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Quiz: How much can you remember about the Leaving Cert English poetry syllabus?

“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood…”

FOR SOME OF us, it may be a long time ago. 

But even if it’s been decades, there’s a good chance you may remember the poets that were on the Leaving Cert English course. 

This quiz is about some of the evergreen poets that have appeared on the course over the years.

Best of luck. 

In the poem The Fish by Elizabeth Bishop, what does the narrator do with the fish in the end?
Vladimir Wrangel/Shutterstock
"And I ate it"
"And I let the fish go"

"And I told the fish I was free"
"And I brought the fish home"
Which poem by Robert Frost starts with these lines: "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, / And sorry I could not travel both"
Mending Wall
'Out, Out--'

The Road Not Taken
Acquainted With The Night
In which Keats poem would you find this line: "Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard, are sweeter"
Ode on a Grecian Urn
Ode to a Nightingale

To Autumn
La Belle Dame Sans Merci
Finish this line from WB Yeats' September 1913: "Romantic Ireland's dead and gone / It's with ___________ in the grave."
PA Images
Parnell
O'Connell

Emmett
O'Leary
At the beginning of Seamus Heaney's The Tollund Man, the narrator says that someday they will go to a European city beginning with the letter A. What city is that?
Michael Stephens/PA Images
Aarhus
Aberdeen

Athens
Amsterdam
Finish the title of this Sylvia Plath poem: "Black ______ in Rainy Weather"
Book
Look

Rook
Luck
In which Adrienne Rich poem would you find these lines: "We talk of people caring for each other / in emergencies - laceration, thirst - / but you look at me like an emergency"
Aunt Jennifer's Tigers
Trying to Talk With a Man

Living in Sin
Storm Warning
How about finishing the title of this poem by Emily Dickinson: "Hope" is the thing with ______
Liquor
Mammals

Religion
Feathers
"I'm just going outside and may be some time" is the first line of the poem Antarctica. Who wrote it?
Derek Mahon
Michael Longley

Paul Durcan
Patrick Kavanagh
Lastly, fill in the blank from the closing lines of Eavan Boland's The War Horse: "Of burned countryside, illicit braid: / A cause ruined before, a world ________."
Frayed
Betrayed

Afraid
Swayed
Answer all the questions to see your result!
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You scored out of !
Top Dog
Full marks, well done
Share your result:
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You scored out of !
Clever cat
Almost purrfect
Share your result:
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You scored out of !
Fintastic
A decent job
Share your result:
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You scored out of !
What are ewe doing?
Baaaaad
Share your result:
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You scored out of !
Turtely awful
A shell of a bad effort
Share your result:

 

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30 Comments
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    Mute Martin Crowe
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    Jan 29th 2021, 9:41 PM

    4/10. I blame Soundings.

    216
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    Mute Maria Monaghan
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    Jan 30th 2021, 12:03 AM

    @Martin Crowe: I got 2,

    20
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    Mute Trevor J Coonan
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    Jan 29th 2021, 10:39 PM

    5/10 but I can repeat it next year, right?

    131
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    Mute Joe Kennedy
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    Jan 29th 2021, 10:52 PM

    @Trevor J Coonan: how does a predicted grade sound instead Trev maybe?

    62
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    Mute Geraldine O'Riordan
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    Jan 29th 2021, 9:46 PM

    7/10. Not too bad for someone who left school in the last century..

    84
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    Mute John kane
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    Jan 29th 2021, 10:08 PM

    @Geraldine O’Riordan: Well yea. I’d hate to see the results of someone born in this century like

    34
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    Mute John Kieran
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    Jan 30th 2021, 12:06 AM

    @John kane: How so?

    23
    See 1 more reply ▾
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    Mute Motherofthree
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    Jan 30th 2021, 9:44 AM

    @John kane: maths next

    11
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    Mute Diana Walshe
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    Jan 30th 2021, 8:24 AM

    Most of those poets were not on the syllabus for me!

    69
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    Mute Dylan Cotter
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    Jan 30th 2021, 12:13 AM

    10/10. Where the f€#% was that level of recall when I was doing the actual Leaving

    72
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    Mute Mattress Dick
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    Jan 29th 2021, 10:10 PM

    Emily Dickinson was legendary. Only thing in modern times to compare to is Robert Smith, The Cure!

    47
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    Mute John kane
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    Jan 29th 2021, 10:13 PM

    @Mattress Dick: the cure are a tonic for the soul. So many great songs

    26
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    Mute John kane
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    Jan 29th 2021, 9:42 PM

    Never forget my first day of second year English class being told about Sylvia Plath’s death. Set the tone for all her poems

    63
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    Mute Fiona Fitzgerald
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    Jan 30th 2021, 4:55 PM

    @John kane: At least Soundings had several cheerful poems as well. The amount of poets who were depressed was unreal.

    2
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    Mute Seymour business
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    Jan 29th 2021, 11:52 PM

    How long until the verses of Shane McGowan make the syllabus. 6/10

    27
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    Mute Deirdre Branley
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    Jan 30th 2021, 11:03 AM

    Yep. Class of ’91. This is a more recent syllabus I think. Eavan Boland, Sylvia Plath, Seamus Heaney definitely weren’t in my old Soundings.

    24
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    Mute Sarah-J. Mc Hugh
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    Jan 30th 2021, 2:42 PM

    @Deirdre Branley: And in addition there were multiple cycles/groups in the new syllabus so not all these poets featured each year. I studied half of these.

    1
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    Mute Fiona Fitzgerald
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    Jan 30th 2021, 4:49 PM

    @Deirdre Branley: Same, I got 6/10 with a couple of lucky guesses, three of the poets I’d never heard of until now, but they sound worth reading.

    4
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    Mute Digdeepradioucc
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    Jan 29th 2021, 11:28 PM

    4/10 and I guessed them all except o’leary in the grave

    22
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    Mute Stephen Walsh
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    Jan 30th 2021, 11:28 AM

    Most of those poets or poems weren’t on Soundings

    15
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    Mute Dave McAuliffe
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    Jan 29th 2021, 10:52 PM

    I really believe my LC English teacher was a sadist.
    I went to an all boys school and he chose Emma for us

    31
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    Mute Jim Lingk
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    Jan 30th 2021, 9:57 AM

    @Dave McAuliffe: he was gay

    10
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    Mute Fiona Fitzgerald
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    Jan 30th 2021, 4:53 PM

    @Dave McAuliffe: You’d wonder all right. My year in secondary had to study Coriolanus while the boys’ school across the road got Romeo and Juliet that year. It didn’t stop them throwing eggs at us but we came up with strategies to dodge the bombardment, so maybe that was the plan.

    1
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    Mute Maria Clery-Breen
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    Jan 30th 2021, 10:20 AM

    6 not bad for someone who left school in 1966.

    11
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    Mute Paul Shepherd
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    Jan 30th 2021, 9:58 AM

    Surprised myself and got four. Might have done better if there had been a Christian brother hovering over me with a cane….

    8
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    Mute Bernard Biggar
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    Jan 30th 2021, 10:25 AM

    7/10 ! Not bad for someone who did his Leaving Cert sometime in the last Millennium!

    6
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    Mute Neuville-Kepler62F
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    Jan 30th 2021, 8:33 PM

    Poetry at school… all I can remember of the leaving cert year is my classmates getting a flogging for not knowing it …

    1789 … Poland legally banned corporal punishment in their schools.
    1989 … Ireland legally banned corporal punishment in their schools.
    Yep … 200 years later. Redress due for the many victims of corporal punishment.

    4
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    Mute Neuville-Kepler62F
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    Jan 30th 2021, 8:39 PM

    @Neuville-Kepler62F: Joe McAveety … survived.

    1
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    Mute ᴛᴏᴍ49
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    Jan 30th 2021, 12:09 PM

    6/10
    Loved English in school but I hated poetry

    2
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    Mute Ross Cleary
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    Jan 30th 2021, 12:51 PM

    Pure guesswork to get 4!either my English teachers were useless(cos I don’t remember any of those poems)or I was asleep for most of 6th year!I do remember the Ann and Barry books though,they were good loads of pictures

    2
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