The Arrival of the Bee Box Quizzes

The Arrival of the Bee Box Quiz

1 Who is the poem's speaker?

Somebody who has just ordered a box full of bees

A bee who lives on a farm

A grieving husband participating in the custom of "telling the bees"

A writer comparing her words to swarming bees
2 Broadly speaking, what did bees symbolize in seventeenth-century Europe?

Noisiness and immorality

Creativity and individuality

Hard work and piety

Poverty and monasticism
3 What is the meaning of the word "colonnade"?

A colonial outpost

A dessert made of fruit

A row of columns

A military parade
4 Which writer did NOT use bees as a symbol or allegory?

Mary Leapor

John Mandeville

Fanny Burney

John Greenleaf Whittier
5 What are the bees probably NOT intended to symbolize in this poem?

Sexual aggression

The speaker's thoughts

Familial demands on women

Climate change
6 Where does the poem most likely take place?

An industrial honey farm

The speaker's home

A field of flowers

A school
7 Which collection was this poem a part of?

Ariel

The Colossus

The Bell Jar

Double Exposure
8 How does the work's final stanza most clearly differ from the others?

It is written in a different meter

It is the only part that does not rhyme

It is spoken by a different speaker

It is only one line long
9 Fill in the blank: I wonder if they would forget me/If I just undid the locks and stood back and _______"

died

turned into a tree

closed my eyes

ran away
10 Which is an example of irony?

The amount of noise that the bees make

The speaker's ability to keep her bees alive or let them die

The speaker's feeling of temptation despite the danger of the bees

The speaker's comparison of herself to God
11 Fill in the blank: It is the noise that _____ me most of all,

distracts

ensnares

appalls

intrigues
12 What does the speaker NOT compare the box to?

A baby

A tent

A chair

A coffin
13 How many stanzas are in the poem?

5

3

9

7
14 The speaker compares the bees to a mob from where?

Ancient Rome

Revolutionary America

Victorian Britain

The Old West
15 What is the meaning of the word "laburnum"?

A New England company

A diploma

A kitchen counter

A type of tree
16 What is the meaning of the word "din"?

Dinner

Hillside

Noise

Sunset
17 Which best describes the poem's portrayal of power?

The speaker loses her power when she buys the bees and gives up her job

The speaker struggles for power, but is no match for nature

The bees' power comes from their cleanliness and cooperativeness

The speaker struggles to decide whether it is she or the bees who holds disproportionate power
18 What is the poem's meter?

It has no set meter

Anapestic tetrameter

Iambic pentameter

Dactylic pentameter
19 What best describes the poem's conflict?

The speaker's decision about whether to free the bees

The beekeeper's conflict with the industrialist

The bee's decision about whether to sting the human

The speaker's fight against the queen bee
20 What best describes the speaker's feelings about the bees?

intimacy and love

maddening irritation

self-effacing admiration

alternating fascination and fear
21 What type of stanzas appear in the poem?

Tercets

Couplets

Sestets

The stanzas are unmatched
22 How is the theme of femininity discussed in the poem?

The poem subtly equates the speaker's fear of the bees with women's fear of violence or subjugation

The queen bee represents the feminists of the twentieth century

The speaker's desire to engage with insects hints at a need to escape human gender norms

The bees' collaboration suggests that only collaboration between women will better their lot
23 Which mythological figure is alluded to in the poem?

Persephone

Daphne

Hercules

Narcissus
24 What do the trees most closely symbolize?

The speaker's ambivalence

Escape from conflict

Strength

The abundance of nature
25 Which of the following is a metaphor?

"They can die, I can feed them nothing"

"In my moon suit and funeral veil"

"There is only a little grid, no exit"

"Square as a chair and almost too heavy to lift"

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