All Free English Literature MCQs with Answers

• A. Nicoll
• B. Goddord
• C. Bradley
• D. Coleridge

Explanation: The remark is associated with A. C. Bradley, whose Shakespearean Tragedy examines the interaction of character and fate rather than…

• A. 1564 AD
• B. 1773 AD
• C. 1809 AD
• D. 1923 AD

Explanation: William Shakespeare was born in 1564, traditionally recorded as 23 April 1564, though the exact birth date is uncertain because only his…

• A. Poets
• B. Playwrights
• C. Novelists
• D. None of these

Explanation: The University Wits were a group of educated Elizabethan playwrights, including Marlowe, Greene, and Peele.

• A. Comedy of Manners
• B. Theater of the Absurd
• C. Heroic Tragedy
• D. Comedy of Humours

Explanation: Comedy of Humours is based on the medical theory that a person’s character is shaped by the balance of four bodily humours: blood, phlegm…

• A. Merchant of Venice / Shakespeare's
• B. Shakespeare's Tempest
• C. Shakespeare's Much ado about nothing.
• D. None of these

Explanation: The lines “All that glisters is not gold” occur in The Merchant of Venice, where they appear on the gold casket.

• A. 1570
• B. 1564
• C. 1590
• D. None of these

Explanation: William Shakespeare was born in 1564, traditionally recorded as 23 April 1564, though the exact day is inferred from his baptismal record.

• A. an ordinary man
• B. a high ranking man
• C. a sacrilegious man
• D. none of these

Explanation: The Shakespearean tragic hero is usually a person of high rank or noble status whose flaw contributes to his downfall.

• A. Hamlet
• B. Othello
• C. King Lear
• D. Julius Caeser

Explanation: “Undo this button” is spoken by King Lear in Shakespeare’s King Lear, during the storm scenes when Lear’s mental and physical distress…

• A. John Lyly
• B. Thomas Kyd
• C. Robert Green
• D. Christopher Marlowe

Explanation: The Spanish Tragedy was written by Thomas Kyd and is a major example of the Elizabethan revenge tragedy.

• A. Nell Gwynn
• B. Aphra Behn
• C. Lady Teazle
• D. Ann Hathaway

Explanation: Aphra Behn is generally regarded as the first Englishwoman to earn her living as a professional writer, including as a playwright.

• A. Shakespeare
• B. Marlowe
• C. Oscar Wilde
• D. T.S. Eliot

Explanation: T. S. Eliot wrote “Murder in the Cathedral,” a verse drama about the assassination of Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral.

• A. Shakespeare
• B. Franklin
• C. Carlyle
• D. Alexander Pope

Explanation: Shakespeare wrote this line in “Julius Caesar,” where Caesar says that fear causes a person to experience repeated deaths before the…

• A. Dr. Johnson
• B. Shakespeare
• C. Dryden
• D. Coleridge

Explanation: John Dryden described a play as “a just and lively image of human nature” in his discussion of dramatic art.

• A. A novel
• B. a short story
• C. a poem
• D. a drama

Explanation: The Merchant of Venice is written for stage performance, with dialogue, characters, scenes and acts, so it is a drama.

• A. Dr. Faustus
• B. The Jew of Malta
• C. Tamburlaine
• D. Edward II

Explanation: The line “I count religion but a childish toy” is spoken in Christopher Marlowe’s The Jew of Malta, reflecting the play’s sceptical and…

• A. Christopher Marlowe
• B. Lord Tennyson
• C. John Milton
• D. All of them

Explanation: Christopher Marlowe was Shakespeare's contemporary and an important Elizabethan dramatist who influenced English tragedy.

• A. Pygmalion
• B. saint joan
• C. Candida
• D. none of these

Explanation: Henry Higgins is the central phonetics professor in George Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion, where he attempts to transform Eliza Doolittle’s…

• A. Laerteus
• B. Hamlet
• C. Horatio
• D. None of these

Explanation: Hamlet kills King Claudius by stabbing and poisoning him at the end of Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

• A. George Bernard Shaw
• B. A. Lord Tennyson
• C. Christopher Marlowe
• D. William Shakespeare

Explanation: Harold is a historical verse drama by Alfred Lord Tennyson, published in 1876 and based on the events surrounding Harold Godwinson.

• A. W. H. Auden
• B. Earnest Jones
• C. Nicoll
• D. Freud

Explanation: W. H. Auden wrote “Macbeth and Oedipus,” a comparative discussion of the two tragic plays and their central characters.