Macbeth Summative Test and Answer Key

Item description

Conclude a unit on Shakespeare’s Macbeth with this Word Document test (a PDF version is also provided). An answer key is included. This fifty-question assessment is divided into four sections and breaks down as follows.

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

• The opening scene
• Macbeth’s new title
• Macbeth’s companion when first encountering the witches
• Lady Macbeth’s concerns about her husband
• A murderous plot
• Macbeth’s hallucinations
• Why Duncan’s sons are suspected of murdering their father
• Macbeth’s plan to betray a friend
• Lady Macbeth’s ironic reaction to having power
• Macbeth’s declining psychological state
• The reason for Hecate’s agitation
• Malcolm’s plan to test Macduff’s loyalty
• The death of Macduff’s family
• The effect of Macbeth’s absence on his wife
• Lady Macbeth’s sleepwalking
• How Macbeth perceives his generals
• The death of Lady Macbeth
• Macduff’s victory of Macbeth
• The promise of a brighter future

Part 2. Quotations in Context. Students will match an excerpt with its appropriate context.

• Act 1, scene 2: For brave Macbeth—well he deserves that name— / Disdaining fortune, with his brandish’d steel, / Which smoked with bloody execution, / Like valour’s minion carved out his passage / Till he faced the slave…
• Act 1, scene 4: …nothing in his life / Became him like the leaving it…
• Act 1, scene 4: I have begun to plant thee, and will labour / To make thee full of growing.
• Act 2, scene 2: My hands are of your color, but I shame / To wear a heart so white.
• Act 3, scene 2: What’s done is done.
• Act 3, scene 3: Thou mayst revenge!
• Act 3, scene 5: And, which is worse, all you have done / Hath been but for a wayward son, / Spiteful and wrathful, who, as others do, / Loves for his own ends, not for you.
• Act 4, scene 1: Though you untie the winds and let them fight / Against the churches, though the yeasty waves / Confound and swallow navigation up, / Though bladed corn be lodged and trees blown down, / Though castles topple on their warders’ heads, / Though palaces and pyramids do slope / Their heads to their foundations, though the treasure / Of nature’s germens tumble all together, / Even till destruction sicken, answer me / To what I ask you.
• Act 5, scene 5: …Our castle’s strength / Will laugh a siege to scorn.

Part 3. 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:

• Macbeth’s early internal conflict
• The names of Duncan’s sons
• The nature of Duncan’s praise of Macbeth
• Macbeth’s “dearest partner in greatness”
• Lady Macbeth’s manipulation of her husband
• The bloodied murder weapons
• Macduff’s prediction for Macbeth’s kingdom
• Banquo’s dynamic character
• How Macbeth is affected by the murders over time
• The reason for Macduff’s desire for revenge

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:

• Allusion
• Metaphor
• Simile
• Personification
• Oxymoron
• Hyperbole
• Sibilance