French Poetry: The Great Poets

Question 1

Question 1 : Which poet wrote "The Lake", a romantic elegy on the passage of time?

Possible answers:

Alphonse de Lamartine
Alfred de Musset
Victor Hugo
Alfred de Vigny

Answer

Alphonse de Lamartine published "The Lake" in his Poetic Meditations in 1820, an emblematic poem of French Romanticism.

Question 2

Question 2 : Who wrote the collection "Les Fleurs du mal", censored upon its publication in 1857?

Possible answers:

Paul Verlaine
Charles Baudelaire
Arthur Rimbaud
Stéphane Mallarmé

Answer

Charles Baudelaire published Les Fleurs du mal in 1857, a collection condemned for offending public morals but which became foundational for modern poetry.

Question 3

Question 3 : Which symbolist poet wrote "The Drunken Boat" at the age of 16?

Possible answers:

Paul Verlaine
Gérard de Nerval
Arthur Rimbaud
Lautréamont

Answer

Arthur Rimbaud composed The Drunken Boat in 1871, a visionary poem that revolutionized French poetry.

Question 4

Question 4 : Who is the author of the famous poem "Tomorrow, at dawn" dedicated to his daughter Léopoldine?

Possible answers:

Alphonse de Lamartine
Alfred de Musset
Théophile Gautier
Victor Hugo

Answer

Victor Hugo wrote this poem in tribute to his daughter Léopoldine, who drowned in 1843. It appears in Les Contemplations.

Question 5

Question 5 : Which Pléiade poet wrote "Mignonne, let us go see if the rose"?

Possible answers:

Pierre de Ronsard
Joachim du Bellay
Clément Marot
François Villon

Answer

Pierre de Ronsard, prince of Renaissance poets, composed this famous ode to Cassandra around 1545.

Question 6

Question 6 : Who wrote "Art poétique" with the famous verse "Music above all else"?

Possible answers:

Stéphane Mallarmé
Paul Verlaine
Théodore de Banville
José-Maria de Heredia

Answer

Paul Verlaine published his Art poétique in 1884, a manifesto of symbolist poetry advocating the musicality of verse.

Question 7

Question 7 : Which Symbolist poet wrote "The Afternoon of a Faun", which inspired Debussy?

Possible answers:

Théophile Gautier
Leconte de Lisle
Paul Verlaine
Stéphane Mallarmé

Answer

Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-1898) publie L'Après-midi d'un faune en 1876. Ce poème symboliste évoquant les rêveries d'un faune inspira à Debussy son célèbre Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune (1894).

Question 8

Question 8 : Which Romantic poet wrote the cycle "The Nights", a lyrical dialogue with the Muse?

Possible answers:

Théodore de Banville
Alphonse de Lamartine
Alfred de Vigny
Alfred de Musset

Answer

Alfred de Musset (1810-1857) écrit Les Nuits entre 1835 et 1837, quatre poèmes (Mai, Août, Octobre, Décembre) qui mettent en scène un dialogue entre le Poète et la Muse après sa rupture avec George Sand.

Question 9

Question 9 : Which 19th century poet wrote "Les Chimères", a collection including "El Desdichado"?

Possible answers:

Gérard de Nerval
Théophile Gautier
Leconte de Lisle
Sully Prudhomme

Answer

Gérard de Nerval published Les Chimères in 1854, hermetic and esoteric sonnets of great beauty.

Question 10

Question 10 : Who wrote "Le Pont Mirabeau" with the refrain "May night come, may the hour strike"?

Possible answers:

Paul Valéry
Guillaume Apollinaire
Jules Supervielle
Saint-John Perse

Answer

Guillaume Apollinaire composed Le Pont Mirabeau, a melancholic poem about lost love, published in Alcools in 1913.

Question 11

Question 11 : Which medieval poet wrote "The Ballad of the Hanged Men" before his supposed execution?

Possible answers:

Charles d'Orléans
Rutebeuf
François Villon
Christine de Pizan

Answer

François Villon composed this poignant ballad, also called Villon's Epitaph, around 1462, a masterpiece of medieval poetry.

Question 12

Question 12 : Who wrote "Paroles" including the famous poem "Barbara"?

Possible answers:

Raymond Queneau
Jacques Prévert
Boris Vian
Jean Cocteau

Answer

Jacques Prévert published Paroles in 1946, a popular collection including Barbara, a poem about war and love.

Question 13

Question 13 : Which Parnassian poet wrote "Les Trophées", a collection of perfect sonnets?

Possible answers:

Leconte de Lisle
Théodore de Banville
Sully Prudhomme
José-Maria de Heredia

Answer

José-Maria de Heredia published Les Trophées in 1893, 118 polished sonnets representing the Parnassian ideal.

Question 14

Question 14 : Who wrote "The Graveyard by the Sea", a meditation on death and creation?

Possible answers:

Paul Valéry
Paul Claudel
Saint-John Perse
Francis Ponge

Answer

Paul Valéry composed The Graveyard by the Sea in 1920, a philosophical poem on death facing the Mediterranean.

Question 15

Question 15 : Which Martinican poet wrote "Notebook of a Return to the Native Land", a founding work of Négritude?

Possible answers:

Frantz Fanon
Édouard Glissant
Léopold Sédar Senghor
Aimé Césaire

Answer

Aimé Césaire (1913-2008), poète et homme politique martiniquais, publie Cahier d'un retour au pays natal en 1939. Avec Senghor, il fonde le mouvement de la négritude, revendication de l'identité noire.

Question 16

Question 16 : Who wrote "Happy he who, like Ulysses, has made a fine voyage"?

Possible answers:

Pierre de Ronsard
Clément Marot
Joachim du Bellay
Maurice Scève

Answer

Joachim du Bellay composed this nostalgic sonnet in Les Regrets (1558), expressing his homesickness while in Italy.

Question 17

Question 17 : Which poet wrote "Liberté", a resistance poem with "I write your name"?

Possible answers:

Louis Aragon
Paul Éluard
René Char
Robert Desnos

Answer

Paul Éluard composed Liberté in 1942, a poem dropped by the RAF over occupied France, symbol of the Resistance.

Question 18

Question 18 : Which Resistance poet wrote "Leaves of Hypnos", a poetic journal from the French Resistance during World War II?

Possible answers:

Jean Cocteau
André Breton
Robert Desnos
René Char

Answer

René Char (1907-1988), résistant sous le nom de capitaine Alexandre, tient ce journal poétique entre 1943 et 1944. Il y mêle fragments philosophiques et récits de la guerre clandestine.

Question 19

Question 19 : Which poet received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1960 for his work "Amers"?

Possible answers:

Paul Claudel
René Char
Saint-John Perse
Yves Bonnefoy

Answer

Saint-John Perse (Alexis Leger) received the Nobel in 1960 for his poetic work including Amers, Anabase and Éloges.

Question 20

Question 20 : Who wrote "Les yeux d'Elsa", a collection dedicated to his muse Elsa Triolet?

Possible answers:

Paul Éluard
André Breton
René Char
Louis Aragon

Answer

Louis Aragon published Les yeux d'Elsa in 1942, a collection celebrating his love for Elsa Triolet during the Occupation.

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