Dr. Norman Prinsky

Humanities 2001: Ancient through Seventeenth-Century Culture - Augusta State University

Test on Dante's Inferno, Introductory Material & Cantos 1-11 (Mark Musa Translation)

1. Dante's Inferno is an example of the literature of: (a) Greece (b) Rome (c) Italy (d) France (e) England

2. Dante's Inferno was written in which language: (a) Greek (b) Latin (c) Italian (d) French (e) English

3. Dante's Comedy (including Inferno) is mainly an example of the two genres of: (a) drama and novel (b) epic and allegory (c) short story and essay (d) prose and satire

4. Dante lived and wrote in the period of which century C.E.: (a) tenth (b) twelfth (c) fourteenth (d) sixteenth

5. As pointed out in class lecture, various components of Dante's Comedy and Inferno suggest Dante's position as: (a) transitional (b) second rate (c) Bergsonian (d) apolitical

6. As pointed out in class lecture, Dante's Comedy and Inferno display all the following except which one: (a) otherworldliness (b) encyclopedism (c) hierarchicalism (d) nationalism (e) democracy

7. As pointed out in class lecture, the treatment of the Classical tradition and material from the Classical tradition in Dante's Inferno (and in the literature of this period) is: (a) apathetic (b) invariable (c) ignorant (d) inconsistent

8. According to NAWLS2, Dante's Comedy exemplifies the: (a) Dark Ages (b) early Middle Ages (c) high Middle Ages (d) Renaissance

9. According to the NAWLS2 editor's introduction to the work, an important feature of Dante's style in this canticle is its: (a) Latinism (b) diversity (c) uniformity (d) elevation

10. According to the commentaries on Dante's Comedy as well as any reader's experience of it, Dante makes innumerable (ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho) symbolic uses of the number: (a) 3 (b) 5 (c) 11 (d) 14

11. The setting in which the pilgrim awakes (canto 1, lines 1-7) in having symbolic connections with the Bible represents the first of many more symbols of what kind in the Inferno: (a) contextual (b) esoteric (c) private (d) typological

12. The setting in which the pilgrim awakes (canto 1, lines 1-7) connects most closely with which of the Psalms: (a) 23 (b) 57 (c) 79 (d) 96

13. The metaphor used for how one’s life is lived canto 1, (line 3) relates to the identical emphatically-repeated metaphor used in all the following except which one: (a) Bhagavad Gita (b) Tanakh (c) New Testament (d) Qur’an

14.. The order in which Dante the pilgrim encounters the three animals in Canto 1: (a) with foreshadowing, corresponds exactly to the descending order of sins as they are arranged in the Inferno (b) reveals Dante's own particular or individual failings (c) is random, suggesting the chance nature of sin (d) shows the basic disorder of the universe or creation

15. An analog from popular music, as played in class or mentioned in Prinsky’s Notes and Questions on Dante, for one of the categories, and symbols, of sin that Dante-pilgrim encounters in Canto 1, is from the Rock group: (a) Duran Duran (b) Stone Temple Pilots (c) Spice Girls (d) REM (e) Hootie and the Blowfish (f) Fat Daddy and the Bulletz

16. The allegorical symbolism in the concluding line of canto 1 is all of the following except which one: (a) Dante lives later in history than Vergil (b) Dante’s epic is written later in history than Vergil’s (c) Dante finds Vergil’s epic a model to follow in several ways (d) Dante finds modern culture and religion inferior to Vergil’s

17. Dante must include in Canto 2, lines 7-9, because of the genre of the Inferno (or Divine Comedy), a/an: (a) in medias res (b) epic simile (c) invocation to the Muses (d) anagnorisis

18. In Canto 2, lines 13-36, Dante’s interpretation of and reference to Vergil’s work represents the fate of the Classical tradition in the Middle Ages of: (a) rejection (b) allegorizing (c) disregard (d) existentialism

19. In Canto 2, Vergil's explanation of the process of how help and a message from above have been sent to Dante most strongly suggests: (a) God's closeness to humanity (b) scholasticism (c) encyclopedism (d) hierarchy

20. In Canto 3, the lighting conditions referred to of the environment (“echoed throughout . . . air of Hell” [line 23]) suggests all of the following except which one: (a) negative definition, appropriate to indecision of the sinners (b) lack of positive direction (the imagery referring to nautical and other guidance) (c) what the Church considered the heresy of Copernicus and Galileo (d) lack of rationality (the imagery containing symbols of reason or order)

21. In Canto 3, the "confusion of tongues" Dante hears in the circle of the opportunists, reminiscent of the Tower of Babel, primarily suggests: (a) over-intellectualism (b) violence (c) self-interest (d) nationalism

22. In Canto 3, the "confusion of tongues" Dante hears in the circle of the opportunists, reminiscent of the Tower of Babel, represents which kind of symbolism: (a) contextual (b) esoteric (c) private (d) typological

23. In Canto 3, the image of the whirlwind as well as what happens to Dante's conscious state in the canto links this canto most closely to: (a) Canto 4 (b) Canto 5 (c) Canto 6 (d) Canto 7

24. In Canto 4 (especially lines 31-63), Vergil’s explanation of why Vergil and other Classical writers are damned, and why or how many of the great figures of Tanakh or the Hebrew scriptures were similarly damned, alludes to how the Middle Ages solved this problem of salvation or damnation of persons prior to Jesus of Nazareth, which is the concept of the: (a) Harrowing of Hell (b) Narrowness of Heaven’s Gate (c) Whore of Babylon (d) Satanic Rebellion in Heaven

25. In Canto 4, how later commentators derive the symbolism of what a character or thing represents in the Inferno or Comedy, for example, in this instance, about what Vergil represents, can be found stated in a particular line or passage such as line(s): (a) 25-27 (b) 43-45 (c) 73-75 (d) 109-111

26. In Canto 4 (The Virtuous Pagans), Dante's attitude toward the five classical writers he meets and walks with in Limbo (Homer, Horace, Ovid, Lucan, Vergil) is: (a) humble but later on in the work condescending (b) arrogant but later on in the work humble (c) consistently neutral (d) scientific

27. In Canto 4, the description of the building, including the kind of building, where the various residents live (lines 106-147) suggests all of the following except which one: (a) Dante’s medieval thought patterns (b) early Christian communalism foreshadowing modern communism (c) the medieval concept of hierarchy (d) some but limited enlightenment from the arts and sciences

28. In the opening of Canto 5 (lines 1-3), the emphasis on the cone shape of hell suggests that the sins of this first of the three main categories of hell are: (a) least widespread (b) sweet as ice cream (c) most widespread (d) cooler than the sins below

29. In the opening of Canto 5 (lines 4-15), Minos represents a parody of and parallel to the Biblical: (a) David (b) Isaiah (c) Jesus (d) Paul

30. In Canto 5, the force of nature repeatedly referred to symbolically suggests: (a) tears thick as rain (b) winds of passion (c) lightning strikes of emotion (d) cloudiness of gloomy emotion

31. In Canto 5, the path of the sinners symbolically suggests all of the following except which one: (a) straight-line ruthless pursuit of a goal (b) ironic contrast to a geometrical symbolism of order or unity (c) never-ending emotionally irrational path (d) self-absorption (e) connection to how Minos sentences the damned

32. In Canto 5, the most frequent animal imagery is that of: (a) birds (b) canines (c) felines (d) horses

33. The symbolism of the animal imagery referred to in the immediately preceding question connects with the symbolism of: (a) flightiness (b) doggedness (c) predatoriness (d) swiftness

34. In Canto 5, Paolo and Francesca's words or action immediately following their words to Dante "whatever pleases you to hear or speak" (lines 94-96 vs. lines 97 and following) mainly shows their: (a) loving nature extended to concern for others (b) self-centeredness (c) physical inconvenience suffered resulting from God's punishments (d) optimism

35. In Canto 5, Paolo and Francesca, as all the sinners, rationalize rather than repent, blaming their sin on: (a) an abstract personification (b) a book they were reading (c) a and b (d) Dante himself

36. In Canto 5, the simile describing how Dante faints at the end of the canto (lines 141-142) has the allegorical symbolism that if Dante sympathizes with or succumbs to the sin of Paolo and Francesca, he will: (a) very probably contract a sexually-transmitted disease (b) become deadened to the plight of the poor (c) not reach his lifetime according to the reckoning of Psalms as 70 years (d) suffer spiritual death

37. In the opening of Canto 6, the method by which Dante-pilgrim and Vergil get by Cerberus has the appropriate symbolism (relating to the sinners in the canto) of: (a) sex (b) indecisiveness (c) eating (d) fraud

38. In Canto 6, when Ciacco identifies himself -- "your own city . . . so filled with envy / its cup already overflows the brim,/ once held me in the brighter life above” (lines 49-51) -- he uses a metaphor that is all of the following except which one: (a) an ironic echo of Psalm 23 (b) appropriate to the general subject of the canto (c) an unwitting reflection of his values and mental processes (d) a demonstration of Florentine cordiality

39. The words of Plutus' babbling that open Canto 7 relate to the motif, relevant to Vergil in his relationship to Dante-pilgrim (repeatedly emphasized in Inferno), as well as the Popes, of their role as: (a) scholar (b) father (c) administrator (d) poet

40. In Canto 7 (Hoarders-Wasters; Wrathful-Sullen), when Dante the pilgrim asks Vergil "Were they all priests, / these tonsured souls I see there to our left?” (lines 37-39), there is an indication of Dante's literary work belonging to: (a) the Dark Ages (b) the early Middle Ages (c) transition to the Renaissance (d) the Hellenic period

41. In Canto 8, the simile describing how the second boatman arrives to pick up Dante and Vergil (lines 13-18) suggests all the following except which one: (a) contrast with the reluctance of the first boatman to pick up Dante (Canto 3) (b) the special weapon of the epic hero (c) the emotion appropriate to a main group of sinners in the canto (d) angry militancy of war or warfare

42. In Canto 8 (Wrathful, Phlegyas, Fallen Angels), Dante the pilgrim says to Filippo Argenti "May you weep and wail / stuck here in this place forever, you damned soul” (lines 37-38) and also says, "Soon afterward, I saw the wretch so mangled / . . . that, to this day, / I thank my Lord and praise Him for that sight” (lines 58-60). When he also says about this event "A wailing noise began to pound my ears / and made me strain my eyes to see ahead” (lines 65-66), what is revealed is his: (a) humanism (b) sadism (c) stoicism (d) continued indignation

43. In Canto 8, as soon as the two poets arrive at the gate of the wall and tower of Dis, Dante's more-than-usually-numerous epithets for Vergil’s authority or power, piled on in this canto ("Master"[3X], “gentle teacher,” “wise teacher,” “dear guide,” “lord,” “gentle father”) are: (a) substantiated (b) harmonious with the angelic nature of the wall's supernatural guardians (c) ironically undercut (d) examples of Dante's low style in Inferno

44. The reference to Vergil by Dante in Canto 8 in “walked back very slowly / with eyes downcast” (lines 117-118) is a good example of a literary author's insight into: (a) podiatrics (b) geriatrics (c) alembics (d) kinesics

45. The manner of the Angelic Messenger's arrival at the gate of Dis in Canto 9 ("dry shod") exemplifies: (a) metaphor (b) Old Testament symbolism (c) typological symbolism (d) anacoluthon

46. In speaking to the fallen angels (Canto 9), the Angelic Messenger's reference to Hercules' visit to the underworld and manhandling of Cerberus exemplifies: (a) rejection of the classical tradition (b) allegorizing of the classical tradition (c) ignorance of the classical tradition (d) rediscovery of the classical tradition

47. In Canto 9, Dante's description of the firing or heating of the tombs shows: (a) realism (b) nationalism (c) hierarchalism (d) scientific interest

48. In Canto 10 ("The Heretics"), Dante's reference to Farinata degli Uberti's seeming to hold all Hell in disrespect, plus Vergil's instructions to Dante the pilgrim about how to speak to this man, apparently shows Dante's: (a) unwavering Christian censure of sinners (b) encyclopedism (c) humanism (d) egalitarianism

49. In Canto 10, appropriate to its content, including the meeting with Farinata, is Dante's level of usage (including the language of Dante-pilgrim) that is: (a) high (b) middle (c) low (d) Germanic (d) Francophone

50. In Canto 11 ("The Heretics"), Dante's description of Dis as a "rust-red city" suggests all of the following except which one: (a) hell's corruption or degeneration (b) Dante's great visual sense (c) condemnation of technology (d) Old Testament approval of technology and urbanization