The Rhodora quiz

Questions and answers

1. 1

   Question 1. Which literary movement best describes "The Rhodora"?

   • Harlem Renaissance
   • Correct answer: Transcendentalism
   • Modernism
   • Puritanism

   Correct. Emerson led the Transcendentalists, who believed one divine spirit runs through nature and people alike; the poem's closing 'Power' that brought both the poet and the flower is that idea.

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2. 2

   Question 2. Where does the speaker find the rhodora?

   • On a sunny hillside meadow
   • Beside a stone wall in his garden
   • Along a sandy beach by the sea
   • Correct answer: In a damp nook in the woods

   The speaker says he "found the fresh Rhodora in the woods," spreading its blooms "in a damp nook." It grows far from gardens and crowds, which matters to the poem's question about unseen beauty.

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3. 3

   Question 3. In what month does the speaker find the rhodora?

   • March
   • April
   • Correct answer: May
   • June

   The poem opens "In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes," so the flower is found in late spring.

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4. 4

   Question 4. What is unusual about the rhodora's blooms when the speaker finds them?

   • Correct answer: They open before any leaves appear
   • They close up whenever rain falls
   • They change color as the sun sets
   • They float on top of the pond water

   The flower is "Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook." The rhodora is a wild shrub that flowers before its leaves come out, so the blossoms stand out bare and bright.

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5. 5

   Question 5. In the line "In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes," what does solitudes mean?

   • Warm, sheltered rooms beside a fire
   • Crowded towns full of noisy, busy people
   • Deep feelings of grief over a loss
   • Correct answer: Lonely places far from other people

   Solitudes are lonely, remote places, or the state of being alone. The sea-winds blow into the quiet, out-of-the-way places where the speaker walks, which prepares us for a flower hidden from view.

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6. 6

   Question 6. According to the poem, what do the fallen petals do to the pool?

   • Correct answer: They brighten its black water with beauty
   • They sink and leave the water just as dark
   • They drift out to sea on the spring winds
   • They choke the pool so the brook stops

   "The purple petals, fallen in the pool, / Made the black water with their beauty gay." Here 'gay' means bright and cheerful: even fallen petals transform the dark pool.

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7. 7

   Question 7. What color are the rhodora's fallen petals?

   • White
   • Golden
   • Correct answer: Purple
   • Crimson

   The poem says "The purple petals, fallen in the pool," brighten the black water.

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8. 8

   Question 8. In the line "To please the desert and the sluggish brook," what does desert mean?

   • A reward that someone has earned
   • Correct answer: A wild place where no people live
   • A dry, sandy land with little rain
   • A sweet dish served after a meal

   In older English a desert was any wild, empty, uninhabited place, deserted by people. The flower grows in a damp nook, so the word stresses that no human is there to admire it.

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9. 9

   Question 9. What do the imagined sages want to know about the flower?

   • Who planted it in such a lonely spot
   • How long its purple petals will last
   • Correct answer: Why its charm is wasted on earth and sky
   • Why it blooms so late in the spring

   "Rhodora! if the sages ask thee why / This charm is wasted on the earth and sky." The wise men assume beauty is wasted if no person sees it; the rest of the poem answers them.

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10. 10

    Question 10. In the line "And court the flower that cheapens his array," what does cheapens mean?

    • Correct answer: Makes his finery seem less splendid
    • Makes his colors look richer and brighter
    • Scolds him for being so proud and vain
    • Lowers the price that he must pay

    To cheapen something is to make it seem of less value. Beside the rhodora, the red-bird's showy feathers (his array) look plain, so the flower outshines even a brilliant bird.

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11. 11

    Question 11. What does the speaker mean by "Beauty is its own excuse for being"?

    • Beauty fades, so enjoy it while it lasts
    • Correct answer: Beauty needs no purpose beyond existing
    • Beauty is worth something once people see it
    • Beauty is a reward for those who seek it

    The poem's most famous line answers the sages: beauty does not have to be useful or admired to be worthwhile. Just as eyes were "made for seeing," beauty justifies itself simply by existing.

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12. 12

    Question 12. Why is it striking that the speaker calls the rhodora a 'rival of the rose'?

    • It shows the rhodora is a kind of rose that grows wild
    • It means the rose has crowded the rhodora out of the woods
    • It suggests the speaker plans to plant roses in that nook
    • Correct answer: It sets a hidden wild bloom beside the most praised flower

    "Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose!" The rose is the classic flower of poetry and gardens; ranking an unseen wild bloom as its equal says that beauty does not depend on fame.

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13. 13

    Question 13. When the speaker cries "Rhodora!" and speaks to the flower as 'dear,' which literary device is he using?

    • Hyperbole
    • Correct answer: Apostrophe
    • Alliteration
    • Onomatopoeia

    Apostrophe is speaking directly to an absent person or a thing that cannot reply. The speaker turns to the flower itself ("Tell them, dear") and gives it the answer to pass on to the sages.

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14. 14

    Question 14. In the phrase "in my simple ignorance," what attitude does the speaker show?

    • Fear of being lost alone in the woods
    • Bitter anger at the sages' questions
    • Correct answer: Humble trust rather than certain knowledge
    • Pride in his own learning and wisdom

    The speaker says "I never thought to ask, I never knew," then offers only a humble guess ("suppose"). Unlike the questioning sages, he trusts what he feels instead of demanding proof.

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15. 15

    Question 15. What does the speaker suppose in the poem's closing line?

    • Correct answer: The same Power brought him and the flower there
    • Blind chance set the flower in that damp nook
    • The flower was put there for him to discover
    • The red-bird carried its seed into the woods

    "The self-same Power that brought me there brought you." The speaker and the flower share one divine source, so neither needs to explain its presence to the other.

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16. 16

    Question 16. How is the poem's sixteen-line structure organized?

    • A question from the sages, then a woodland scene
    • A complaint about winter, then praise of spring
    • A tale told by the red-bird, then the poet's reply
    • Correct answer: A woodland scene, then an answer to a question

    Lines one to eight describe the flower, the pool and the red-bird; line nine ("if the sages ask thee why") turns to the question, and the last eight lines answer it.

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17. 17

    Question 17. Which Transcendentalist belief do the poem's closing lines most clearly express?

    • Correct answer: One divine force runs through people and nature
    • Nature is fallen and must be tamed by people
    • Nature exists mainly to serve human needs
    • Scientific study is the surest path to truth

    Transcendentalists held that one divine spirit lives in nature and in every soul. The "self-same Power" that brought both the poet and the flower to the woods is that idea in a single line; Emerson wrote the poem in 1834, two years before his essay Nature.

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18. 18

    Question 18. Which of these happen in the poem?

    • The speaker finds the rhodora blooming in a damp nook in the woods.

      Happened

      He says he "found the fresh Rhodora in the woods" spreading its blooms "in a damp nook."

    • The speaker picks the rhodora and carries it home to show his friends.

      Didn't happen

      He never picks it; the flower stays where it grows, pleasing "the desert and the sluggish brook."

    • The flower's fallen purple petals brighten the black water of the pool.

      Happened

      "The purple petals, fallen in the pool, / Made the black water with their beauty gay."

    • The sages convince the speaker that the flower's beauty is wasted.

      Didn't happen

      The sages only might ask; the speaker answers that "Beauty is its own excuse for being."

    • The speaker pictures a red-bird coming to cool its plumes by the flower.

      Happened

      "Here might the red-bird come his plumes to cool, / And court the flower that cheapens his array."

    • The speaker says the rose is far lovelier than the humble rhodora.

      Didn't happen

      He calls the rhodora a "rival of the rose," its equal, and says it outshines the red-bird.

    • The speaker speaks to the flower directly and calls it rival of the rose.

      Happened

      He addresses it as "Rhodora!" and "dear," and cries "O rival of the rose!"

    • The rhodora blooms in a sunny garden that many people visit each day.

      Didn't happen

      It grows in a "damp nook" in the woods, a lonely place with no admirers but the brook.

    • The speaker admits he never thought to ask why the flower was there.

      Happened

      "Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose! / I never thought to ask, I never knew."

    • The speaker claims to know for certain why the flower grows there.

      Didn't happen

      He offers only a guess "in my simple ignorance," saying he can "suppose" but never knew.

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