Attack (Sassoon poem) Quizzes

1 Which point(s) of view is/are used in the poem?

Third-person

Second and third-person

First-person

Second-person
2 Describe the speaker.

The speaker is a soldier who experiences shell shock as a result of the bristling fire.

The speaker is Sassoon himself.

The speaker is a commanding officer.

An unidentified speaker witnesses a battle taking place. The final plea to Jesus to stop the violence indicates that the speaker is either participating in the battle, or is speaking on behalf of the soldiers.
3 How many lines does the poem have?

12

13

11

14
4 What poetic form does "Attack" most closely resemble?

Epic

Sonnet

Villanelle

Sestina
5 What kinds of poems deal with morning and the departure of lovers?

Sonnet

Love poem

Aubade

Shakespeare
6 Describe the sunlight in the poem.

Pale yellow, filtering

Wild purple, glowering

Strong and blinding

Bright purple, glowing
7 Define "dun"

Of a dull grayish-brown color.

A horse

The state of being finished

A bright green color
8 What first emerges in the morning light?

The trench

The ridge

The tanks

The soldiers
9 Which is not an example of alliteration?

The menacing scarred slope

The barrage roars and lifts

Smouldering through spouts of drifting smoke that shroud

time ticks blank and busy
10 What is alliteration?

The use of "like" or "as" to make a comparison.

A figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable.

The repetition of the sound of a vowel or diphthong in nonrhyming stressed syllables near enough to each other for the echo to be discernible

The occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words
11 Why are the soldiers "clumsily bowed"?

They are deathly afraid.

They bow to their superiors

They are weighed down by gear.

They have been crippled.
12 What is a barrage?

Soldiers' accommodations

A concentrated artillery bombardment over a wide area

A place where military gear is stored

A battlefield
13 What does not get personified in the poem?

The slope

Hope

The mud

The sunlight
14 Which is example of personification?

Lines of grey, muttering faces, masked with fear,

At dawn the ridge emerges massed and dun

They leave their trenches, going over the top,

And hope, with furtive eyes and grappling fists, / Flounders in mud
15 What is personification?

The attribution of a personal nature or human characteristics to something nonhuman, or the representation of an abstract quality in human form

The occurrence of a poet humanizing someone.

The occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words

A figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable.
16 What is the form?

Free verse

Blank verse

Iambic pentameter, with some exceptions in syllabic stress

Strict iambic pentameter
17 Finish this quote: "While time ticks__"

blank and brutal on their wrists

blank and busy on their wrists

meaninglessly

in their chests
18 Who does the speaker plead to in the final line?

His commanders

His mother

Jesus

God
19 What is the tone?

Bitter, Tragic, Reflective

Pointed, Angry, Violent

Eerie, Desperate, Violent

Acerbic, Violent, Uncanny
20 Which detail best foreshadows the violence to come?

The dawn light makes the ridge visible

The smoke smolders

Men jostle and climb to

The scarred slope is menacing
21 Which of the following is used in the poem?

Onomatopoeia

Hyperbole

Understatement

Personification
22 Which collection was this poem published in?

The War Poems

Collected Poems

The Old Huntsman

Counter-Attack and Other Poems
23 How was the collection received?

Poorly, as the details were too grotesque

Poorly, Sassoon was then hospitalized for shell shock

Well, though Sassoon was then hospitalized for shell shock

Well, due to its truthful and harrowing accounts of World War I.
24 Which of the following is not a theme?

The Horrors of Warfare

Nature

Explicitly Criticizing the British Public

Anonymity
25 Which line best demonstrates the theme of Anonymity?

And hope, with furtive eyes and grappling fists

Lines of grey, muttering faces, masked with fear,

Smouldering through spouts of drifting smoke that shroud

The menacing scarred slope; and, one by one,

Attack (Sassoon poem)

by Siegfried Sassoon

Attack (Sassoon poem) Quiz

Attack (Sassoon poem) Questions and Answers

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