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AP English Literature and Composition 1.6 Passage Drill 5
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AP English Literature and Composition 1.6 Passage Drill 5. Death is primarily characterized as what?

AP English Literature and Composition 1.4 Passage Drill 3
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AP English Literature and Composition 1.4 Passage Drill 3. How is Burne's view of pacifism best characterized in lines 57 through 67?

AP English Literature and Composition 1.9 Passage Drill 4
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AP English Literature and Composition 1.9 Passage Drill 4. Lines 32-34 are best understood to mean what?

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AP English Literature and Composition 1.2 Passage Drill 5 242 Views


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AP English Literature and Composition 1.2 Passage Drill 5. What is being personified?

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Transcript

00:03

Here's your shmoop du jour, brought to you by the word "Canst." Because... we canst think

00:08

of anything better.

00:16

What is being personified?

00:18

And here are the potential answers...

00:25

Life... life... give our creation... LIIIIIIFE!!!

00:28

Yeah, any time we're faced with a personification question, we're pretty much playing Dr. Frankenstein.

00:33

There's something in this poem that is NOT a person, but the author is treating it as

00:37

if it IS one.

00:38

Let's go through our answer choices and see how everything shakes out...

00:41

Is "might" being personified?

00:44

Well, it... might. In this case, we're talking about the "power" version of might, not the... "maybe" kind.

00:50

The author does call Death "mighty and dreadful" on line 2...

00:53

...but, we just kinda answered our own question.

00:56

He's using "might" to describe something... so he's not making it a person.

01:00

What about pride?

01:01

Once again, we won't find the exact word, but we will find a form of it...

01:05

...right out of the gate, the poem reads: Death, be not proud...

01:08

But again, pride is used as a descriptor here -- not as a person.

01:12

C -- Death?

01:13

Yup. As often as we've seen Death depicted as the tall creepy guy holding gardening equipment...

01:19

...it isn't actually a real person. So, when the poem keeps referring to death like it's

01:22

a living, breathing dude -- how ironic... the author is personifying it.

01:27

Sleep and Pleasure, while mentioned, are also bogus answers.

01:30

C's our guy.

01:32

Not that... C is an actual guy...

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