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Mary Oliver - Quiz
Contributed by: Neal
  • 1. What is Mary Oliver's full birth name?
A) Mary Jean Oliver
B) Mary Janet Oliver
C) Mary Jane Oliver
D) Mary Josephine Oliver
  • 2. When was Mary Oliver born?
A) January 17, 1938
B) September 10, 1938
C) September 10, 1935
D) January 17, 1935
  • 3. When did Mary Oliver die?
A) September 10, 2019
B) September 10, 2015
C) January 17, 2015
D) January 17, 2019
  • 4. Which major literary prize did Mary Oliver win in 1984?
A) Pulitzer Prize
B) Christopher Award
C) National Book Award
D) Lannan Literary Award
  • 5. Which major literary prize did Mary Oliver win in 1992?
A) National Book Award
B) Pulitzer Prize
C) PEN New England Award
D) Pioneer Award
  • 6. Where was Mary Oliver born?
A) Bennington, Vermont
B) Maple Heights, Ohio
C) Austerlitz, New York
D) Provincetown, Massachusetts
  • 7. What was the profession of Mary Oliver's father?
A) Social studies teacher and athletics coach
B) Editor and publisher
C) Botanist and nature writer
D) Musician and orchestra conductor
  • 8. At what age did Mary Oliver begin writing poetry?
A) 15
B) 14
C) 17
D) 12
  • 9. In what year did Oliver attend the National Music Camp at Interlochen?
A) 1951
B) 1955
C) 1950
D) 1963
  • 10. What section of the National High School Orchestra was Oliver in at Interlochen?
A) String section
B) Percussion section
C) Woodwind section
D) Brass section
  • 11. Whose home did Oliver visit at age 17 in Austerlitz, New York?
A) Emily Dickinson
B) Edna St. Vincent Millay
C) Walt Whitman
D) Henry David Thoreau
  • 12. Who was Norma in relation to Edna St. Vincent Millay?
A) Mother
B) Cousin
C) Daughter
D) Sister
  • 13. Which universities did Oliver attend in the mid-1950s without receiving a degree?
A) Ohio State University and Vassar College
B) Bucknell University and Sweet Briar College
C) Harvard University and Yale University
D) Bennington College and Tufts University
  • 14. What was the name of Edna St. Vincent Millay's estate where Oliver worked?
A) Provincetown House
B) Maple Heights
C) Steepletop
D) Green Pastures
  • 15. What was the title of Oliver's first collection of poems, published in 1963?
A) New and Selected Poems
B) American Primitive
C) House of Light
D) No Voyage, and Other Poems
  • 16. How old was Oliver when her first collection of poems was published?
A) 28
B) 30
C) 25
D) 35
  • 17. Which university did Oliver teach at during the early 1980s?
A) Bennington College
B) Sweet Briar College
C) Bucknell University
D) Case Western Reserve University
  • 18. Which poetry collection won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1984?
A) Thirst
B) Winter Hours
C) American Primitive
D) House of Light
  • 19. What position did Oliver hold at Bucknell University in 1986?
A) Writer in Residence
B) Poet In Residence
C) Chair for Distinguished Teaching
D) Editor of Essays
  • 20. What position did Oliver hold at Sweet Briar College in 1991?
A) Margaret Banister Writer in Residence
B) Poet In Residence
C) Director of Creative Writing
D) Catharine Osgood Foster Chair
  • 21. Until what year did Oliver hold the Catharine Osgood Foster Chair at Bennington College?
A) 2001
B) 1995
C) 2009
D) 2004
  • 22. Which awards did Oliver win for her 1990 collection House of Light?
A) Christopher Award and L. L. Winship/PEN New England Award
B) Lannan Literary Award and Pioneer Award
C) Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award
D) Green Prize and Pulitzer Prize
  • 23. Which collection won the National Book Award in 1992?
A) House of Light
B) New and Selected Poems
C) American Primitive
D) Winter Hours
  • 24. In the poem 'When Death Comes', what does Oliver say she was married to all her life?
A) Amazement
B) Silence
C) Nature
D) The ocean
  • 25. In what year was the collection Why I Wake Early published?
A) 1990
B) 2004
C) 2006
D) 1999
  • 26. Which edition of Best American Essays did Oliver edit?
A) 2009
B) 2001
C) 1996
D) 1998
  • 27. Which organization gave Oliver the Pioneer Award for Sustainable Literature?
A) New York Times Literary Board
B) Santa Monica Public Library Green Prize
C) Lannan Foundation
D) PEN New England
  • 28. From which institution did Oliver receive an honorary doctorate in 2012?
A) Tufts University
B) Marquette University
C) Dartmouth College
D) The Art Institute of Boston
  • 29. From which institution did Oliver receive an honorary doctorate in 2008?
A) Marquette University
B) Tufts University
C) Dartmouth College
D) Ohio State University
  • 30. From which institution did Oliver receive an honorary doctorate in 2007?
A) Tufts University
B) Vassar College
C) Dartmouth College
D) Bucknell University
  • 31. From which institution did Oliver receive an honorary doctorate in 1998?
A) The Art Institute of Boston
B) Sweet Briar College
C) Case Western Reserve University
D) Marquette University
  • 32. Which publication called Oliver 'far and away, this country's best-selling poet' in 2007?
A) America magazine
B) The New Yorker
C) The New York Times
D) The Christian Science Monitor
  • 33. What is the principal setting for Oliver's work after she moved there in the 1960s?
A) Bennington
B) Austerlitz
C) Provincetown
D) Maple Heights
  • 34. Which two writers strongly influenced Oliver's work?
A) Whitman and Thoreau
B) Rumi and Hafez
C) Keats and Shelley
D) Emerson and Dickinson
  • 35. According to the 1983 Chronology of American Literature, American Primitive presents a new kind of what?
A) Transcendentalism
B) Realism
C) Romanticism
D) Modernism
  • 36. In her book Long Life, what does Oliver compare herself to on the map of the world?
A) A wandering star
B) A quiet shadow
C) A blue comma
D) A green dot
  • 37. What object did Oliver hide in the trees after finding herself in the woods without one?
A) Pens
B) Notebooks
C) Index cards
D) Pencils
  • 38. What size was the hand-sewn notebook Oliver often carried?
A) 2-by-3-inch
B) 4-by-6-inch
C) 5-by-8-inch
D) 3-by-5-inch
  • 39. Who compared Oliver to 'a patroller of wetlands in the same way that Thoreau was an inspector of snowstorms'?
A) Angela Alaimo O'Donnell
B) Maxine Kumin
C) Lisa Ampleman
D) Ruth Franklin
  • 40. Which historical poets did Oliver list as her favorites alongside Whitman, Rumi, and Hafez?
A) Dickinson, Poe, and Frost
B) Milton, Blake, and Donne
C) Emerson, Shelley, and Keats
D) Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Byron
  • 41. With which classic American poet has Oliver been compared due to a shared affinity for solitude and inner monologues?
A) Walt Whitman
B) Henry David Thoreau
C) Emily Dickinson
D) Edgar Allan Poe
  • 42. How does the Harvard Review describe Oliver's work in relation to social and professional lives?
A) As an antidote to inattention and baroque conventions
B) As a critique of traditional pastoral poetry
C) As a celebration of modern urban complexity
D) As an exploration of industrial isolation
  • 43. According to Lisa Ampleman in America magazine, how did Oliver's writing change as she grew older?
A) It became more politically radical
B) It became more and more spiritual
C) It focused increasingly on urban landscapes
D) It abandoned nature themes entirely
  • 44. What is the title of Oliver's collection of selected poems mentioned by Lisa Ampleman?
A) Devotions
B) Thirst
C) House of Light
D) Winter Hours
  • 45. Who noted that many poems in Oliver's collection would not feel out of place in an unconventional religious service?
A) Debra Dean Murphy
B) Maxine Kumin
C) Angela Alaimo O'Donnell
D) Ruth Franklin
  • 46. Who wrote a review of Oliver's 2006 collection Thirst in Fordham University's publication?
A) Lisa Ampleman
B) Ruth Franklin
C) Angela Alaimo O'Donnell
D) Debra Dean Murphy
  • 47. According to Angela Alaimo O'Donnell, Oliver's collection Thirst shows a movement toward a frank acknowledgment of what faith?
A) Jewish
B) Quaker
C) Christian
D) Buddhist
  • 48. Which poem by Oliver explores engagement with Scripture?
A) The Vast Ocean Begins Just Outside Our Church
B) When Death Comes
C) After Her Death
D) The Poet Thinks About the Donkey and Gethsemane
  • 49. Which two poems by Oliver explore imaginative engagement with Christ's life and words?
A) When Death Comes and Leaf and the Cloud
B) After Her Death and Coming to God: First Days
C) Six Recognitions of the Lord and The Poet Thinks About the Donkey and Gethsemane
D) American Primitive and House of Light
  • 50. According to Debra Dean Murphy, what has Oliver's work always been about pointing readers toward?
A) The pursuit of political reform
B) The gift of presence
C) The rejection of religious tradition
D) The critique of American capitalism
  • 51. In what decade did Mary Oliver meet Molly Malone Cook?
A) Late 1960s
B) Early 1950s
C) Early 1940s
D) Late 1950s
  • 52. What was Molly Malone Cook's profession?
A) Photographer
B) Poet
C) Publisher
D) Painter
  • 53. What role did Molly Malone Cook serve for Mary Oliver aside from being her partner?
A) Biographer
B) Editor
C) Literary agent
D) Publicist
  • 54. In what year did Molly Malone Cook pass away?
A) 2005
B) 2019
C) 2012
D) 2009
  • 55. Where did Mary Oliver move to live after leaving Provincetown?
A) Massachusetts
B) New York
C) California
D) Florida
  • 56. What tree does Mary Oliver specifically state she adores in 'Six Recognitions of the Lord'?
A) Red maple
B) White willow
C) Black oak
D) Silver birch
  • 57. Who directed the documentary Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World?
A) Maxine Kumin
B) Sasha Waters
C) Benjamin Myers
D) Alicia Ostriker
  • 58. What rating did the documentary Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World receive on Rotten Tomatoes?
A) 85% positive rating
B) 100% positive rating
C) 97% positive rating
D) 92% positive rating
  • 59. In what year was Mary Oliver diagnosed with lung cancer?
A) 2015
B) 2019
C) 2005
D) 2012
  • 60. What disease ultimately caused Mary Oliver's death?
A) Lymphoma
B) Lung cancer
C) Heart failure
D) Pneumonia
  • 61. How old was Mary Oliver when she died?
A) 83
B) 91
C) 86
D) 79
  • 62. Which critic numbered Oliver among America's finest poets and compared her to Emerson in a review for The Nation?
A) Sue Russell
B) Alicia Ostriker
C) Bruce Bennetin
D) William Logan
  • 63. Which collection of poetry did Alicia Ostriker review for The Nation?
A) Thirst
B) Six Recognitions of the Lord
C) Dream Work
D) American Primitive
  • 64. Who wrote that American Primitive 'insists on the primacy of the physical'?
A) Bruce Bennetin
B) Maxine Kumin
C) Angela Alaimo O'Donnell
D) Vicki Graham
  • 65. Who wrote that American Primitive 'touches a vitality in the familiar that invests it with a fresh intensity'?
A) William Logan
B) Holly Prado
C) Sue Russell
D) Diane S. Bond
  • 66. In regard to which poetry volume did Angela Alaimo O'Donnell discuss potential misperceptions of pantheism?
A) Our World
B) American Primitive
C) Dream Work
D) Thirst
  • 67. In The Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review, to whom did Sue Russell compare Mary Oliver to show Oliver was not writing as a contemporary lesbian balladeer?
A) Alicia Ostriker
B) Holly Prado
C) Marilyn Hacker
D) Maxine Kumin
  • 68. In The Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review, to whom did Sue Russell compare Mary Oliver to show Oliver was not writing as a political thinker?
A) Adrienne Rich
B) Diane S. Bond
C) Marilyn Hacker
D) Sasha Waters
  • 69. What book did Mary Oliver compile after Molly Malone Cook's death containing Cook's photos and journal excerpts?
A) Our World
B) American Primitive
C) Dream Work
D) Thirst
  • 70. Which foundation awarded Mary Oliver a Fellowship in 1980?
A) Harvard University
B) Lannan Foundation
C) Guggenheim Foundation
D) PEN New England
  • 71. In what year did Mary Oliver win the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry?
A) 1998
B) 1992
C) 1984
D) 1969
  • 72. In what year did Mary Oliver receive the Lannan Literary Award for poetry?
A) 1998
B) 2003
C) 1991
D) 1984
  • 73. What honorary membership did Mary Oliver receive from Harvard University in 2003?
A) Pulitzer Board
B) PEN New England
C) Poetry Society of America
D) Phi Beta Kappa
  • 74. In what year did Mary Oliver receive an Honorary Doctorate from Tufts University?
A) 2008
B) 2007
C) 1998
D) 2012
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