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American Literature CLEP Practice Test
1) In which work does James Madison propose that a republican government control
factions?
A) The History and Present State of Virginia
B) History of the Dividing Line
C) The Federalist
D) Of Plymouth Plantation
E) Journal
2) Henry David Thoreau is perhaps best known for Walden, which detailed his independent
journey to become one with nature. However independent he claimed to
be, though, others of his time criticized him for:
A) Living with his mistress on Walden Pond
B) Plagiarizing accounts from other writers of the time
C) Ridiculing transcendentalism to his cronies in private
D) Failing to live purely off the land, as he purported; he did go into town for
supplies as he needed them
E) Running away from a bear and refusing to learn how to fish on Walden Pond
3) _________ is known as the father of the American short story.
A) James Fenimore Cooper
B) Edgar Allan Poe
C) Ralph Waldo Emerson
D) Henry David Thorough
E) Washington Irving
4) This realist is famous for his stories about factory workers:
A) Paul Lawrence Dunbar
B) Henry James
C) Mark Twain
D) Upton Sinclair
E) Stephen Crane
5) This female author of the realist movement is known for her writings on women
and their place in society:
A) Kate Chopin
B) Rebecca Harding Davis
C) Ellen Glasgow
D) Edith Wharton
E) Alice Walker
6) A mentally retarded boy’s perspective is included in which 1929 novel?
A) The Sound and the Fury
B) The Grapes of Wrath
C) The Red Badge of Courage
D) Catcher in the Rye
E) To Kill a Mockingbird
7) This passage is from which famous modernist work:
Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question...
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit.
A) The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
B) The Scarlet Letter
C) A Farewell to Arms
D) Winesburg, Ohio
E) Four Quartets

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Our American Literature CLEP Study guide has 139 MORE test questions to help you get ready for the test!
CLEP Practice Test Answer Key:
1. C
2. D
3. E
4. D
5. A
6. A
7. A