The Dictators (Neruda Poem) Quizzes

The Dictators (Neruda Poem) Quiz

1 What does the word "surfeit" mean?

Complaint

Charter or agreement

Large dinner party

Excess
2 Which best characterizes this poem?

It embraces moral ambiguity, leaving readers unsure who to root for

It focuses on the psyche of the speaker

It makes heavy use of figurative language

It follows an elaborate, complex formal structure
3 Which best describes the poem's speaker?

A journalist bearing witness to the dictator's cruelty

An unidentified, limited first-person speaker

A dictator

An unidentified, omniscient third-person speaker
4 Where are the poem's first several lines set?

A military hospital

A schoolbuilding

A sugarcane field

A coffee shop
5 What is the poem's rhyme scheme?

ABBACDDCABBACDDC

It has no rhyme scheme

ABCBAADCD

AABAABABA
6 What is the dictator's palace compared to?

A diamond ring

A teapot

A dog's mouth

A watch face
7 Who is the translator of the version discussed in this guide?

W.S. Merwin

Ben Belitt

Mark Eisner

Pablo Neruda
8 Neruda compares the palace-dwellers to "wineglasses, _____, and piping."

Chocolates

Drumbeats

Collars

Gemstones
9 What is the poem's meter?

Iambic pentameter

Anapestic hexameter

Trochaic trimeter

It is free verse
10 What does the word "finical" mean?

Erudite

Multifaceted

Picky

Shiny
11 Which of the following does the poem sharply critique?

Religious extremism

Adult cruelty to children

Fascism and authoritarianism

Industrialization
12 How many lines are in this poem?

14

17

10

15
13 Which of the following phrases does NOT contain alliteration?

"The snout filled with silence and slime"

"carrion, blood, and a nausea"

"the plant and its pollen"

"the blinded, big leaves"
14 Which of the following are juxtaposed?

The dictator and his allies

The plant and the pollen

The snout and the bones

Laughter and death
15 What does the word "satrap" mean?

A subordinate ruler or official

A grand palace

A type of trap used to catch mice and rats

An exclusive, government-sponsored club
16 Which type of sensory imagery is prominent in the poem's opening lines?

Sound imagery

Tactile imagery

Taste imagery

Smell imagery
17 What does the plant most likely symbolize?

God's abandonment

The refuge of nature

The power of the arts

Life under dictatorship
18 Which is NOT one of the poem's themes?

Evil and oppression

Inequality

Gender

Death
19 Which of the following is an instance of hyperbole?

"Lament was perpetual"

"Vendetta was born"

"their festering surfeit of bones"

"A finical satrap conversed"
20 Which of the following serve as a synecdochic representation in the poem?

A glove

A petal

A mouth

A plant
21 What does the word "carrion" mean?

A battle cry

Decaying dead bodies

A type of bird of prey

A brand of gun popular in fascist Spain
22 Neruda uses a simile to compare which of the following to a flower petal?

A military medal

A gunshot wound

The smell of corpses

A flag
23 In which era is this poem most likely set?

The mid-twentieth century

The 1970s

The early Medieval period

The late eighteenth century
24 How does Neruda depict authoritarians?

As sadistic and monstrous

As frivolous and willfully blind

As zealous and obsessive

As vulnerable and frightened
25 What does the word "bludgeon" mean?

Broken-down vehicle

Physical blow

Blunt person

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