Test Papers / Previous Question Papers of IGNOU MEG1 British Poetry June 2005

MASTER'S DEGREE PROGRAMME IN ENGLISH
Term-End Examination

MEG-1 : BRITISH POETRY

Time: 3 hours
Maximum Marks: 100

1. Critically comment on the following passage with reference to the context :

(a)                   What ? that thing of silk,
Sporus, that mere white curd of ass's milk ?
Satire or sense, alas ! can Sporus feel ?
Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel ?

OR

(b) Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean :
And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war !

2. What is the idea Chaucer wishes to convey in 'The Nonnes Preestes Tale' ? How does it relate to 'The Prologue' ? Discuss.

3. Consider Andrew Marvell as a metaphysical poet basing your answer on the poems included in your course.

4. Comment on Pope's An Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot as a typical example of Augustan satire.

5. Bring out the points of similarity and difference between Wordsworth and Coleridge as Romantic poets by taking examples from their poems in your course.

6. Is Keats's Hyperion a political allegory or a poem about the nature and function of the poet ? Discuss.

7. Discuss Robert Browning as a poet of optimism giving examples from his poems in your course.

8. Different voices and shifting points merge together to give a kind of unity to Eliot's 'The Waste Land'. Do you agree ? Give a reasoned answer.

9. To what extent can we call Sylvia Plath a poet of 'failed relationships' ? Base your answer on the poems in your course.