PREVIOUS QUESTIONS

Introduction of Literary Criticism: Up to Romantic Period

2016

English

Subject Code: 231113

(Introduction of Literary Criticism: Up to Romantic Period)

Time: 4 Hours                                                                                                       Full Marks: 80

Part-A

1. Answer any ten of the following questions                                                           1 × 10 = 10

a)   What is Catharsis?

      Ans: Catharsis is the purification and purgation of emotions like pity and fear through witnessing certain kinds of art like tragedy, music etc.

b)   What is the unity of time?

      Ans: The unity of time is one of the three unities of drama that limits the supposed action of the duration, roughly, to a single day.

c)   What is 'Hamartia'?

      Ans: Greek term ‘hamartia’ means ‘error in judgment’.

d)   What are the Constituents of a tragedy?

      Ans: The six constituent parts of a tragedy are plot, character, thought, diction, music and spectacle.

e)   How does Sidney prove that poets are not liars?

      Ans: Sidney proves that poets are not liars by saying that a poet "never affirmeth" anything. He makes the claim that all statements in literature are hypothetical or pseudo-statements.

f)   Who is Sophocles?

      Ans: Sophocles was one of the most famous and celebrated writers of tragedy in ancient Greece.

g)   What is Dr. Johnson's opinion about Shakespeare's dramas?

      Ans: Dr. Johnson's opines about Shakespeare's dramas that they are neither pure tragedy nor pure comedy. They are tragi-comedy.

h)   To what school of criticism does Dr. Johnson belong?

      Ans: Dr. Johnson belongs to neo-classical school of criticism.

i)    What are the primary passions of human life?

      Ans:  The primary passions of human life are love, hate, desire, joy, wonder and sorrow.

j)    What are the main difference between a poet and a common man?

      Ans: The main difference between a poet and a common man, according to Wordsworth, is not in nature, but in degree. A poet is a man who has greater sensibility, imagination, knowledge of human nature, comprehensiveness, zest for life, and power of communication than a common man.

k)   What is Coleridge’s idea of ‘fancy’?

      Ans: According to Coleridge, fancy is indeed no other than a mode of memory emancipated from the order of time and space.

l)    What does Aristotle mean by imitation?

      Ans: By the term ‘imitation’, Aristotle means the process of creation by which the poet, drawing his material from the phenomenal world, makes something new out of it.

Part-B

Answer any five of the following questions:                                                               4 × 5 = 20

2    Why did Philip Sydney write an Apology for Poetry?

3    According to Wordsworth what is the connection between good poetry and feelings?

4    Why does Johnson prefer Shakespeare's comedies to tragedies?

5    what is Coleridge's objection to Wordsworth's selection of characters in his poems?

6    What are Wordsworth's comments about the functions of a poet?

7    Write a short note on Neo-classicism.

8    What are the characteristics of a tragic hero?

9    What does Johnson say about Shakespeare's violation of the unites?

Part-C

Answer any five questions:                                                                                        10 × 5 = 50

10  What are Aristotle's arguments in favour of tragedy over epic poetry? Do you think they are convincing?

11  Write and explain Aristotle's definition of tragedy?

12  Comment on Johnson's evaluation of Shakespeare's tragedies.

13  How does Johnson defend Shakespeare's mixing of comic and tragic elements?

14  Discuss in detail the morality of poetry as mentioned by Sidney in his "An Apology for Poetry"?

15  How does Sidney defend poetry against the allegations brought by Gosson?

16  Discuss critically Coleridge's concept of fancy and imagination.

17  Why is Wordsworth's "Preface to Lyrical Ballads" considered the manifesto to the Romantic Movement?