The Buck in the Snow Quizzes

The Buck in the Snow Quiz

1 Which best describes the speaker?

The speaker is unidentified

The speaker is a lightly veiled version of the poet

The speaker is a baby deer

The speaker is an aging hunter
2 How does the buck die?

The cause of the death is never stated

From the cold

From disease

From hunters
3 Which sound creates alliteration in the phrase "Under the heavy hemlocks"?

M

N

V

H
4 Which best describes the speaker's relationship to the buck?

Curious observation

Tentative interaction

Violent pursuit

Intimate friendship
5 Millay uses a simile to compare falling snow to which of the following?

Blood

A feather

Tears

A bomb
6 Who does the speaker address in the poem's opening lines?

The snow

The doe

Herself

The sky
7 When was this poem published?

1945

1933

1918

1928
8 What is a buck?

A baby deer

A male deer

A female deer

A deer without antlers
9 Which of the following lines includes personification?

I saw them suddenly go

letting fall a feather of snow

How strange a thing is death

into the wood of hemlocks bowed with snow.
10 Which collection was this poem originally a part of?

Second April

Renascance

The Buck in the Snow

The Ballad of the Harp Weaver
11 Which detail may allude to the story of the garden of Eden?

The wall

The hemlocks

The apple trees

The snow
12 What is the poem's form?

Sonnet

It does not follow a traditional poetic form

Ode

Haiku
13 What is the poem's rhyme scheme?

AAAAA A BACDAA

ABABAB CDCDCD

ABBA BBCC ABCBA

AAAAA B CCCCC
14 What is the most prominent effect of the poem's repeated long O end rhymes?

A quizzical tone

Emphasis on the similar-sounding word "doe"

A ghostly, mournful mood

A firm, opinionated tone
15 Which best defines the word "hemlock" as used in this poem?

A heavy lock used in barns

A conifer tree

A type of deer

A poisonous plant
16 How does Millay emphasize the contrast between the buck's blood and the snow?

By placing the words "blood" and "snow" in two different lines

By using assonance

By using the word "scalding"

By juxtaposing their red and white colors
17 Which is NOT a major theme of this poem?

Nature

Human/Animal interactions

Death

Racism
18 Which of the following does the "white sky" NOT suggest?

Nature's indifference

The coming of death

The winter cold

The effects of climate change
19 What can the blood be said to symbolize?

Ancestry

War

Life

Guilt
20 What types of stanza appear in this work?

An octave and a sestet

Two quintains and two couplets

Two quintets and a couplet

A quintet, a monostich, and a sestet
21 What does the orchard symbolize?

The abundance of summer

The world of human society

Nature's power over humanity

The speaker's creativity
22 How does Millay dramatize the revelation of the buck's death?

By placing it in a separate line

By altering the rhyme scheme

By making it unclear whether he is alive

By using an exclamation point
23 Alliterative S sounds in the phrase "I saw them. I saw them suddenly go" communicate which of the following?

A sense of speed and movement

The speaker's secrecy

The deers' inability to speak clearly

The rushing of water outside
24 Who is the poem's antagonist?

The buck

The doe

Death

The speaker
25 Which of the following does NOT describe the poem's tone?

Contemplative

Furious

Philosophical

Reflective

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The Buck in the Snow study guide contains a biography of Edna St. Vincent Millay, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

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