Common Core: 11th Grade English Language Arts : Read and comprehend literature, including stories, dramas, and poems: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.10
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Example Questions
Example Question #10 : Common Core: 11th Grade English Language Arts
Passage adapted from Othello by William Shakespeare (1604)
IAGO: Three great ones of the city,
In personal suit to make me his lieutenant,
Off-capp'd to him: and, by the faith of man,
I know my price, I am worth no worse a place:
But he; as loving his own pride and purposes, 5
Evades them, with a bombast circumstance
Horribly stuff'd with epithets of war;
And, in conclusion,
Nonsuits my mediators; for, 'Certes,' says he,
'I have already chose my officer.' 10
And what was he?
Forsooth, a great arithmetician,
One Michael Cassio, a Florentine,
A fellow almost damn'd in a fair wife;
That never set a squadron in the field, 15
Nor the division of a battle knows
More than a spinster; unless the bookish theoric,
Wherein the toga’d consuls can propose
As masterly as he: mere prattle, without practise,
Is all his soldiership. But he, sir, had the election: 20
And I, of whom his eyes had seen the proof
At Rhodes, at Cyprus and on other grounds
Christian and heathen, must be be-lee'd and calm'd
By debitor and creditor: this counter-caster,
He, in good time, must his lieutenant be, 25
And I—God bless the mark!—his Moorship's ancient.
The speaker’s attitude toward Michael Cassio in the bolded and underlined lines can best be described as __________.
resentful but calm
aggrieved and detached
reverent and admiring
envious and indignant
envious and indignant
The correct answer is “envious and indignant.” The speaker (Iago) makes it clear that he has not been chosen for a position in the military, and that Cassio has been selected instead. Iago is not merely upset and angry; he is envious of Cassio’s success, and wishes it for himself. Moreover, Iago notes that Cassio has little actual military experience, and is indignant about this fact, deriding Cassio for his book-learning (Cassio is “a great arithmetician” rather than a great soldier). Iago is certainly aggrieved and resentful, but he is neither detached nor calm.
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