William Shakespeare MCQs [English Literature & Famous Authors]

Collection of important MCQs on William Shakespeare

There are total _______ number of plays did Shakespeare write in all ?

(A) 60

(B) 38

(D) 20

Question’s Answer: 37

____ called Shakespeare “an upstart crow beautified with our

feathers”?

(A) John Lyly

(B) Robert Greene

(D) George Peele

Question’s Answer: Robert Greene

Who is the writer of the malicious pamphlet entitled “A Groat’s Worth of Wit Bought with a Million of Repentance” against Shakespeare?

(A) Thomas Kyd

(B) Robert Greene

(D) John Lyly

Question’s Answer: Robert Greene

Who ridiculed Shakespeare by saying that he knew “small Latin and less Greek”?

(A) Marlowe

(B) Sidney

(D) Ben Jonson

Question’s Answer: Ben Jonson

Who said,”Shakespeare has only heroines, and no heroes”?

(A) Ruskin

(B) Dr. Johnson

(D) T. S. Eliot

Question’s Answer: Ruskin

Aldous Huxley took the hint for the title of his novel Brave New World from

Shakespeare’s:

(A) A Midsummer Night’s Dream

(B) Winter’s Tale

(D) Antony and Cleopatra

Question’s Answer: Tempest

Shakespeare was born at Stratford-on-Avon. Stratford was the name of the town where

he was born. What was Avon?

(A) A high plateau on which Stratford was situated

(B) A hillock on which Stratford was situated

(D) A heath where Stratford was situated

Question’s Answer: A river on the bank of which Stratford was situated

Shakespeare’s King Lear was given a happy ending by one of the following playwrights. Identify the playwright:

(A) Nahun Tate

(B) Nathaniel Lee

(D) George Farquhar

Question’s Answer: Nahun Tate

“Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale.” About whom are these lines spoken ?

(A) Desdemona

(B) Cordelia

(D) Miranda

Question’s Answer: Cleopatra

Imogen is the main character and heroine of which of the following?

(A) Winter’s Tale

(B) Pericles

(D) Tempest

Question’s Answer: Cymbeline

Who is the author of the critical work Shakespeare’s Sonnets Reconsidered?

(A) E.M. Forster

(B) WH Auden

(D) Charles Lamb

Question’s Answer: Samuel Butler

“The greatest genius that perhaps human nature has yet produced, our myriad-minded

Shakespeare.” Who makes this observation?

(A) Hazlitt

(B) Coleridge

(D) Byron

Question’s Answer: Coleridge

Which was the last play written by Shakespeare?

(A) Cymbeline

(B) The Winter’s Tale

(D) Pericles

Question’s Answer: The Tempest

“Sweet are the uses of adversity.” This line is related to which play?

(A) The Merchant of Venice

(B) Romeo and Juliet

(D) As You Like It

Question’s Answer: As You Like It

“Frailty, thy name is woman !” This line is part of which play?

(A) Othello

(B) Macbeth

(D) Hamlet

Question’s Answer: Hamlet

“Neither a borrower nor a lender be;

For loan oft loses both itself and friend.” These lines are taken from Hamlet. Who is the speaker of these qoutations?

(A) Hamlet

(B) Laertes

(D) Polonius

Question’s Answer: Polonius

“There’s a divinity that shapes our ends,

Rough-hew them how we will.” These lines are taken from which of the following play?

(A) Hamlet

(B) Othello

(D) None of these

Question’s Answer: Hamlet

“Cowards die many times before their deaths, The valiant never tastes of death but once.” These lines are taken from which of the following play?

(A) Macbeth

(B) Othello

(D) Julius Caesar

Question’s Answer: Julius Caesar

………. Life’s a tale,

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Singnifying nothing.”

These lines are taken from which of the following play?

(A) King Lear

(B) Hamlet

(D) Macbeth

Question’s Answer: Macbeth

“This royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle, This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, This other Eden, demi-paradise, This fortress built by Nature for herself Against infection and the hand of war”

Who expresses these sentiments in Richard II?

(A) Richard II

(B) Bolingbroke

(D) Queen of Richard II

Question’s Answer: John of Gaunt

Who is the messenger of the Fairies in The Tempest?

(A) Ariel

(B) Juno

(D) Iris

Question’s Answer: Ariel

“We are such stuff

As dreams are made of, and our little life

Is rounded with a sleep.” Who is the speaker of these qoutations?

(A) Brutus

(B) Prospero

(D) Polonius

Question’s Answer: Prospero

“He was not of an age, but for all times; Nature herself was proud of his designs !”

Who is the author of Preface to Shakespeare?

(A) Dr. Johnson

(B) Matthew Arnold

(D) Coleridge

Question’s Answer: Dr. Johnson

Who is the writer of the critical book Characters of Shakespeare’s Plays?

(A) Addison

(B) Coleridge

(D) Hazlitt

Question’s Answer: Hazlitt

________ is the play in which the hero dies at the end of the Fourth Act, but the play

continues to the Fifth Act:

(A) Antony and Cleopatra

(B) Richard the Second

(D) King John

Question’s Answer: Antony and Cleopatra

________ is the play in which the hero and the heroine die together:

(A) Romeo and Juliet

(B) Othello

(D) Macbeth

Question’s Answer: Romeo and Juliet

Which is not a Roman play?

(A) Antony and Cleopatra

(B) Timon of Athens

(D) Coriolanus

Question’s Answer: Timon of Athens

Who praises Shakespeare in these words?

(A) Ben Jonson

(B) Spenser

(D) Dr. Johnson

Question’s Answer: Ben Jonson

“He was the man, who of all modern and perhaps ancient poets, had the largest

and the most comprehensive soul.”

Whose observation is this?

(A) Ben Jonson’s

(B) Robert Browning’s

(D) Dryden’s

Question’s Answer: Dryden’s

“Shakespeare is the grandest thing we have yet done…… Indian Empire will go, at any

rate, some day, but this Shakespeare does not go, he lasts for ever with us. We cannot

give up our Shakespeare.”

Who has that opinion?

(A) Ben Jonson

(B) Dryden

(D) Carlyle

Question’s Answer: Carlyle

In which year were Shakespeare’s Sonnets published?

(A) 1616

(B) 1598

(D) 1600

Question’s Answer: 1609

“Others abide our question Thou art free. We ask and ask-thou smilest and art still,

Out-topping knowledge.” These lines are written in praise of Shakespeare.

Who is the writer of them?

(A) Hazlitt

(B) Coleridge

(D) Tennyson

Question’s Answer: Matthew Arnold

“Soul of the age!

The applause! delight! the wonder of our stage!

My Shakespeare, rise.”

Who praises Shakespeare in these words?

(A) Dryden

(B) Spenser

(D) Dr. Johnson

Question’s Answer: Ben Jonson

What is Rape of Lucrece?

(A) A sonnet

(B) A narrative poem

(D) A narrative poem

Question’s Answer: A narrative poem

In which play does Hermione appear as the heroine ?

(A) Timon of Athens

(B) The Winter’s Tale

(D) Pericles

Question’s Answer: The Winter’s Tale

For what is the phrase ‘The Mousetrap’ used by Shakespeare in Hamlet?

(A) The Play within the Play in Hantlet

(B) The ghost of Hamlet’s father

(D) Hamlet’s Conscience

Question’s Answer: The Play within the Play in Hantlet

Dryden’s play All For Love is based on one of Shakespeare’s plays.

(A) Antony and Cleopatra

(B) Romeo and Juliet

(D) The Merchant of Venice

Question’s Answer: Antony and Cleopatra

The phrase “What’s in a name ?” is a part of which of the following?

(A) Othello

(B) Hamlet

(D) Romeo and Juliet

Question’s Answer: Romeo and Juliet

How many sonnets did Shakespeare write in all ?

(A) 40

(B) 170

(D) 154

Question’s Answer: 154

What is Shakespeare’s Venus and Adonais?

(A) A Narrative poem

(B) A Tragedy

(D) A Romance

Question’s Answer: A Narrative poem

To ____ , Shakespeare dedicate his first Narrative poem Venus and Adonais ?

(A) Earl of Southampton

(B) James I

(D) Ben Jonson

Question’s Answer: Earl of Southampton

According to _____, “The quality of mercy is not strained,

It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven, Upon the place beneath: it is twice blessed; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.”

(A) Portia’s

(B) Cordelia’s

(D) Desdemona’s

Question’s Answer: Portia’s

“The lunatic, the lover, and the poet

Are of imagination all compact”

quoted from A Midsummer Night’s Dream Who is the speaker of these qoutations?

These lines are

(A) Theseus

(B) Hippolyta

(D) Bottom

Question’s Answer: Theseus

William Shakespeare MCQs [English Literature & Famous Authors]

Famous English Authors MCQs

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