The Dictators (Neruda Poem) Quizzes

The Dictators (Neruda Poem) Quiz

1 What does the word "surfeit" mean?

Charter or agreement

Complaint

Excess

Large dinner party
2 Which best characterizes this poem?

It focuses on the psyche of the speaker

It follows an elaborate, complex formal structure

It makes heavy use of figurative language

It embraces moral ambiguity, leaving readers unsure who to root for
3 Which best describes the poem's speaker?

An unidentified, omniscient third-person speaker

A journalist bearing witness to the dictator's cruelty

A dictator

An unidentified, limited first-person speaker
4 Where are the poem's first several lines set?

A military hospital

A sugarcane field

A schoolbuilding

A coffee shop
5 What is the poem's rhyme scheme?

ABBACDDCABBACDDC

It has no rhyme scheme

ABCBAADCD

AABAABABA
6 What is the dictator's palace compared to?

A teapot

A watch face

A dog's mouth

A diamond ring
7 Who is the translator of the version discussed in this guide?

Mark Eisner

Ben Belitt

W.S. Merwin

Pablo Neruda
8 Neruda compares the palace-dwellers to "wineglasses, _____, and piping."

Gemstones

Chocolates

Drumbeats

Collars
9 What is the poem's meter?

It is free verse

Iambic pentameter

Trochaic trimeter

Anapestic hexameter
10 What does the word "finical" mean?

Shiny

Multifaceted

Erudite

Picky
11 Which of the following does the poem sharply critique?

Adult cruelty to children

Religious extremism

Fascism and authoritarianism

Industrialization
12 How many lines are in this poem?

14

17

15

10
13 Which of the following phrases does NOT contain alliteration?

"carrion, blood, and a nausea"

"the blinded, big leaves"

"The snout filled with silence and slime"

"the plant and its pollen"
14 Which of the following are juxtaposed?

The snout and the bones

The dictator and his allies

The plant and the pollen

Laughter and death
15 What does the word "satrap" mean?

A grand palace

An exclusive, government-sponsored club

A type of trap used to catch mice and rats

A subordinate ruler or official
16 Which type of sensory imagery is prominent in the poem's opening lines?

Smell imagery

Sound imagery

Tactile imagery

Taste imagery
17 What does the plant most likely symbolize?

The power of the arts

Life under dictatorship

God's abandonment

The refuge of nature
18 Which is NOT one of the poem's themes?

Evil and oppression

Inequality

Death

Gender
19 Which of the following is an instance of hyperbole?

"Lament was perpetual"

"their festering surfeit of bones"

"A finical satrap conversed"

"Vendetta was born"
20 Which of the following serve as a synecdochic representation in the poem?

A mouth

A petal

A plant

A glove
21 What does the word "carrion" mean?

Decaying dead bodies

A type of bird of prey

A battle cry

A brand of gun popular in fascist Spain
22 Neruda uses a simile to compare which of the following to a flower petal?

The smell of corpses

A gunshot wound

A flag

A military medal
23 In which era is this poem most likely set?

The early Medieval period

The late eighteenth century

The 1970s

The mid-twentieth century
24 How does Neruda depict authoritarians?

As vulnerable and frightened

As zealous and obsessive

As frivolous and willfully blind

As sadistic and monstrous
25 What does the word "bludgeon" mean?

Toolbox

Blunt person

Broken-down vehicle

Physical blow

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