Past Exam Questions - OEE

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Separation 'Wulf is on iege, ic on oþerre.' (Wulf and Eadwacer)

[Wulf is on one island; and I on another].

Discuss closeness AND/OR separation.

4B20

Transcience

'Þæs ofereode, ðisses swa mæg'. (Deor)

[That passed away; so may this].

Discuss attitudes to transience AND/OR the role(s) of the poet.

4B20

'Forþan nis naht þysses middangeardes wlite and þysse worulde wela; he is hwilendlic and yfellic and forwordenlic' (Vercelli Homily X).

[And so this world's beauty and this world's wealth is nothing; it is fleeting and evil and damnable.]

To what extent does this statement fully represent the attitudes to material objects that you have found in the early medieval literature you have read?

4120 - 13

Sorrow

'O all ye that pass by the way, attend, and see if there be any sorrow like to my sorrow' (BIBLE, Douay-Rheims translation, Lamentations 1:12)

4B20

'Time is lived. It is full of attachments and desires, histories and futures [...] Sleep and sorrow exemplify that our lived sense of time can differ from the measured time of successive linear intervals' (CAROL DINSHAW)

4120-13

Fate

'Fate is simply the name we give after the event to innumerable individual decisions that people make about their lives.' Discuss.

4120 - 13

'The grass withereth; the flower fadeth because the spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it. Surely the people is grass' (ISAIAH) How does Old English literature deal with forces or powers beyond human control?

4104

Interiority

Mæg ic be my sylfum soðgied wrecan,

siþas secgan, hu Ic geswincdagum

earfoðhwile oft þrowade.' (The Seafarer)

[I can tell a true song about myself, speak of journeys, how I suffered often a time of hardship through days of struggle].

Are the speaking characters of early medieval texts ever more than effects produced by artful rhetoric?

4120 - 13

'While the language of Old English literature may be highly wrought, its characters are one-dimensional.' Discuss with reference to any Old English texts.

4104