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Quizzes > Books & Literature

Poetry Quiz: Test Your Knowledge of Famous Poets and Authors

Quick, free poem quiz to test your knowledge. Instant results.

Editorial: Review CompletedCreated By: Ciara SedenoUpdated Aug 24, 2025
Difficulty: Moderate
2-5mins
Learning OutcomesCheat Sheet
paper art open book quill pen and stacked verses forming quiz banner for anthology of poets and authors on teal background

This poetry quiz helps you check your grasp of famous lines and the poets and authors behind them. For more practice, try our english poetry quiz, or compare forms in the prose vs poetry quiz. Want to focus on writers? Test yourself with the famous authors quiz.

Who wrote the poem "The Road Not Taken"?
Robert Browning
Robert Frost
Emily Dickinson
Walt Whitman
"The Road Not Taken" was written by Robert Frost and first published in 1916. It's one of Frost's most anthologized and analyzed poems, exploring the idea of choices and their consequences. The poem's final lines have become a cultural touchstone for decision making. .
Which poet is traditionally known as the Bard of Avon?
Christopher Marlowe
William Shakespeare
Ben Jonson
Edmund Spenser
William Shakespeare is called the Bard of Avon because he was born in Stratford-upon-Avon and became England's most celebrated playwright and poet. The title "bard" signifies his role as a national poet. His works have had lasting influence on English literature. .
Who wrote "Ode to a Nightingale"?
Lord Byron
John Keats
William Wordsworth
Percy Shelley
John Keats composed "Ode to a Nightingale" in 1819, one of his most famous odes expressing the tension between the immortal voice of the nightingale and human mortality. It appears in Keats's collection published in 1820. Scholars praise its rich imagery and emotional depth. .
What is the rhyme scheme of a Shakespearean sonnet?
ABBA ABBA CDE CDE
ABAB BCBC CDCD EE
ABAB CDCD EFEF GG
AABB CCDD EEFF GG
A Shakespearean sonnet consists of three quatrains followed by a final rhyming couplet, following the ABAB CDCD EFEF GG pattern. This structure allows for development of themes and a concluding resolution. It differs from the Italian (Petrarchan) sonnet form. .
Who penned the narrative poem "The Raven"?
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Edgar Allan Poe
Emily Dickinson
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Edgar Allan Poe published "The Raven" in 1845, and it quickly became his most famous poem. Its meter, internal rhyme, and haunting refrain contribute to its reputation as a masterpiece of Gothic literature. The poem explores themes of grief and loss. .
Who is the author of the poetry collection "Leaves of Grass"?
Ezra Pound
Walt Whitman
Robert Frost
T.S. Eliot
Walt Whitman self-published the first edition of Leaves of Grass in 1855 and continued to revise it throughout his life. The collection celebrates democracy, nature, and the individual spirit in free verse form. It remains a cornerstone of American poetry. .
Which poet wrote the poem "If - "?
Robert Service
Rudyard Kipling
William Blake
Alfred Tennyson
Rudyard Kipling published "If - " in 1910 as part of his collection Rewards and Fairies. The poem offers a father's counsel on maturity, stoicism, and moral integrity. It remains one of Kipling's most quoted works. .
In which of William Wordsworth's collections does the poem "Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey" first appear?
Poems, in Two Volumes
Lyrical Ballads
The Prelude
Sonnets Dedicated to Liberty
"Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey" first appeared in the second edition of Lyrical Ballads, co-authored with Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1800. It's notable for its reflective tone and exploration of memory. .
Which poet wrote "Do not go gentle into that good night"?
Dylan Thomas
W.H. Auden
Robert Graves
Seamus Heaney
Dylan Thomas wrote "Do not go gentle into that good night" as a villanelle in 1947, urging defiance against death. It was published in his collection In Country Sleep and Other Poems in 1952. The poem is celebrated for its emotional power and strict form. .
T.S. Eliot's "The Waste Land" opens with an epigraph in which language?
Sanskrit
Greek
French
Latin
The Waste Land's opening epigraph is taken from Petronius's Satyricon in Latin: "Nam Sibyllam quidem Cumis…". Eliot uses this classical reference to frame the poem's themes of decay and renewal. .
Which poet wrote the villanelle "One Art"?
Elizabeth Bishop
Sylvia Plath
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Marianne Moore
Elizabeth Bishop's "One Art" is a villanelle published in 1976 as part of her collection Geography III. It plays with the form's repetition to explore loss and mastery. .
Who is the author of the 1956 poem "Howl"?
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
William Carlos Williams
Allen Ginsberg
Jack Kerouac
Allen Ginsberg published "Howl" in 1956, and it became a defining text of the Beat Generation. Its candid language and critique of modern society led to an obscenity trial that ultimately affirmed its artistic value. .
Which 19th-century American poet wrote "Because I could not stop for Death"?
Sara Teasdale
Walt Whitman
Emily Brontë
Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson wrote "Because I could not stop for Death" around 1863. It personifies Death as a courteous suitor, reflecting Dickinson's characteristic economy of language and profound themes of mortality. .
Langston Hughes's first book of poetry, "The Weary Blues," was published in which year?
1919
1926
1940
1935
Langston Hughes's debut collection The Weary Blues was published in 1926, blending jazz rhythms with themes of African American life. It established Hughes as a leading voice of the Harlem Renaissance. .
What is the primary meter used in John Milton's epic poem "Paradise Lost"?
Heroic couplets
Blank verse
Dactylic hexameter
Iambic tetrameter
Milton composed Paradise Lost in unrhymed iambic pentameter, commonly known as blank verse, to lend an epic grandeur without the constraints of rhyme. This choice influences many later English epics. .
Who wrote the epic poem "Aurora Leigh"?
Mary Shelley
Felicia Hemans
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Christina Rossetti
Elizabeth Barrett Browning published Aurora Leigh in 1856. This verse-novel addresses social issues like women's education and artistic vocation. It remains a landmark work in Victorian literature. .
Which poet wrote the long-form poem "Zong!" addressing the Zong massacre?
M. NourbeSe Philip
Jean Toomer
Derek Walcott
Kamau Brathwaite
M. NourbeSe Philip's Zong! (2008) is a poetic and documentary response to the 1781 Zong slave ship massacre. The work uses fragmented language to confront silence around this atrocity. .
Dante Alighieri wrote his "Divine Comedy" in which dialect of Italian?
Sicilian
Venetian
Lombard
Tuscan
Dante chose the Tuscan dialect for the Divine Comedy in the early 14th century. His use of the Tuscan vernacular rather than Latin helped establish it as the basis for standard Italian. .
The surviving fragments of Sappho's poetry are primarily preserved through what medium?
Medieval codices
Oral tradition
Stone inscriptions
Papyrus manuscripts
Most of Sappho's poetry survives in papyrus fragments from Hellenistic and Roman Egypt. These shards were discovered in archaeological digs and pieced together by scholars. .
Which Romantic poet collaborated with Lord Byron on a play and was also his close friend?
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
John Keats
Percy Bysshe Shelley
William Blake
Percy Bysshe Shelley and Lord Byron collaborated on the play The Deformed Transformed in 1821 and maintained a close friendship during Byron's exile in Italy. Both were leaders of the English Romantic movement. .
In a sonnet, the term "volta" refers to what?
The concluding couplet
The thematic turn
A rhyme scheme
The opening quatrain
The volta is the thematic or rhetorical turn in a sonnet, traditionally occurring between the octave and sestet in Petrarchan sonnets or before the final couplet in Shakespearean sonnets. It shifts the poem's argument or mood. .
Which French writer coined the term "surrealism" in relation to literature?
Paul Éluard
Stéphane Mallarmé
Guillaume Apollinaire
André Breton
André Breton published the first Surrealist Manifesto in 1924, defining surrealism as "pure psychic automatism." He is considered the founder of the movement in literature and art. .
Who translated "Beowulf" into modern English verse in 1968?
E. V. Rieu
Burton Raffel
J.R.R. Tolkien
Seamus Heaney
Seamus Heaney's 1999 translation of Beowulf (though completed earlier) brought renewed attention to the Old English epic with poetic modern English verse. His work won the Whitbread Book of the Year award. .
Which Japanese poet is credited with popularizing the haiku form in the 17th century?
Masaoka Shiki
Yosa Buson
Kobayashi Issa
Matsuo Bash?
Matsuo Bash? (1644 - 1694) elevated haikai no renga (linked verse) opening verses into standalone haiku, emphasizing simplicity and nature. He is regarded as the master who shaped the form's golden age. .
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Study Outcomes

  1. Identify Poetic Authors -

    Recall and name the poets behind famous lines, enhancing your ability to connect verses with their creators.

  2. Analyze Verse Themes -

    Explore the central themes and motifs in selected poems to deepen your literary interpretation skills.

  3. Recall Iconic Quotations -

    Memorize and recognize memorable lines from celebrated works, sharpening your poetry recall and retention.

  4. Compare Poetic Styles -

    Contrast different authors' poetic techniques and tones, broadening your understanding of literary diversity.

  5. Assess Literary Knowledge -

    Test your grasp of anthology quiz questions to measure progress and pinpoint areas for further study.

  6. Engage with Author Trivia -

    Enjoy fun facts and trivia about famous writers, boosting both your enjoyment and your author trivia expertise.

Cheat Sheet

  1. Poetic Forms and Structures -

    Master the hallmarks of sonnets, villanelles, and haikus to decode anthology quiz prompts faster. For instance, a Shakespearean sonnet's ABAB CDCD EFEF GG rhyme and iambic pentameter (Purdue OWL) signal its form instantly. Recognizing these patterns means fewer second-guessing moments in poetry quiz questions.

  2. Meter and Mnemonics -

    Use mnemonic devices like "da-DUM" for iambic and "DUM-da" for trochaic meter to scan lines in author trivia quiz rounds. According to the Poetry Foundation, practicing with familiar lines - "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" - reinforces your sense of rhythm. A quick rhythmic tap helps you answer meter-based literary quiz questions with confidence.

  3. Key Poet Biographies -

    Summarize each poet's life in a two-sentence snapshot: birth era, major work, and influence (Britannica). Knowing that Wordsworth championed nature poems during the Romantic era or that Dickinson wrote nearly 1,800 untitled lyrics gives you context clues in questions for poets. Bite-size bios speed up recall when the clock is ticking.

  4. Essential Literary Devices -

    Spot devices like metaphor, enjambment, and alliteration to answer literary quiz questions faster. For example, "Hope is the thing with feathers" uses metaphor (Cornell University Library), so naming the device becomes almost automatic. Highlighting one device per line in practice sessions trains your eye for trivia rounds.

  5. Answering Strategies -

    Approach multiple-choice author trivia quiz items by eliminating outliers, then matching themes or keywords to your pre-memorized list of poets. Create a mini "cheat sheet" of signature lines - e.g., "Do not go gentle" for Dylan Thomas - so you can cross-reference quickly. This tactic turns tough anthology quiz questions into manageable challenges.

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