Macbeth Test Study Guide

Macbeth Test

20 Matching characters with a description of them
10 Matching literary terms with the definition
25 True/False about the play
10 Matching the quote with who said it
20 Fill-in-the-blank Questions
40 Four essay questions

125 points ‡ 112 – 125 = A
100 – 111 = B
88 – 99 = C
75 – 87 = D


Quotes to Know:

Lady Macbeth: “Out damned spot! Out, I say!”

“But screw your courage to the sticking place and we’ll not fail!”

“Here’s the smell of the blood still; all the perfumes of Arabia
will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh!

The Witches: “Fair is foul and foul is fair.”

“Double, double, toil and trouble; fire burn and cauldron bubble.”

Macbeth: “Had I but died an hour before this chance, I had lived a blessed
time; for, from this instant, there’s nothing serious in mortality; All is but toys; renown and
grace is dead; The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees is left this vault to brag of.”

“I have lived long enough; my way of life is fall’n into the sear,
the yellow leaf; And that which should accompany old age, as
honor, love, obedience, troops of friends…”
“Out, out, brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor
player, that struts and frets his hour upon stage and then is
heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and
fury, signifying nothing.”

Malcolm: “We will perform in measure, time, and place; So thanks to all at once and to each one,
whom we invite to see us crowned at Scone.”

Banquo: “Oh, treachery! Fly, Fleance! Fly, fly, fly!”


Literary Terms


soliloquy: characters speaks his (lengthy) thoughts; onstage people can’t hear

aside: character speaks briefly to the audience; people onstage cannot hear

verse drama: a play that is almost all poetry with a fixed pattern of rhythm

blank verse: poetry which is UNRHYMED but has regular rhythm

iambic pentameter: metrical line of five feet, each made up of two syllables (first stressed, the second unstressed)

metaphor: comparison that does NOT use like or as

dramatic irony: appears true to characters, but audience knows is false

foreshadowing: the dropping of important hints by the author

theme: the central idea in a piece of literature

comic relief: a humorous episode that interrupts the (often intense) regular action of the play





Fill-in-the-Blank Review:

Shakespeare’s hometown: Stratford-upon-Avon

Shakespeare married: Anne Hathaway

Shakespeare’s theater: The Globe

Setting of Macbeth: 11th century Scotland

Performed in: Elizabethan time period

In 1613 Shakespeare’s theater burned down.


Class notes: