Literature-In-English Exam Past Questions and Answers | JAMB, WAEC and NECO

Literature in English is the study of works written in the English language. It includes all forms of writing, such as novels, plays, short stories, and poetry. This subject involves exploring and analyzing these texts to understand their themes and meanings.

• Question 1301: In 'Vanity', Birage Diop portrays the African predicament as arising from Options:
  A) sad complaining voices of beggars
  B) pitiful anger bowing like a tumour
  C) not listening to the dead
  D) clamouring and crying roughly over our torments
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is C .
• Question 1302:

  This question is based on General Literary Principles

  A short, carefully phrased expression meant to elicit amusement and surprise is

  Options:
  A) hyperbole
  B) limerick
  C) tercet
  D) wit
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is D .
• Question 1303:

  This question is based on selected poems from D. Ker, C. Maduka et al (eds.): New Poetry from Africa, Wole Soyinka (ed.): Poems of Black Africa, K.E. Senanu and T. Vincent (eds.): A Selection of African poetry and E.W. Parker (ed.) A Pageant of Longer Poems.

  'The is my son, mine own Telemachus To whom I leave the scepter and the isle.'

  In the lines above from Tennyson's Ulysses', scepter' and 'isle' are a poetic device called

  Options:
  A) metonymy
  B) symbol
  C) allusion
  D) allegory
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is D .
• Question 1304:

  Using the name of one thing for something else with which it is closely associated in an instance is

  Options:
  A) paradox
  B) parody
  C) parallelism
  D) metonymy
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is D .
• Question 1305: This question is based on Ahmed Yerima's Attahiru.
  The play is about Options:
  A) resistance to British administration
  B) opposition to Christianity
  C) disunity among the Hausa state
  D) unity in the caliphate
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is A .
• Question 1306: In The Victims, the two old women play the role of Options:
  A) guardians of tradition
  B) eavesdroppers
  C) witches
  D) chorus
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is D .
• Question 1307: This question is based on Charles Dicken's Great Expectations.'In any case with the help of the loyal armed forces thank God, the incipient revolt had been quickly mastered, and the recalcitrant farmers had been finally persuaded back into fulfilling their patriotic duties of starving in order that the rulers might live and belch'. Kolera Koleji by Femi Osofisan The two most prominent weapons of satire in this passage are Options:
  A) understatement and hyperbole
  B) irony and metaphor
  C) simile and personification
  D) irony and understatement
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is D .
• Question 1308:

  In J.P Clark's Olokun', the line

  'So drunken like ancient walls'

  Means that the worshipers are drunken with

  Options:
  A) wine served at Olokun's altar
  B) sacred water since Olokun rules the sea
  C) bounties to be bestowned by Olokun
  D) intense awe of Olokun
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is D .
• Question 1309:

  'To see a world in a grain of sand
  And a heaven in a wild flower
  Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
  And eternity in an hour'
  - William Blake
  To see a World In a Grain of Sand.
  The predominant figure of speech used in the lines above is

  Options:
  A) metaphor
  B) simile
  C) paradox
  D) hyperbole
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is A .
• Question 1310:

  This question is based on Literary Principles

  ''She wanted to spit herself. But she checked herself. 'Get dressed,' she said earnestly. 'Get dressed and let's go You known I have a lot of things to do. And if we are going to meet again like this, ...'she slapped the Samson and Deliah.'''

  Festus lyayi: Violence

  In the passage above, the speaker can described as

  Options:
  A) domineering
  B) tyreacherous
  C) friendly
  D) hungry
  Show Answer
  The correct answer is A .