English 12

  •  This line from Beowulf makes a good use of alliteration, the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words:

blundering back with the butchered corpses (line 40)

  • In lines 35–38 the author substitutes the name Grendel with the kenning God-cursed brute in order to emphasize the depth of Grendel’s evil. 

  • In his speech (lines 211−215) before he battles the dragon, Beowulf says:

 I’ve never known fear, as a youth I fought / In endless battles. I am old, now, But I will fight again, seek fame still, / If the dragon hiding in his tower dares / To face me 

     These lines convey Beowulf's state of mind that he’s feeling brave and utterly without fear as he goes into battle.

  • In lines 288−290, the poet describes death as —

a journey

Into darkness that all men must make, as death

Ends their few brief hours on earth.

People 1,200 years ago, when Beowulf
was written, viewed life as fragile and were more fatalistic.

  • The motivation of Grendel's mother was that she wants revenge against the Danes for the death of her son.

  • The epic poem Beowulf gives the reader a strong sense of what Anglo-Saxon culture must have valued:  loyalty and bravery.

  • In line 396, a kenning is used to describe Beowulf as the “gray-bearded lord of the Geats.” The meaning of the kenning is to show Beowulf as an aging former hero.

  • This passage gives insights into the nature of the culture that produced the epic poem Beowulf.


             One can conclude the people who lived in that culture had been Christianized.


  • The author’s purpose in including “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue” with
    “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” was to maintain the frame story by showing interactions between characters.

  • The phrase playfully irreverent best describes the Wife of Bath’s perspective in her discussion of fairies and friars in lines 29–54

  • This phrase  uses correct subject-verb agreement in the underlined section in the
    sentence below: Cold were the days in the depths of winter.                  It is correct as is.

  •  The theme  the narrator develops in lines 320–338 is true gentility cannot be inherited but comes from living virtuously.

  •  This quotation from the selection best supports the theme above:  That we are gentle comes to us by grace / And by no means is it bequeathed with place (lines 337–338).

  • This quote from the selection expresses a stereotype about how to gain a woman’s favor:

. . .  A man can win us best with flattery. / To dance attendance on us, make a fuss, / Ensnares us all, the best and worst of us (lines 106–108).

  • The  “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” fits into the structure of The Canterbury Tales because it is one of many tales connected by the frame story.

  •  This sentence shows the strongest connections between “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” and “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue”:

      The Friar laughs at the Wife of Bath, and at the beginning of her tale she hints at the immorality of friars. 

  • The Chaucer excerpt includes two sections, a prologue and a tale. 

In “The Wife of Bath’s Prologue” a character is interrupted by arguing characters.

In “The Wife of Bath’s Tale” characters live during the time of the legendary King Arthur.

Also in “The Wife of Bath’s Tale”a character goes on a physical and moral journey.

  • The knight has an internal conflict when his wife asks him to decide whether she will be beautiful or faithful.

  • The imagery most clearly appeals in “Sonnet 30” to the sense of touch.

  • In “Sonnet 30,”  when the speaker compares his own love to fire, he most likely means it is passionate. 

  • In “Sonnet 30,” the turn, or shift in thought, that resolves the speaker’s questions is in lines 13–14. 

  • The details in “Sonnet 75” suggest  the speaker’s beloved is intelligent.

  • This statement best paraphrases the resolution of “Sonnet 75”: The speaker will immortalize his beloved by writing poetry about his love for her.

  • Based on both sonnets, the reader can infer one of the themes of Amoretti, the sonnet cycle in which they are found, is that love has remarkable power.

  •  This quotation from “Sonnet 30 best supports the theme above:

Such is the pow’r of love in gentle mind,
That it can alter all the course of kind. (“Sonnet 30,” lines 13–14)

  •  This quotation from “Sonnet 75” best supports the theme above:

Where whenas death shall all the world subdue,
Our love shall live, and later life renew. (“Sonnet 75,” lines 13–14)

  • A paradox is a statement or situation that seems impossible but nevertheless is true in some way.

Example: In “Sonnet 30,” the coldness of his beloved makes the speaker hotter. 

  •  “Sonnet 30” and “Sonnet 75” differ from a typical Shakespearean sonnet because the quatrains use a rhyme scheme of ABAB BCBC CDCD.

  • Using personification in lines 1–2, the speaker tells Death not to be proud because death is not really all that powerful.

  • A Disdainful tone is conveyed in lines 1–8 of “Death, Be Not Proud”?

  •  This line best supports the tone: Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so; (line 2).

  • “Death, Be Not Proud” is a Petrarchan sonnet with 14 lines. The “turn” that starts in line 9 is when the speaker intensifies his attack on Death.

  • The final line (line 14) of “Death, Be Not Proud” is a paradox because it portrays Death as a living being that can itself die.

  • The function of the dramatic irony present in Duncan’s arrival at Macbeth’s castle in Act I, Scene 6 is  Lady Macbeth’s warm welcoming of Duncan provides him with a false sense of security and comfort. 

  • The theme of the play that is most clearly illustrated in Macbeth’s quote “False face must hide with the false heart doth know” is the association of cruelty with ambition. 

  • In Acts II-IV, the character of Macbeth changes after he murders Duncan when  he becomes quick to kill anyone he sees as a threat. 

  • This quotation  best supports Macbeth’s changes: “From this moment / The very firstlings of my heart shall be / The firstlings of my hand.” 

  • Read the quotation from Act V, Scene 5, lines 38-41 

Macbeth: “If thou speak’st false, / Upon the next tree shall thou hang alive / Till famine cling thee. If thy speech 

be sooth / I care not if thou dost for me as much – “  

The word true best expresses the meaning of the archaic word sooth as it is used in line 40. 

  •  Banquo serves as a foil for Macbeth because Banquo suspects the witches of deceit. 

  • Lady Macbeth’s dialogue in Act V, Scene 1 reveals her guilt. 



















  • This quote from the selection best supports the main idea of the article:

The Internet has become so weird, so saturated with cats and lists and Buzzfeed quizzes that it’s difficult to know what’s serious and what’s a spoof any more. (paragraph 4)

  • This phrase most accurately describes the first three paragraphs of the editorial:

An indirect opener that strikes an irreverent tone, in keeping with the subject of
satire blindness

  • The author cites financial pressure for internet sites to offer eye candy as a cause of satire-blindness.

  • This sentence from the selection uses the imperative mood:

Forget self-driving cars or virtual reality nano-technology algorithms, the newest innovation to emerge from Silicon Valley is square brackets. (paragraph 1)

  • The author would most likely agree that diminishing attention spans in the twenty-first century can in part be explained by widespread availability of easily digestible amusement.

  • The author’s word choice and syntax contribute to the tone of the selection by her use of irony and overstatement to make fun of internet users who are inattentive and desensitized to nuance.

  • Mocking best describes the author’s tone in the selection.

  • This quote from the selection best supports the tone:

It should perhaps be noted that Facebook isn’t introducing the satire tag because it thinks we’re all morons, but rather because it knows we’re all morons.