The Death Bed Quizzes

The Death Bed Quiz

1 Which best describes the poem's speaker?
Omniscient, third-person; addresses the reader using second-person

All-knowing, first-person, addresses the reader using second-person

Unidentified, third-person

Omniscient, third-person; addresses the soldier using second-person
2 Describe the form.
Seven sextets

Six sextets

Seven stanzas composed of different lengths

Six stanzas composed of different lengths
3 What senses are engaged in this poem?
All senses

Auditory, gustatory, olfactory

Visual, tactile, auditory

Visual
4 Which of the following is not a metaphor in the poem?
"silence heaped / Round him, unshaken as the steadfast walls"

"his mortal shore / Lipped by the inward, moonless waves of death"

"in the wings of sleep"

Water
5 Which best describes a metaphor?
The occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words

A word or phrase used in a non-literal sense for rhetorical or vivid effec

A description of one thing by way of another, unrelated thing

A comparison between two things that are otherwise unrelated using the words "like" or "as"
6 Which is not an example of alliteration?
"That soak the woods; not the harsh rain"

"And there was silence in the summer night; / Silence and safety; and the veils of sleep"

"Silence and safety"

"Light many lamps and gather round his bed. / Lend him your...will to live"
7 What is alliteration?
A comparison between two things that are otherwise unrelated

The occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words

A word or phrase used in a non-literal sense for rhetorical or vivid effect

A comparison between two things that are otherwise unrelated using the words "like" or "as"
8 What is the reader implored to do?
Care for the dying soldier's physical and energetic needs.

Row down a river.

Protest the war by writing letters.

Enlist and fight.
9 What is the major conflict of the poem?
World War One

World War Two

Whether or not the young soldier will encounter his death

Death does not care about justice
10 Which quote best foreshadows the soldier's death?
"Rain—he could hear it rustling through the dark;"

"He swallowed, unresisting; moaned and dropped"

"Shuddering because that evil thing had passed."

"Gently and slowly washing life away"
11 Which is an example of onomatopoeia?
thudding

music

flickered

trickling
12 What collection was this poem published in?
Counter-Attack and Other Poems

The Daffodil Murderer

The Old Huntsman and Other Poems

The War Poems of Sigfried Sassoon
13 What is Sassoon best known for today?
His romantic pastoral poetry

His novels

His satires

His angry and compassionate anti-war poems
14 Which fellow soldier-poet named "The Death Bed" as the "finest poem" in the collection?
Rupert Brooke

Isaac Rosenberg

Wilfred Owen

Robert Graves
15 Which of the following is not a theme in the poem?
Death and Sleep as a Journey

Mortality

Satirizing military authority

Criticizing the Military Establishment
16 Who or what is personified in the poem?
an animal that broke into the ward

death

the soldier

death and the soldier's pain
17 What is personification?
the attribution of a personal nature or human characteristics to something nonhuman, or the representation of an abstract quality in human form.

A comparison between two things that are otherwise unrelated using the words "like" or "as"

A word or phrase used in a non-literal sense for rhetorical or vivid effect

The occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words
18 What does water symbolize?
Tranquility

Summertime

The soldier's acceptance of his death

The fluid state of the soldier's consciousness
19 Why are the guns at the end specified as "the"?
There is no reason for the specification

They refer to the guns the soldier used in battle

They refer to the conflict of World War I

They refer to the conflict of World War II
20 Why is death not capitalized in the poem?
Because it is an inanimate process.

Death is capitalized in the poem

Unspecified, but perhaps to suggest a humble sense

Unspecified, but perhaps to suggest a weak sense
21 Where in the poem does Sassoon clarify that the drowsing man is dying?
In the final line

In the first stanza

Never

In the second-to-last stanza
22 Which words become an anaphora?
Summer and night

Light and summer

Water and night

Water and summer
23 Finish this quote: "Lipped by the inward, moonless__"
starless sky

waves of death

night sky

waves of pain
24 What is anaphora?
The repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive clauses.

The occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words

The attribution of a personal nature or human characteristics to something nonhuman, or the representation of an abstract quality in human form.

A comparison between two things that are otherwise unrelated
25 Why does the speaker give a false sense of hope that the soldier will live?
To show that justice prevails when there is hope

To cruelly trick the reader

To show that there is always hope

To increase the poem's tension by prolonging the death

The Death Bed Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for The Death Bed is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Ask Your Own Question

Study Guide for The Death Bed

The Death Bed study guide contains a biography of Siegfried Sassoon, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

Read the Study Guide for The Death Bed…