UPESSC Assistant Professor English 18-04-2026 Previous Year Question Paper

Match List-I with List-II:
List-I (Concept)
(a)  Dhvani
(b)  Rasa
(c)  Vakrokti
(d)  Auchitya
List-II (Associated Idea)
(I)  Suggestion as soul of poetry
(II)  Aesthetic experience
(III)  Oblique expression
(IV)  Appropriateness
Choose the correct answer from the codes given below-

According to I. A. Richards in Principles of Literary Criticism, the confusion that frequently undermines literary criticism arises from the critic’s tendency to treat evaluative language as though it described inherent properties of the artwork rather than responses generated in the reader.
Within the framework developed in “The Language of Criticism,” which of the following best captures Richards’ distinction between critical remarks and technical remarks?

Each essay in The Mechanical Bride typically begins with-

A Room of One’s Own was first published in-

Which of the following statements best describes the nature and significance of John Galsworthy’s drama in the early twentieth-century theatrical revolution?

________ claims that the older writers can produce nothing so courtly in wit, nor anything that expresses so much the conversation of a gentleman as Sir John Suckling; nothing so even, sweet and flowing as Mr. Waller; nothing so majestic, so correct as Sir John Denham; nothing so elevated, so copious and full of spirit as Mr. Cowley.

Which of the following statements are true?
(I) ‘Tintern Abbey’ deals with themes of nature and memory.
(II)  The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a supernatural narrative poem.
(III)  William Blake belongs to the Victorian Age.
(IV)  Thomas Gray is associated with the Graveyard School of poetry

Consider the following statements about Swami Vivekananda’s Chicago Address:
(I)  It was delivered in 1893 at the Parliament of Religions.
(II)  It begins with “Sisters and Brothers of America.”
(III)  It promotes religious intolerance.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

Match the essays with their first publication date:
List-I
(a)  The South Sea House
(b)  On Reading Old Books
(c)  Dream Children: A Reverie
(d)  The Convalescent
List-II
(I)  1825
(II)  1822
(III)  1820
(IV)  1821
Choose the correct answer from the codes given below-

Given below are two statements, one is labelled as Assertion (A) and the other as Reason (R)-
Assertion (A) : The syntactic component of grammar consists of rewriting rules and transformational rules.
Reason (R) : Rewriting rules generate base strings, while transformational rules derive new phrase-markers.
Select the correct answer from the codes given below-

Consider the following statements regarding Ferdinand de Saussure’s concept of the linguistic sign:
Statement I :  The linguistic sign consists of two inseparable components: the signifier and the signified.
Statement II :  According to Saussure, the linguistic sign is completely motivated and naturally connected to its meaning.
Statement III :  The immutability of the linguistic sign refers to the resistance of language signs to change due to social convention.
Statement IV :  The mutability of the linguistic sign indicates that language signs can change over time through historical and social processes.

Statement A :  Spirituality is the dominant theme in Walt Whitman’s “A Passage to India”.
Statement B :  In a Poem “A Passage to India”, the passage symbolizes, first, the physical exploration carried on by sailors and navigators, adventurers and explorers through railroad and steamship.
Choose the correct option-

The concept of ‘Intentional Fallacy’ was associated with

“I shall be ambitious to have it said of me, that I have brought philosophy out of closets and libraries, schools and colleges, to dwell in clubs and assemblies, at tea-tables and coffee-houses”
To whom is this quote attributed?

The phrase “weakness of your machete and your hoe” in Things Fall Apart metaphorically refers to-

In Kanthapura, the narrative technique primarily employed by Raja Rao reflects:

Which term in sociolinguistics refers to a language situation where two distinct varieties of the same language are used in a community, each with different social functions?

How did the experience of the First World War influence the literary sensibility of the Modern period (1920–1945)?

The allusion to “Jakke Straw and his meynee” in The Prologue to the Canterbury Tales most likely refers to-

Match List I with List II and select the correct answer using the code given below:
List-I (Poems)
(a)  ‘Enterprise’
(b)  ‘An Introduction’
(c)  ‘A River’
(d)  ‘Background, Casually’
List-II (Themes)
(I)  Critique of tradition and poetic indifference
(II)  Personal identity and confessional voice
(III)  Journey as a metaphor for human endeavour
(IV)  Autobiographical exploration of cultural identity
Choose the correct answer from the codes given below-

Match the poems with the central idea it explores:
List-I
(a)  Easter 1916
(b)  The Second Coming
(c)  A Prayer for My Daughter
(d)  Among School Children
List-II
(I)  Reflection on the unity of life and art
(II)  Political transformation and sacrifice
(III)  Parental anxiety and hope for moral stability
(IV)  Collapse of civilization and prophetic vision

Match List-I with List-II:
List-I (Play)
(a) Waiting for Godot
(b)  Look Back in Anger
(c)  The Birthday Party
(d)  Roots
List-II (Production House)
(I)  Royal Court Theatre, 1956
(II)  Theatre de Babylone, 1953
(III)  Royal Court Theatre, 1959
(IV)  Cambridge Arts Theatre, 1958
Choose the correct answer from the codes given below-

Which property of human language allows speakers to produce and understand an unlimited number of sentences from a finite set of elements?

Match List-I with List-II:
List-I (Work)
(a)  Sons and Lovers
(b)  The Power and the Glory
(c)  Lord of the Flies
(d)  The Sea, The Sea
List-II (Year)
(I)  1954
(II)  1913
(III)  1940
(IV)  1978
Choose the correct answer from the codes given below-

What argument does the speaker use to justify his love in John Donne’s ‘The Canonization’?

Given below are two statements, one is labelled as Assertion (A) and the other as Reason (R):
Assertion (A): The Proviso Scene in The Way of the World presents an idealized romantic love.
Reason (R): Millamant and Mirabell negotiate practical conditions for marriage.
Select the correct answer from the codes given below:

Which of the following pairs of plays and authors is incorrect?

T. S. Eliot’s Essay “Tradition and the Individual Talent” first appeared in The Egoist in-

Earlier, ________ criticism was devoted to reconstructing the past on the basis of historical evidence in order to determine to what extent a text is a truthful and accurate representation of social reality at a given time.

Nadine Gordimer’s essay “English Language, Literature and Politics in South Africa” primarily discusses ________.

________’s best fictional work has to do with what has been called “the matter of Hannibal” that is, his experiences as a child in the slaveholding state of Missouri and his years as a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi.

Statement I: In Of Revenge, Bacon argues that seeking revenge keeps a man’s mind liberated from past injury and guided for the future.
Statement II: In Of Regimen of Health, Bacon suggests that careful moderation and self-observation are essential for maintaining both physical and mental balance.
Which of the following options best describes the relationship between the two statements?

“The theme of the play lies in the way the Life Force works itself out in human affairs to improve the race. Shaw, a Lamarckian evolutionist influenced by Samuel Butler, believed that the Life Force cooperates with the individual will to achieve the further development of the human race.”

Identify the play to which these lines belong:

Lyrical Ballads was planned with _______ in 1797, when Wordsworth was living at Race down with his sister.

The political background of Absalom and Achitophel is most closely associated with which historical episode in English history?

“‘Justice’ was done, and the President of the Immortals, in Aeschylean phrase, had ended his sport with (her).”
It is the first sentence of the last paragraph in Thomas Hardy’s novel, _______

In the Renaissance era, ________ was considered the highest poetic form.

Who calls Yank a filthy beast in the play The Hairy Ape?

In Is India Civilized?, Sri Aurobindo challenges Western notions of civilization by asserting that:

________ is a dialogue in twenty chapters between the Reader and the Writer on the problem of Indian Independence.

In postmodern aesthetics, pastiche differs from parody because pastiche:

Shelley wrote Adonais as an elegy on the death of which poet?

In which novel by Anita Desai is Maya the central character?

The critical tradition extending from Samuel Johnson and _______ to T.S. Eliot and F. R. Leavis is known as the ‘Practical Criticism’ track.

With reference to Poetics by Aristotle, consider the following:
Assertion (A):  Aristotle privileges plot (mythos) over character (ethos), arguing that tragedy fundamentally imitates action (praxis) rather than individual agents, and therefore the structural arrangement of incidents determines the emotional and aesthetic effect of tragedy.
Reason (R):  Aristotle maintains that the tragic emotions of pity and fear arise primarily from the ethical qualities of characters, since tragedy is essentially a representation of moral character types.
Which of the following is correct?

Which is the season of the year described in the poem “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”?

‘Brahma’ has reference to _______

Which of the following statements best reflects the transformation in sensibility associated with the Romantic Period, as illustrated through Edward Gibbon’s response to Rome?

Which of the following best characterizes the intellectual and cultural condition of the High Victorian period (1830–1880)?

Pragmatics in stylistics is primarily concerned with:

Match List-I with List-II:
List-I
(a)  The Mystic Drum
(b)  Africa
(c)  Tizzic
(d)  Judas
List-II
(I)  Edward Braithwaite
(II)  Mervyn Morris
(III)  David Diop
(IV)  Gabriel Okara
Choose the correct answer from the codes given below-

According to ________, a text, whatever it may be, has no real existence until it is read.

Given below are two statements, one is labelled as Assertion (A) and the other as Reason (R)-
Assertion (A):  According to F.R. Leavis, poetry invites only intellectual judgment.
Reason (R):  Poetry demands a complex, lived response rather than mere thinking about words.
Select the correct answer from the codes given below-

The term ‘New Historicism’ was coined by

In Margaret Atwood’s Surfacing, the sign “MOTEL, BAR BIÈRE BEER” primarily signifies-

In “The Emperor of Ice-Cream” and “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird,” Stevens destabilizes metaphysical certainty by foregrounding the relationship between perception, mortality, and sensory immediacy.

Which of the following critical interpretations most precisely explains the shared philosophical structure of the two poems?

Which of the following consonant clusters can occur in the initial position of an English syllable according to the phonotactic constraints of English?

(a)  /pt/ as in ptake
(b)  /ŋl/ as in ŋlap
(c)  /str/ as in street
(d)  /dl/ as in dlip

Morphology differs from etymology in that:

Which of the following is NOT a characteristic feature of Restoration literature?

Everyday speech, where we use words in particular contexts, is what Ferdinand de Saussure called ________.

Statement A:  Henry Fielding’s Joseph Andrews parodied Samuel Richardson’s novel Pamela.
Statement B:  Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities is an autobiographical novel.
Choose the correct Answer from the code given below-

Which dramatic technique in Every Man in His Humour most strongly reflects Jonson’s classical orientation?

In Our Casuarina Tree, the central tree symbolizes:

Which character in The Spectator represents the country gentleman?

Given below are two statements, one is labelled as Assertion (A) and the other as Reason (R)-
Assertion (A):  In The Old Man and the Sea, Santiago’s struggle with the marlin represents the existential dignity of human perseverance even in the face of inevitable defeat.
Reason (R):  This is because Hemingway structures the narrative around the principle that true heroism lies not in victory but in endurance and moral courage.
Select the correct answer from the codes given below-

In My Place, how is the child narrator’s psychological state represented during her visits to the hospital?

Match List-I with List-II:
List-I
(a)  Your Attention Please
(b)  Summer of the Seventeenth Doll
(c)  House and Land
(d)  Oscar and Lucinda
List-II
(I)  Ray Lawler
(II)  Allen Curnow
(III)  Peter Carey
(IV)  Peter Porter
Choose the correct answer from the codes given below-

Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex (1949) has an important section on the portrayal of women in the novels of ________.

Which of the following statements most accurately reflects the dramatic method adopted by T. S. Eliot in Murder in the Cathedral?

Which poem by Robert Browning has the note, “Shortly after the revival of Learning in Europe”, at the beginning?