1. Samuel Johnson (18 September 1709 – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer. He was a devout Anglican, and a committed ___?
a) Whigs
b) Tory
c) Protestent
d) Puritan
springline's Correct option: b) Tory
2. Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets (1779–81), alternatively known by the shorter title Lives of the Poets, is a work by Samuel Johnson comprising short biographies and critical appraisals of 52 poets, most of whom lived during the eighteenth century. These were arranged, approximately, by _______?
a) date by birth
b) date by death
c) date by first work
d) date by period
springline's Correct option: b) date by death
3. Johnson began writing individual biographical pieces in 1740, the first being devoted to Jean-Philippe Baratier, Robert Blake, and Francis Drake. In Which year he wrote his first extended literary biography, the Life of Mr. Richard Savage, in honour of a friend who had died the year before?
a) 1743
b) 1746
c) 1744
d) 1742
springline's Correct option: c) 1744
4. In 1777, Who proposed to bring out a 109-volume set of The Poets of Great Britain complete from Chaucer to Churchill, printed in Edinburgh at the rate of a volume a week?
a) John Bell
b) John Donne
c) John Aubrey
d) Andrew Marvell
springline's Correct option: a) John Bell
5. Various accounts are given of how Johnson came to write his Lives of the Poets during an episode of anti-Scottish sentiment in England. As related in the preface to the 1891 edition of the Lives, Scottish publishers had started to produce editions of the collected works of various English poets and sell them in ?
a) England
b) Britain
c) London
d) Italy
springline's Correct option: c) London
6. Johnson spent the rest of his time studying, even during the Christmas holiday. He used his time to learn French while working on his Greek. He drafted a ‘plan of study’ called _______?
a) Contra
b) Adversaria
c) prospectus
d) curriculum
springline's Correct option: b) Adversaria
7. Johnson He eventually did receive a degree. Just before the publication of his Dictionary in 1755, the University of Oxford awarded Johnson the degree of Master of Arts. He was awarded an honorary doctorate in _____?
a) 1766
b) 1761
c) 1765
d) 1779
springline's Correct option: c) 1765
8. Johnson remained with his close friend Harry Porter during a terminal illness, which ended in Porter's death on 3 September 1734. Porter's wife Elizabeth was now a widow at the age of 45, with three children. Some months later, Johnson began to court her. Who claims that ‘the first advances probably proceeded from her, as her attachment to Johnson was in opposition to the advice and desire of all her relations’?
a) Boswell
b) Johnson
c) Dylan Burns
d) William Shaw
springline's Correct option: d) William Shaw
9. Robert DeMaria believed that Tourette syndrome likely made public occupations like schoolmaster or tutor almost impossible for Johnson. This may have led Johnson to the invisible occupation of authorship’. Robert DeMaria Who was a_______?
a) Critic
b) Biographer
c) Historian
d) Philosopher
springline's Correct option: b) Biographer
10. The name Columbia, a poetic name for America coined by Johnson, first appears in a 1738 weekly publication of the debates of the British parliament in The Gentleman's Magazine. Who said that the author (Johnson) ‘will soon be déterré’ (unearthed, dug up), but this would not happen until 15 years later?
a) William Blake
b) James Thomson
c) Alexander Pope
d) Joshua Reynolds
springline's Correct option: c) Alexander Pope
11. Who asked a friend of Jonathan Swift to plead with Swift to use his influence at the University of Dublin to have a master's degree awarded to Johnson, in the hope that this could then be used to justify an MA from Oxford, but Swift refused to act on Johnson's behalf?
a) Robert Burns
b) Johnson
c) John Keats
d) Lord Gower
springline's Correct option: d) Lord Gower
12. Johnson was slow to put pen to paper, although on 3 May 1777 to Whom he wrote that he was busy preparing little Lives and little Prefaces, to a little edition of the English Poets ?
a) James Boswell
b) Scottish Lawyer
c) George Herbert
d) Robert Burns
springline's Correct option: a) James Boswell
13. Between 1821 and 1824 ,Who published several essays in The London Magazine, collected and posthumously published in 1846 under the title Lives of English poets, from Johnson to Kirke White, designed as a continuation of Johnson's Lives?
a) Thomas Gray
b) Boswell
c) Robert Burns
d) Henry Francis Cary
springline's Correct option: d) Henry Francis Cary
14. The essays follow Johnson's tripartite exposition of biographical detail, character study and descriptive survey of the poetry, and begin with Johnson himself, at ninety pages in length by far the longest essay in the book. There his prose works as well as his poetry are discussed; in fact more pages are devoted to the Lives of the Poets than to Johnson's own performance as a_________?
a) Biographer
b) Critic
c) Poet
d) Philosopher
springline's Correct option: c) Poet
15. Oliver Goldsmith appears midway through the book of The Lives Of Poet and is given only twenty-four pages, less than those awarded William Mason and Erasmus Darwin, who precede and follow him. Where it is pertinent, Whose critical opinions are quoted (although not always approved), and in Goldsmith's case Johnsonian anecdotes are introduced?
a) Thomas Gray
b) John Donne
c) Alexander Pope
d) Samuel Johnson
springline's Correct option: d) Samuel Johnson
16. Lives of the Poets ; The ‘Johnson edition’ had failed in extensiveness by starting the English canon only in the second half of the 17th century. When it was augmented with the work of fourteen more poets in ___?
a) 1784
b) 1788
c) 1790
d) 1791
springline's Correct option: c) 1790
17. Matthew Arnold, in his Six Chief Lives from Johnson's ‘Lives of the Poets’ (1878), considered the lives of Milton, Dryden, Pope, Addison, Swift, and Gray as ‘points which stand as so many natural centres, and by returning to which we can always find our way again. Who was the editor of Six Chief Lives from Johnson’s Lives of the Poet?
a) Henry Francis Cary
b) Matthew Arnold
c) Macaulay
d) William Collins
springline's Correct option: b) Matthew Arnold
18. Who was commenting on the Lives in The Oxford Handbook of British Poetry, 1660-1800, nuances this by pointing out that Johnson did not set out to produce a literary history. His main preoccupation is with how literary work is in a state of flux and advanced by individuals writing within a historical context?
a) George Crabbe
b) William Cowper
c) James Thomson
d) Philip Smallwood
springline's Correct option: d) Philip Smallwood
19. John Milton was by birth a gentleman, descended from the proprietors of Milton near Thame in Oxfordshire, one of whom forfeited his estate in the times of York and Lancaster. Which side he took know not; his descendant inherited no veneration for the _______?
a) White Rose
b) Red Rose
c) White Villa
d) Yellow Card
springline's Correct option: a) White Rose
20. Who praised Paradise Lost as ‘a poem which ... with respect to design may claim the first place, and with respect to performance, the second, among the productions of the human mind’, though he (a Tory and recipient of royal patronage) described Milton's politics as those of an acrimonious and surly republican’?
a) Thomas Gray
b) Robert Burns
c) William Blake
d) Abraham Cowley
springline's Correct option: d) Abraham Cowley
21. Of John Milton, Johnson devotes adoration to the scholar's language proficiency from such a young age. Education appears to be the first piece of the puzzle that is this infamous poet's success. Johnson writes about other poets to whom Milton owes homage like Spenser, Shakespeare, and ________?
a) Alexander Pope
b) John Donne
c) Cowley
d) John Dryden
springline's Correct option: c) Abraham Cowley
22. In 1625, Milton began attending Christ's College, Cambridge. He graduated with a B.A. in 1629, ranking fourth of 24 honours graduates that year in the University of Cambridge. Preparing to become an Anglican _____?
a) Poet
b) Priest
c) Courtier
d) Poet Laureate
springline's Correct option: b) Priest
23. In May 1638, Milton embarked upon a tour of France and Italy that lasted until July or August 1639. His travels supplemented his study with new and direct experience of artistic and religious traditions, especially Roman Catholicism.For specific details of what happened within Milton's ‘grand tour’, there appears to be just one primary source: Milton's own _________.
a) Pere Goriot
b) Le Grand Meaulnes
c) Comte de Gabalis
d) Defensio Secunda
springline's Correct option: d) Defensio Secunda
24. Milton followed up the publication Paradise Lost with its sequel Paradise Regained, which was published alongside the tragedy Samson Agonistes in ____?
a) 1670
b) 1669
c) 1671
d) 1674
springline's Correct option: c) 1671
25. In Milton’s early poems, the poet narrator expresses a tension between vice and virtue, the latter invariably related to Protestantism. In Comus, Milton may make ironic use of the Caroline court masque by elevating notions of purity and virtue over the conventions of court revelry and _____?
a) Political
b) Religious
c) Spiritual
d) Supersition
springline's Correct option: d) Supersition
26. Milton embraced many heterodox Christian theological views. He has been accused of rejecting the Trinity, believing instead that the Son was subordinate to the Father, a position known as_____?
a) Regional
b) Arianism
c) National Rally
d) Priest
springline's Correct option: b) Arianism
27. The Garden of Eden may allegorically reflect Milton's view of England's recent Fall from Grace, while Samson's blindness and captivity—mirroring Milton's own lost sight—may be a metaphor for England's blind acceptance of ______?
a) James I
b) Charles II
c) Charles I
d) James V
springline's Correct option: b) Charles II
28. Who was called in the Areopagitica for 'the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties' to the conflicting Protestant denominations?
a) John Milton
b) Johnson
c) John Dryden
d) Alexander Pope
springline's Correct option: a) John Milton
29. Who considered Milton the major English poet, also Who placed Edmund Spenser as Milton's precursor, and saw himself as Milton's poetical son ?
a) Abraham Cowley
b) Robert Burn
c) William Blake
d) John Donne
springline's Correct option: c) William Blake
30. The ‘Heroick measure’, according to Whom, ‘is pure ... when the accent rests upon every second syllable through the whole line ... The repetition of this sound or percussion at equal times, is the most complete harmony of which a single verse is capable’?
a) Samuel Johnson
b) Edmund Spenser
c) John Dryden
d) John Milton
springline's Correct option: a) Samuel Johnson