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Sat Paul Mittal School, Ludhiana

XII/ Eng. Literature/ The Darkling Thrush

1. The poem The Darkling Thrush is a meditative poem written by ________

a) Matthew Arnold
b) Thomas Hardy
c) Lord Alfred Tennyson

2. The use of the word ‘darkling’ recalls the same word in Matthew Arnold’s Dover
Beach, a poem about loss of faith. However, the poem The Darkling Thrush
describes......
a) The dying of the old world at the turn of the century
b) The death of an era after Industrial Revolution
c) The death of religious beliefs after scientific inventions

3. In the poem The Darkling Thrush, the poet expresses his despair regarding the decay
of a traditional and natural world. Written at the turn of ………, the poet mourns at the
end of the century which was more natural and more human to him.
a) 20th century
b) 19th century
c) 18th century

4. ‘And every Spirit upon earth/ Seemed fervourless as I”. Hopelessness on the speaker’s
part is reflected throughout the poem. This underlines the absence of harmony and
therefore, of ……… in the speaker’s vision of life.
a) Joy
b) Hope
c) Despair
d) Anguish

5. The word ‘darkling’ means in darkness, or becoming dark. But thrush bird is a symbol
of.....
a) Despair
b) Hope
c) Loneliness

6. Hardy creates a bleak picture of the world around him – ‘And winter’s dregs made
desolate/ The weakening eye of the day’. 'Winter' in the poem The Darkling Thrush
symbolises....
a) Peace and serenity
b) Death and despair
c) Hope and despair

7. In the poem, the speaker is "unaware" of the "blessed Hope”. Perhaps this means that
the bird is singing in vain, and the Christian tradition it evokes is as doomed as the rest
of civilization. Nevertheless, the poem ends on a ....... note.
a) Pessimistic
b) Positive
c) Ambiguous
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8. Originally titled ……….., the poem The Darkling Thrush is an ironic comment on
humanity’s joyless state.
a) By the Century’s Deathbed
b) By the Era’s Deathbed
c) The Darkling Plain

9. The area all-around was as pale as a ghost and the pale sun looked desolate and grey in
the dregs of winter. Rhetorical device …… is used in the phrase 'the weakening eye of
day' to create effects that are creative, imaginative and add literary quality to the poem.
a) Irony
b) Personification
c) Simile

10. The line 'the ancient pulse of germ and birth' in the poem The Darkling Thrush signifies
…….. For the very ‘pulse’ of creation is dead and nature is at a standstill. There is no
hope for the next spring to come.
a) Farming
b) Life’s vibrancy
c) Germination of seeds

11. The poem The Darkling Thrush conduits the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries.
Therefore it can rightly be called a ………..
a) Transitional poem
b) Meditative poem
c) Didactive poem

12. By giving ‘F’ a capital letter in Frost, Hardy has used ……. in the line ‘Frost was
spectre-grey’…
a) Metaphor
b) Personification
c) Alliteration

13. ………. is an unexpected word used for the singing of the bird. It conveys the sense
and sound of joy in the bird’s song
a) illimited
b) unlimited
c) infinite

14. In this poem, the poet describes his feelings and also the feelings of an entire nation at
the transition between the Victorian era and the Modern era. Thus, the gateway in the
poem is suggestive of………
a) A new hope
b) A new century
c) A new era

15. At the beginning of the poem, the poet describes himself as standing at the entrance of
a gate leading to a coppice. This act of leaning over the gate symbolises…..
a) His dejection and tiredness
b) His taste for nature
c) His loss of hope
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16. Technological progress and scientific knowledge in 19th century had not only brought
enlightenment to masses but also brought more misery and pain. Hardy’s hopelessness
in the poem The Darkling Thrush is mainly due to the abandoned …… of the
countryside and the loss of ………..
a) Farms, rural customs and traditions
b) Barns, social customs and rituals.
c) Houses, social customs and rituals

17. In the first half of the poem, the speaker treats the bleak landscape as an extended
metaphor for the cultural decline of Western civilization—a decline so severe that the
speaker sees no possibility that it might be renewed or reborn. But the hope the thrush
embodies does offer the possibility of renewal and resurrection, specifically through
…….. faith.
a) Religious
b) Spiritual
c) both

18. Thomas Hardy is seen as a modern poet who criticized much of the Victorian society.
The declining status of the rural agricultural society and old values caused by the
industrial revolution saddened him. Written at the turn of the 20th century, the
…….laments the end of the century and actually an attempt to search for the meaning
in the world.
a) elegy
b) sonnet
c) ballad

19. The clouds in the poem would serve as……. to The Century’s corpse
a) A canopy
b) A tomb
c) A monument

20. Arrival of thrush and poet’s earlier lines of the poem are ……..
a) Contrasting
b) Similar
c) Disconnected

21. The Darkling Thrush is a lyrical poem with ……., eight-line stanzas, with an ………
rhyme scheme. It is written in iambic tetrameter.
a) Four, ab ab cd cd
b) Three, ab cd ab cd
c) Four, ab cd ef gh

22. coppice, spectre, dregs, desolate create a whispery atmosphere in the first three lines
the poem. They are an example of ……. used in the stanza.
a) Sibilance
b) Onomatopoeia
c) Rhyme
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Vocabulary Quiz/ Fill ups

23. 1st stanza -- another word for ghost

a) Spectre
b) Haunted
c) Spirit

24. 1st stanza -- This hyphenated term refers to long thin tree branches with no leaves that
shoot straight up.
a) Bine-stems
b) Broken-lyres
c) Bleak-twigs

25. 1st stanza -- another word for the stuff left at the bottom of a cup after you've drunk
your coffee or tea
a) Left over
b) Dregs
c) Remains

26. 2nd Stanza – it is a ‘nonce word’. Hardy made up this word. It is supposed to mean
"laid out flat"
a) Outleant
b) Stretched out
c) Spread out

27. 2nd Stanza -- The word 'fervourless' means…….

a) Lacking in passion
b) Lacking in money
c) Lacking warmth

28. 3rd Stanza -- This word means "thin from lack of food"
a) Gaunt
b) Frail
c) weak

29. 3rd Stanza -- This word means "evening song"

a) Evensong
b) Prayer song
c) A service of evening prayers

30. 3rd Stanza -- This word means feather

a) Wing
b) Plume
c) Quill

31. 3rd Stanza -- This compound word refers to the wind-beaten feathers of the bird
a) Blast-beruffled
b) Blast-ruffled
c) Blast-baffled
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32. 3rd Stanza -- This is a more descriptive word for "throw"

a) Fling
b) Heave
c) Toss

33. 4th Stanza -- This word refers to feeling or expressing overwhelming happiness or
joyful excitement.
a) Ecstatic
b) Happy
c) Glad

34. 4th Stanza -- The word the speaker uses for "earthly"
a) Terrestrial
b) Worldly
c) Materialistic

35. 4th Stanza -- This archaic word means "near or nearby"

a) Nigh
b) Close by
c) Close

36. So little cause for ……/ Of such ecstatic sound.

a) Carolings
b) Caroling
c) Evensong

37. His happy good-night ……../ Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew/ and I was unaware.
a) Ditty
b) Air
c) Song