JUPEB Literature in English
Past Questions
26+ verified Literature in English practice questions for JUPEB. Step-by-step worked answers in 5 Nigerian languages.
Literature in English topics (3)
Sample Literature in English practice questions
1. The sequence of events in a story, arranged to show cause and effect, is called the
- A. setting.
- B. plot.
- C. tone.
- D. theme.
Answer: B
AI Explanation
The plot is the structured arrangement of incidents, typically moving through exposition, rising action, climax, falling action and resolution. Setting is time and place, theme is the central idea, and tone is the author's attitude.
2. A story told by a narrator who knows the thoughts and feelings of all the characters and can move freely between them uses
- A. the third-person omniscient point of view.
- B. the third-person limited point of view.
- C. first-person narration.
- D. stream of consciousness.
Answer: A
AI Explanation
The omniscient ('all-knowing') narrator stands outside the story and has access to every character's mind. In third-person limited narration the narrator follows one character only; first-person narration uses 'I'; stream of consciousness records a character's unbroken flow of thought.
3. A character who changes significantly in the course of a novel, usually through experience, is described as
- A. a static character.
- B. a foil.
- C. a flat character.
- D. a dynamic (round) character.
Answer: D
AI Explanation
Dynamic or round characters develop and are shown from several sides; flat or static characters remain the same and are built on one trait. A foil is a character who contrasts with another to highlight qualities.
4. The point of greatest tension in a story, after which the conflict begins to be resolved, is the
- A. flashback.
- B. exposition.
- C. climax.
- D. denouement.
Answer: C
AI Explanation
The climax is the turning point where the conflict reaches its peak. Exposition introduces characters and setting, the denouement is the final unravelling after the climax, and a flashback is a return to earlier events.
5. The technique by which a writer gives hints of events that will happen later in the story is called
- A. flashback.
- B. irony.
- C. foreshadowing.
- D. suspense.
Answer: C
AI Explanation
Foreshadowing plants clues that prepare the reader for later developments, such as an omen or a proverb. Flashback looks backward, suspense is the anxiety the reader feels about what will happen, and irony is a contrast between expectation and reality.
6. A long work of prose fiction with a complex plot and developed characters is a
- A. novel.
- B. novella.
- C. fable.
- D. short story.
Answer: A
AI Explanation
A novel is the longest form of prose fiction, allowing many characters, sub-plots and themes. A novella is intermediate in length, a short story can be read at one sitting and usually has a single effect, and a fable is a brief tale with a moral, often using animals.
7. A story in which characters, events and settings stand for abstract ideas or moral qualities, so that it can be read on two levels, is called
- A. a satire.
- B. an allegory.
- C. a biography.
- D. a picaresque novel.
Answer: B
AI Explanation
An allegory carries a hidden meaning beneath the surface narrative, as when animals on a farm represent political figures. Satire ridicules folly to correct it, a biography records a real life, and a picaresque novel follows the adventures of a roguish hero.
8. The main character of a story, whose fortunes the reader follows, is the
- A. antagonist.
- B. narrator.
- C. confidant.
- D. protagonist.
Answer: D
AI Explanation
The protagonist is the central figure; the antagonist opposes them. The narrator tells the story and may or may not be a character in it, and a confidant is a character to whom the protagonist reveals thoughts.
9. When a writer reveals character through what other characters say about a person, and through the person's own actions and speech rather than by direct statement, the method is called
- A. direct characterisation.
- B. caricature.
- C. authorial intrusion.
- D. indirect (dramatic) characterisation.
Answer: D
AI Explanation
Indirect characterisation lets the reader infer traits from behaviour, dialogue and others' reactions. Direct characterisation states traits explicitly ('he was a greedy man'), authorial intrusion is the narrator commenting on the story, and caricature exaggerates traits for comic effect.
10. A novel that traces the growth and education of its protagonist from childhood to maturity is described as
- A. a gothic novel.
- B. an epistolary novel.
- C. a bildungsroman.
- D. a historical novel.
Answer: C
AI Explanation
Bildungsroman (German for 'novel of formation') follows the moral and psychological development of a young person. An epistolary novel is told through letters, a historical novel is set in a real past period, and a gothic novel deals in terror and the supernatural.
11. An unreliable narrator is one who
- A. tells the story in a way the reader cannot fully trust because of limited knowledge, bias, immaturity or deliberate deception.
- B. is a minor character.
- C. tells the story in the third person.
- D. knows everything about all the characters.
Answer: A
AI Explanation
A child narrator, a madman or a self-justifying criminal may distort events, and the reader must read between the lines. Recognising the gap between what the narrator says and what actually happens is central to interpreting such novels.
12. The general atmosphere or feeling that a prose passage creates in the reader, such as gloom or joy, is its
- A. motif.
- B. mood.
- C. diction.
- D. syntax.
Answer: B
AI Explanation
Mood is the emotional climate of a work, created through setting, imagery and diction. Diction is word choice, syntax is sentence structure, and a motif is a recurring element that supports a theme.
13. A speech in which a character, alone on stage, speaks his or her thoughts aloud to the audience is called
- A. an aside.
- B. a soliloquy.
- C. a dialogue.
- D. a chorus.
Answer: B
AI Explanation
The soliloquy reveals a character's inner mind while no other character is present. An aside is a brief remark to the audience that other characters on stage are assumed not to hear; dialogue is speech between characters; the chorus is a group commenting on the action.
14. A play in which the protagonist, a person of high standing, is brought to ruin through a fatal flaw or error of judgement is a
- A. tragedy.
- B. melodrama.
- C. comedy.
- D. farce.
Answer: A
AI Explanation
Aristotle described tragedy as arousing pity and fear through the fall of a great person because of hamartia (error) and often hubris (excessive pride). Comedy ends happily, farce relies on improbable situations and physical humour, and melodrama uses exaggerated emotion and stereotyped characters.
15. The term 'dramatic irony' describes a situation in which
- A. two characters speak at the same time.
- B. the ending is unexpectedly happy.
- C. the audience knows something important that a character on stage does not.
- D. a character says the opposite of what he means.
Answer: C
AI Explanation
Dramatic irony creates tension because the audience can see the significance of words or actions that the character cannot, as when a king vows to punish a murderer who is himself. Verbal irony is saying the opposite of what is meant.
16. Written instructions in the text of a play describing movements, gestures, setting and tone, usually in italics or brackets, are called
- A. the epilogue.
- B. the prologue.
- C. the plot summary.
- D. stage directions.
Answer: D
AI Explanation
Stage directions guide directors, actors and readers on how the play is to be staged and are not spoken. The prologue is an introductory speech before the action, and the epilogue is a concluding speech after it.
17. The moment in a tragedy when the protagonist recognises the truth about himself or his situation is known as
- A. catharsis.
- B. anagnorisis.
- C. peripeteia.
- D. hubris.
Answer: B
AI Explanation
Anagnorisis (discovery or recognition) often coincides with peripeteia, the reversal of fortune. Hubris is the pride that leads to the fall, and catharsis is the purging of pity and fear experienced by the audience at the end.
18. A play that mixes serious and comic elements, often ending happily after tragic possibilities, is called
- A. a morality play.
- B. a masque.
- C. a pantomime.
- D. a tragicomedy.
Answer: D
AI Explanation
Tragicomedy blends the two modes so that grave situations are resolved without catastrophe. A masque is a courtly spectacle with music and dance, a morality play personifies virtues and vices, and a pantomime is performed through gesture without words or, in Britain, as a Christmas entertainment.
19. The major divisions of a play are called
- A. acts.
- B. stanzas.
- C. cantos.
- D. chapters.
Answer: A
AI Explanation
A play is divided into acts, which are subdivided into scenes. Chapters belong to prose fiction, stanzas to poetry, and cantos to long narrative poems.
20. The struggle between opposing forces that drives the action of a play is called
- A. characterisation.
- B. resolution.
- C. conflict.
- D. exposition.
Answer: C
AI Explanation
Conflict may be external (between characters, or between a character and society, fate or nature) or internal (within a character's mind). Without conflict there is no dramatic tension; exposition introduces it and resolution settles it.
21. A character whose function is to provide comic relief in an otherwise serious play, and who often speaks uncomfortable truths, is typically the
- A. fool or clown.
- B. hero.
- C. messenger.
- D. villain.
Answer: A
AI Explanation
The fool lightens tension and, under cover of jest, comments on the folly of the powerful. Comic relief prevents the audience from becoming numb to tragedy and often sharpens it by contrast.
22. In traditional African drama, the use of song, dance, drumming, masquerade and audience participation illustrates the concept of
- A. the well-made play.
- B. the theatre of the absurd.
- C. the fourth wall.
- D. total theatre.
Answer: D
AI Explanation
Total theatre integrates all performance arts into one experience and breaks down the separation between performers and audience, as seen in festival drama and in plays that draw on Yoruba or Igbo ritual. The fourth wall is the imaginary barrier between stage and audience in realistic Western drama.
23. A brief speech made by a character directly to the audience, which other characters on stage are supposed not to hear, is called
- A. an interlude.
- B. a soliloquy.
- C. an aside.
- D. a monologue.
Answer: C
AI Explanation
The aside shares a character's private reaction with the audience in the middle of a scene while others are present. A soliloquy is delivered alone on stage, a monologue is a long speech to other characters, and an interlude is a short entertainment between acts.
24. The 'three unities' of classical drama, derived from Aristotle by Renaissance critics, require unity of
- A. tragedy, comedy and history.
- B. action, time and place.
- C. actor, director and audience.
- D. plot, character and theme.
Answer: B
AI Explanation
Unity of action means a single main plot without sub-plots, unity of time confines the action to about one day, and unity of place keeps it in one location. Shakespeare and most modern dramatists ignore these rules.
25. Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions that follow. 'Papa did not look up when I came in. He was bent over the ledger as he had been bent over it every evening of my childhood, the kerosene lamp throwing his shadow huge against the wall so that the small, stooped man at the table seemed to have a giant standing guard behind him. I put the envelope beside his elbow. He did not touch it. "University," he said at last, and the word sat between us like a third person neither of us had invited. Then he closed the ledger, very gently, the way you close the eyes of the dead, and I understood that the money for my fees and the money for the shop's new roof were the same money, and that he had already decided which of us would go without.' (a) From whose point of view is the passage narrated, and what is the effect of this choice? (4 marks) (b) Explain the significance of the description of the father's shadow. (4 marks) (c) Identify the figure of speech in 'the word sat between us like a third person neither of us had invited' and explain what it conveys about the relationship. (4 marks) (d) What does the narrator 'understand' at the end of the passage, and how does the writer make this moment moving? (8 marks)
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