The Merchant of Venice Summative Test and Answer Key

Conclude a unit on William Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice with this fifty-question test delivered in Word Document and PDF formats. (Alternatively, a self-grading Google Drive option is available.) An answer key is included. This assessment is divided into four sections and breaks down as follows.

Part 1. Knowledge of Plot. Students will demonstrate comprehension of the following:

• Antonio's general demeanor in the opening Act

• Bassanio's personal motivations

• Antonio's relationship with Bassanio

• The conditions under which Portia may marry

• Shylock's distinguishing characteristic

• Shylock's deal with Antonio

• Why Launcelot wishes to sever ties with Shylock

• Gratiano's distinguishing characteristic

• Jessica's commitment to Lorenzo

• Jessica's crime against her father

• Bassanio's participation in the casket-choosing game

• Portia's perception of Antonio

• The Duke's sympathetic inclinations toward Antonio

• Antonio's resignation to fate

• Characters in disguise

• Gratiano's gift to Portia

• Portia and Nerissa's planned deception

Part 2. True/False and Either Or. Students will identify whether a statement is true or false, or they will identify the correct option between two choices. Questions focus on:

• The deed from Shylock

• Antonio's characterization

• Nerissa's disguise

• Shylock's stubbornness

• What Bassanio discovers inside his chosen casket

• Salerio and Solanio's reaction to news of Antonio's lost ship

• Balthazar's role

• Morocco's general characterization

• Old Gobbo's condition

• Launcelot's role

Part 3. Quotations in Context. Students will match an excerpt with its appropriate context.

• Act 1, scene 1: Your mind is tossing on the ocean, / There, where your argosies with portly sail, / Like signors and rich burghers on the flood— / Or, as it were, the pageants of the sea— / Do overpeer the petty traffickers / That curtsy to them, do them reverence / As they fly by them with their woven wings...

• Act 1, scene 2: ...such a hare is madness the /youth…

• Act 2, scene 1: I would not change this hue, / Except to steal your thoughts, my gentle queen.

• Act 2, scene 2: ...I am famished in / his service; you may tell every finger I have with / my ribs.

• Act 2, scene 2: Mark me now; now I will raise the waters...

• Act 2, scene 7: Gilded tombs do worms enfold.

• Act 3, scene 3: But, since I am a dog, beware my fangs…

• Act 4, scene 1: So please my lord the duke and all the court / To quit the fine for one half of his goods, / I am content…

• Act 5, scene 1: ...watch me like Argus.

Part 4. Application of Literary Devices. Students will be given a detail or excerpt from the drama and must determine which literary device is best reflected. Literary devices addressed include:

• Hyperbole

• Personification

• Allusion

• Euphemism

• Oxymoron

• Pun

• Epistrophe

• Metaphor

• Simile