Quiz

How Do I Love Thee

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

1. 1. What is the formal structure of 'How Do I Love Thee'?

   A Shakespearean sonnet with three quatrains and a coupletA Petrarchan sonnet with an octave and a sestetA Spenserian sonnet with interlocking rhymesA free-verse lyric arranged in fourteen lines

2. 2. In the opening lines, the speaker measures her love by 'the depth and breadth and height / My soul can reach.' This imagery is best described as:

   Tactile imagery evoking physical sensationSpatial and cosmic imagery suggesting limitless scopePastoral imagery rooted in the natural worldAuditory imagery emphasizing the sound of devotion

3. 3. What is the dominant theme of the poem?

   The fear that love will fade with the passage of timeThe transcendent and all-encompassing nature of true loveThe tension between earthly desire and spiritual purityThe grief of losing loved ones and finding consolation

4. 4. Who is the speaker of this poem?

   An omniscient narrator reflecting on romantic love in generalA grieving widow addressing her late husbandA first-person lover cataloguing the ways she loves anotherA detached observer describing someone else's devotion

5. 5. The lines 'I love thee freely, as men strive for Right' use which literary technique?

   Apostrophe, addressing an abstract concept directlySimile, comparing the quality of love to a moral pursuitMetaphor, equating love with the concept of justicePersonification, giving love human characteristics

6. 6. How does the poem's tone shift from the octave to the sestet?

   From joyful celebration to bitter disappointmentFrom abstract and cosmic idealism to personal, emotional intimacyFrom quiet restraint to loud, defiant proclamationFrom spiritual devotion to skepticism about the afterlife

7. 7. The reference to 'my childhood's faith' in the poem primarily serves to:

   Suggest the speaker has abandoned religious belief as an adultContrast immature love with the speaker's current feelingsConvey the sincerity and purity associated with early, uncomplicated trustImply that the beloved reminds the speaker of a childhood friend

8. 8. What does the phrase 'my lost saints' most likely allude to?

   Religious figures the speaker no longer worshipsPeople the speaker loved who have died or passed from her lifeSaints depicted in paintings the speaker once admiredIdealized fictional characters from books of her youth

9. 9. Which comprehension question best reflects what the speaker promises in the final two lines?

   That she will stop counting the ways she loves once she diesThat her love, by God's grace, will grow even stronger after deathThat she fears death will bring her love to an endThat she hopes God will judge her love worthy of heaven

10. 10. The repetition of the phrase 'I love thee' throughout the poem is an example of:

    Enjambment, where sentences run across line breaks without pauseAnaphora, the repetition of a phrase at the start of successive clausesEpistrophe, the repetition of a phrase at the end of successive clausesChiasmus, the reversal of grammatical structures in successive phrases
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