25 Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) with answers based on the topics Beat Writers / Beat Movement and Autobiography & Biography

 

25 Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) with answers based on the topics Beat Writers / Beat Movement and Autobiography & Biography

Section A: Beat Movement (1–15)

1. Who is considered the leading poet of the Beat Generation?
A) Jack London
B) Allen Ginsberg
C) Ernest Hemingway
D) T.S. Eliot
Answer: B) Allen Ginsberg

2. Which poem by Allen Ginsberg is considered a manifesto of the Beat Generation?
A) Kaddish
B) America
C) Howl
D) A Supermarket in California
Answer: C) Howl

3. What is the genre of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road?
A) Historical Fiction
B) Travel Literature
C) Beat Fiction / Semi-autobiographical Novel
D) Detective Fiction
Answer: C) Beat Fiction / Semi-autobiographical Novel

4. Which Beat writer is known for the novel Naked Lunch?
A) Allen Ginsberg
B) Lawrence Ferlinghetti
C) William S. Burroughs
D) Gregory Corso
Answer: C) William S. Burroughs

5. The term “Beat” in Beat Generation means:
A) Musical Rhythm
B) Defeated and Spiritual Enlightenment
C) Political Rebellion
D) Religious Doctrine
Answer: B) Defeated and Spiritual Enlightenment

6. The Beat writers opposed which of the following?
A) Capitalism
B) Conformity
C) Authority
D) All of the above
Answer: D) All of the above

7. Which of the following is NOT a Beat Generation writer?
A) Allen Ginsberg
B) Jack Kerouac
C) Ezra Pound
D) William Burroughs
Answer: C) Ezra Pound

8. Which book by Lawrence Ferlinghetti became popular during the Beat era?
A) A Coney Island of the Mind
B) The Wasteland
C) Tender Buttons
D) The Bell Jar
Answer: A) A Coney Island of the Mind

9. What city is often considered the heart of the Beat Movement?
A) New York
B) San Francisco
C) Boston
D) Chicago
Answer: B) San Francisco

10. Which religion had a strong influence on Beat writers?
A) Christianity
B) Buddhism
C) Islam
D) Hinduism
Answer: B) Buddhism

11. Who wrote The Holy Barbarians, a book on Beat culture?
A) Jonah Raskin
B) Lawrence Lipton
C) Brenda Knight
D) Anne Charters
Answer: B) Lawrence Lipton

12. What kind of literary form was often used by Beat poets in their public readings?
A) Haiku
B) Free verse with jazz improvisation
C) Sonnets
D) Limericks
Answer: B) Free verse with jazz improvisation

13. “On the Road” is based on Jack Kerouac’s journey with which friend?
A) Allen Ginsberg
B) Neal Cassady
C) William Burroughs
D) Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Answer: B) Neal Cassady

14. Which of the following themes is NOT central to Beat literature?
A) Rebellion
B) Spiritual quest
C) Conformity
D) Sexual freedom
Answer: C) Conformity

15. Brenda Knight’s Women of the Beat Generation focuses on:
A) Male poets only
B) Female Beat writers
C) Jazz musicians
D) 20th-century politicians
Answer: B) Female Beat writers

Section B: Autobiography & Biography (16–25)

16. What is the key difference between an autobiography and a biography?
A) Autobiography is fictional; biography is factual
B) Autobiography is about someone else’s life
C) Autobiography is written by the subject; biography is written by another person
D) No difference
Answer: C) Autobiography is written by the subject; biography is written by another person

17. Confessions by St. Augustine is an example of:
A) Fiction
B) Religious autobiography
C) Political commentary
D) Satire
Answer: B) Religious autobiography

18. Who wrote The Autobiography of Malcolm X?
A) Malcolm X alone
B) Malcolm X with Alex Haley
C) Langston Hughes
D) James Baldwin
Answer: B) Malcolm X with Alex Haley

19. The poetic autobiography The Prelude was written by:
A) Lord Byron
B) P.B. Shelley
C) William Wordsworth
D) John Keats
Answer: C) William Wordsworth

20. Which of these is NOT an autobiography?
A) Confessions by Rousseau
B) The Life of Samuel Johnson by Boswell
C) The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
D) The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein
Answer: B) The Life of Samuel Johnson by Boswell

21. What is a memoir?
A) A fictional story
B) A biography
C) A historical document
D) A personal account focusing on specific events
Answer: D) A personal account focusing on specific events

22. Who developed the term “Autobiographical Pact”?
A) Paul John Eakin
B) James Olney
C) Philippe Lejeune
D) Roy Pascal
Answer: C) Philippe Lejeune

23. The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston is best described as:
A) Pure autobiography
B) Novel
C) Memoir with fictional elements
D) Science fiction
Answer: C) Memoir with fictional elements

24. Who wrote Literary Biography (1957)?
A) Leon Edel
B) David Novarr
C) Richard Altick
D) Nancy Grace
Answer: A) Leon Edel

25. Which is the earliest known form of autobiography?
A) Essays by Montaigne
B) The Prelude
C) Confessions by St. Augustine
D) Confessions by Rousseau
Answer: C) Confessions by St. Augustine