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AP English Literature and Composition 1.8 Passage Drill 5 218 Views
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AP English Literature and Composition 1.8 Passage Drill 5. Line 9 is best understood as all of the following except what?
- Product Type / AP English Literature
- Reading / Audience and Purpose
- English / Audience and Purpose
- Reading Literature / Analyze how author’s choices in structure create mystery, suspense, or surprise
- Reading Literature / Analyze how author’s choices in structure create mystery, suspense, or surprise
- Imagery and Figurative Language / Identifying uses of imagery
- Literary Comprehension / Identifying details about plot, setting, or characterization
Transcript
- 00:03
Here’s your shmoop du jour, brought to you by Fate. There’s no escaping it.
- 00:07
Unless you have MacGyver and Chuck Norris on speed dial.
- 00:18
Line 9 is BEST understood as all of the following EXCEPT… what?
- 00:23
And here are the potential answers…
- 00:29
Had enough of Line 9? We didn’t think so…
Full Transcript
- 00:33
This question wants us to interpret the line and determine which of the answer choices
- 00:36
is INcorrect.
- 00:38
Note the “EXCEPT” in the question. They even “all caps”ed it for us.
- 00:42
Okay, first let’s take one last look at Line 9:
- 00:45
Thou'art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men
- 00:48
Yikes. Doesn’t seem like we could squeeze four pieces of factual information out of
- 00:52
such a short line…
- 00:53
…but the question tells us that there’s only one rotten egg in the bunch…
- 00:57
Let’s… start sniffin’…
- 00:59
We’ll start with A – Death is often subject to the whims of man.
- 01:02
Well… kings are men, last we checked. And “desperate men” are tacked onto the end there.
- 01:08
So yeah – Death is a slave to kings and desperate men, who often make the decision
- 01:12
to take lives.
- 01:13
It’s good to be the king. B – Death is but a consequence of luck or war.
- 01:18
It’s hinted at a little more indirectly… but sure. The “kings and men” we mentioned
- 01:22
aren’t always just walking up to randoms and knifing them in alleyways.
- 01:26
War is where kings and men do a lot of their dirty work…
- 01:28
…and “fate” takes care of the “luck” part.
- 01:30
C – Death has no mastery of someone who willingly takes his life.
- 01:34
Nothing directly stated about suicide in this line either… but it goes without saying
- 01:38
that if a “desperate man” kills himself, Death can’t really do anything about it.
- 01:42
So C is out. D – Death is avoided by fate.
- 01:45
Ah – here’s our black sheep. Fate determines death, it doesn’t avoid it.
- 01:50
Just to be sure… E – Death is unpredictable.
- 01:52
Yup. The author is implying that death can occur randomly… so there’s certainly some
- 01:56
unpredictability in the mix. Answer: D
- 01:58
As in, “Dead giveaway.”
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