The Red Wheelbarrow quiz

Questions and answers

1. 1

   Question 1. Which literary genres best describe “The Red Wheelbarrow”?

   • Poetry, Romanticism, Blank Verse & Nature Poetry
   • Correct answer: Poetry, Imagism, Free Verse & Modernist Poetry
   • Poetry, Victorian Verse, Ballad & Narrative Poem
   • Poetry, Metaphysical Verse, Sonnet & Love Poetry
   • Poetry, Gothic Verse, Elegy & Confessional Poetry

   Correct. The poem is built on one clear, exact image in plain words (Imagism), uses no rhyme and no regular beat (free verse), and breaks with older poetic forms the way much American poetry of the 1920s did (modernist poetry).

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2. 2

   Question 2. According to the poem, what is the red wheelbarrow “glazed with”?

   • Morning dew
   • Wet paint
   • Correct answer: Rain water
   • Melted snow

   The third stanza says the wheelbarrow is “glazed with rain / water.” The rain water gives the red wheelbarrow a wet shine, which is why Williams can call it glazed.

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3. 3

   Question 3. Which two colors does the poem name, and what does each one describe?

   • Correct answer: Red for the wheelbarrow, white for the chickens
   • White for the wheelbarrow, red for the chickens
   • Red for the wheelbarrow, white for the rain water
   • Red for the farmhouse, white for the wheelbarrow

   The wheelbarrow is “a red wheel / barrow” and the chickens are “the white / chickens.” Red and white are the only two colors in the poem, and they stand side by side, which makes the picture sharp and easy to see.

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4. 4

   Question 4. How are the poem’s eight lines arranged on the page?

   • Two four-line stanzas, each ending with a pair of rhyming words
   • One long stanza in which every line holds the same number of words
   • Four two-line stanzas, each a one-word line followed by a three-word line
   • Correct answer: Four two-line stanzas, each a three-word line followed by a one-word line

   Every stanza follows the same pattern: three words, then one. “so much depends / upon”, “a red wheel / barrow”, “glazed with rain / water”, “beside the white / chickens.” Many readers find that the repeated shape makes the poem look as plain and sturdy as the wheelbarrow itself.

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5. 5

   Question 5. The poem splits “wheel / barrow” and “rain / water” across two lines. What effect do many readers see in these breaks?

   • They hide a rhyme that is only heard when the words are joined
   • Correct answer: They slow the reader, so each part is seen as a thing of its own
   • They mark the places where the speaker stops to take a breath
   • They copy the rhythm of a song the speaker is quietly singing

   Running a phrase on past the end of a line like this is called enjambment. Many readers find that breaking “wheel / barrow” and “rain / water” makes them pause and look at the wheel, then the barrow, the rain, then the water, so each part becomes a thing worth seeing. Slowing the reader down so that every word counts is one of Williams’s main tools.

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6. 6

   Question 6. How does the poem move from its first line to its last?

   • From the white chickens, to the rain water, to the wheelbarrow, to a closing claim
   • From a rainstorm, to a farmer at work, to the chickens he feeds at dusk
   • Correct answer: From a broad claim, to one object, to its wet surface, to what is beside it
   • From a question, to the speaker’s answer, to a memory of a childhood farm

   It opens with a broad claim, “so much depends / upon,” then gives one object, “a red wheel / barrow,” then its wet surface, “glazed with rain / water,” and ends with what is next to it, “beside the white / chickens.” One way to picture it: the view moves outward from the thing itself to its surroundings, like a camera pulling back.

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7. 7

   Question 7. Which of these does the poem never tell the reader?

   • Correct answer: What exactly depends on the red wheelbarrow
   • What color the poem gives the wheelbarrow
   • What the wheelbarrow is glazed with
   • What animals are beside the wheelbarrow

   The poem says “so much depends / upon” the wheelbarrow but never says what. It does tell us the wheelbarrow is red, that it is “glazed with rain / water,” and that it stands “beside the white / chickens.” Leaving the claim open makes readers fill it in for themselves.

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8. 8

   Question 8. Match the word to its meaning as it is used in “glazed with rain / water”:

   • Dull and unfocused, the way very tired eyes look late at night
   • Fitted with panes of glass, the way a window or a door is
   • Scratched and roughened from many years of hard, steady use
   • Correct answer: Covered with a thin, shiny coating that catches the light

   Here “glazed” means covered with a thin, shiny coat, as a pot is glazed or a doughnut is glazed with sugar. The rain water lies over the red wheelbarrow like a glaze, so the wheelbarrow gleams. The word has other meanings (glazed eyes, glazed windows), but only this one fits the wet wheelbarrow.

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9. 9

   Question 9. What does "Free verse" mean in this story?

   • Poetry written in rhymed pairs of lines of the same length
   • Correct answer: Poetry with no regular pattern of rhyme and no set rhythm
   • A Japanese form of three lines and seventeen syllables
   • A fourteen-line poem with a set rhyme scheme and rhythm

   Free verse is poetry without a regular rhyme scheme or a set beat. None of the poem’s line endings rhyme, and the lines are uneven: three words, then one. Williams shapes the poem with line breaks instead of rhyme and meter.

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10. 10

    Question 10. Did it happen? Review these statements about the poem and mark each one.

    • The wheelbarrow in the poem is red.

      Happened

      The second stanza names “a red wheel / barrow.” Red is the first color the poem gives us.

    • A farmer pushes the wheelbarrow across the yard.

      Didn't happen

      No person appears anywhere in the poem, and no one does anything. It shows only the wheelbarrow, the rain water and the chickens.

    • The wheelbarrow is wet with rain water.

      Happened

      The third stanza says it is “glazed with rain / water,” so its surface is coated and shining with water.

    • The chickens beside the wheelbarrow are black.

      Didn't happen

      The poem ends “beside the white / chickens.” The chickens are white, set against the red wheelbarrow.

    • The poem names what depends on the wheelbarrow.

      Didn't happen

      The poem says only “so much depends / upon” it and never says what that “so much” is. The reader has to supply it.

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11. 11

    Question 11. The poem opens “so much depends / upon” and then shows only a wheelbarrow, rain water and chickens. What idea do many readers take from this?

    • That farm tools matter far more than the people who use them
    • That rain is a warning sign that hard times are on their way
    • Correct answer: That plain, everyday things are worth seeing and can matter a great deal
    • That the speaker is mourning someone who has recently died

    By setting a big claim, “so much depends / upon,” in front of a plain wheelbarrow and some chickens, the poem can be read as saying that ordinary things deserve close attention and may matter more than we notice. The poem mentions no people, no death and no hard times, so the other choices have nothing in the text to stand on.

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12. 12

    Question 12. What was Williams’s full-time job for more than forty years?

    • Correct answer: Doctor with a practice in Rutherford, New Jersey
    • Teacher at a public high school in Paterson, New Jersey
    • Editor of a weekly newspaper in New York City
    • Lawyer at a small firm in Newark, New Jersey

    Williams was a doctor. He earned his medical degree at the University of Pennsylvania in 1906 and ran a general practice in Rutherford, New Jersey, for more than forty years, writing poems between patients.

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