poetic forms?
An epistolary poem

A mock-epic

Dactylic hexameter

A sonnet
2 The sight of the kestrel causes the speaker to
Question and subsequently reaffirm his faith in God

Envy the ease and grace with which it navigates the buffeting winds

Reflect on other spontaneous or unexpected sources of beauty in life

Feel remorse at poetry's inability to fully capture natural beauty
3 The phrase "morning morning's minion" is an example of
Parataxis

Alliteration

Synecdoche

Irony
4 Which of the following is NOT present in the line "High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing"?
Assonance

Consonance

Hyperbole

Alliteration
5 For the speaker, one of the things the kestrel symbolizes is...
Christ's grace

Human vanity and pride

His own grief

His lost faith
6 The meter of "The Windhover" is
Syllabic

Trochaic hexameter

Sprung rhythm

Iambic pentameter
7 Which of these statements about the final tercet of the poem is true?
It abandons metaphor in favor of more straightforward language

It undercuts the exhuberant tone of the opening octet

It reflects on and extends the insights of the rest of the poem

It reverses many of the ideas of the previous tercet
8 Gerard Manely Hopkins' conversion to Catholicism:
Was extremely disruptive to his personal relationships and career prospects

Spurred a new period of poetic innovation, in which he invented sprung rhythm

Inspired him to begin writing poetry

Was seen as a harmless, if somewhat unusual, idiosyncrasy
9 The tone of "The Windhover" is best characterized as:
Calm and hopeful

Exhuberant and philosophical

Nervous and energetic

Despairing and frantic
10 The "Heart in hiding" mentioned in the poem refers to:
A feeling of disconnection from life experienced by the speaker

The heart of his long lost love, for whom he still searches

The heart of Christ, from whom he feels disconnected

A reference to an old folktale about a man who loses his heart
11 What tone does the use of rhyme in the phrase "stirred for a bird" evoke?
Exasperation or pity

Fear or loathing

Humor or irony

Depression or regret
12 What is the difference between sprung rhythm and iambic pentameter?
Iambic pentameter requires a specific rhyme scheme, as seen in Shakespeare's sonnets

Iambic pentameter is much quicker-paced

Sprung rhythm counts only the stressed syllables in a line

Sprung rhythm is a form of free verse
13 The line "In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing" does NOT contain
Caesura

Alliteration

Assonance

Consonance
14 Which of the following explanations for why the speaker calls the kestrel "my chevalier!" is best?
Because it "rescued" him from the despondent mood he'd been stuck in

Because in medieval times knights used falcons to hunt game

Because chevalier is a colloquial way of referring to Christ

Because its wings flash silver light a knight's armor
15 Which of the following is an acceptable paraphrase of the line "No wonder of it: sheer plod makes plough down sillion"
It's obvious: beauty is all around us, even in boring menial tasks like plowing

As wonderful as it is, the kestrel is no miracle; even in the most menial tasks we can find accidental beauty if we look for it

Of course seeing this falcon lifted my spirits, after all the hard, boring manual labor I've been doing

Really this falcon is nothing special; even the trudge of plowing turns up beautiful rich soil