Where does the reference come from?
Grade 9 Reading Worksheet - Challenge Me
Circle the best answer.
Read this first
Source card (written by PencilGo)
About 1513 Niccolò Machiavelli wrote The Prince, advice to rulers. It says that to keep power a ruler may need cunning and deceit instead of goodness. “Machiavellian” now describes cold, scheming tactics.
Bo reads the source card. Which sentence uses the allusion the way the source supports?
- Reading The Prince made the club a Machiavellian group, since each member borrowed a copy from the library.
- The senator’s Machiavellian plan quietly set each rival against the next, so that her own hands stayed clean.
- The coach’s Machiavellian rule that phones stay in lockers was posted on the gym door for the whole team to read.
- The mayor was called Machiavellian because she ruled with open honesty and hid no plan from the town.
Source card (written by PencilGo)
In George Orwell’s novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), the ruling Party’s leader, Big Brother, appears on posters that say he is watching. Citizens are watched through screens and told what to believe.
Esme reads the source card. Which sentence uses the allusion the way the source supports?
- The coach’s older brother, a real Big Brother to the whole team, drove the carpool each morning.
- The librarian’s strict silence rule gave the room a Big Brother feel, though no one was ever watched, timed or recorded.
- The mayor’s Big Brother approach meant handing citizens every record and trusting them to check it themselves.
- The new cameras on every corner of the campus gave it a Big Brother feel, as if an unseen office logged each move.
At Waterloo in 1815, Napoleon suffered the defeat that ended his rule for good. Jun reads the source card. Which sentence uses the allusion the way the source supports?
- The team met its Waterloo in the opening game, then won the next nine games and the league title.
- The bakery met its Waterloo when the oven broke for an hour, but it reopened after lunch and sold out by evening.
- After forty straight wins, the champion met her Waterloo in one match and never entered another tournament.
- The general met his Waterloo by winning every battle of the campaign and retiring in peace at home.
Source card (written by PencilGo)
Paul Bunyan, in American tall tales, is a giant logger whose feats grow bigger with each telling: he digs lakes with his boots and eats pancakes by the acre.
Text A: Our class built a Paul Bunyan of a snowman, tall as the gym door and wide enough to need a tarp.
Text B: By the fourth retelling of the fish that almost got away, the story had gone full Paul Bunyan.Kira reads two short texts that use the same source. How do the two texts use it differently?
- A borrows the giant size and treats it with delight; B borrows the way the tales swell with each retelling and treats it as exaggeration.
- A borrows the way the tales swell with each retelling and treats it as exaggeration; B borrows the giant size and treats it with delight.
- A is about a real logger who built a snowman; B is about a real fish that the logger almost caught.
- Both borrow the giant size of the logger and treat it with delight in a good-natured way.
Source card (written by PencilGo)
Horatio Alger wrote popular novels in the 1800s in which poor boys rise to success through hard work and luck. “A Horatio Alger story” now means a rise from poverty to success.
Text A: From a rented stall to three bakeries: the owner’s Horatio Alger story fills the local paper.
Text B: Politicians love a Horatio Alger story because it suggests that hard work lifts anyone; the data on wages says otherwise.Luz reads two short texts that use the same source. How do the two texts use it differently?
- A questions whether the promise of such a rise holds for most people; B celebrates one person’s rise through hard work.
- Both celebrate a rise from poverty as proof that hard work pays off for people in the town.
- A is about a novel written by Horatio Alger; B is about a politician who wrote novels.
- A celebrates one person’s rise through hard work; B questions whether the promise of such a rise holds for most people.
Source card (written by PencilGo)
In Edmond Rostand’s play Cyrano de Bergerac (1897), Cyrano, a brilliant poet, writes beautiful love letters for a handsome friend who cannot write them, and stays hidden behind the words.
Text A: The ghostwriter behind the mayor’s best speeches is a Cyrano: brilliant with words, unseen, and content to let someone else take the bow.
Text B: In the group chat, the friend who wrote everyone’s apology texts was a Cyrano, except that nobody’s heart was in the words.Milo reads two short texts that use the same source. How do the two texts use it differently?
- A admires a gift for words and staying unseen; B borrows the writing for others to question whether the words are sincere.
- A is about a man with a long nose; B is about apology texts sent by hand.
- Both treat the writer as a fraud who deceives the people who read the words.
- A borrows the writing for others to question whether the words are sincere; B admires a gift for words and a willingness to stay unseen.
Source card (written by PencilGo)
In Thomas More’s Utopia (1516), a traveler describes an island where property is shared and people have enough. The name comes from Greek words that can mean “no place.”
Text A: Our city planners dream of a utopia of bike lanes and green roofs.
Text B: Remember that “utopia” means no place; this plan has no budget.Noah reads two short texts that use the same source. How do the two texts use it differently?
- Both treat utopia as a real city that exists today and can be visited by travelers.
- A borrows the dream of a perfect place; B borrows the name’s meaning, “no place”, to doubt that the plan can exist.
- A describes an island in a book; B describes a budget in the same book.
- A borrows the name’s meaning, “no place”, to doubt that the plan can exist; B borrows the dream of a perfect place.
Source card (written by PencilGo)
In Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Romeo climbs into a moonlit garden to declare his love to Juliet, who stands on her balcony.
Passage: Our class’s Romeo sent a text that said “u up?” from his couch and left the balcony empty.Pia reads the passage and the card. What does the allusion show about the writer’s attitude?
- It praises the classmate as a great romantic who woos with grand gestures, since he is called a Romeo by the class.
- It tells the reader that the classmate climbed to a balcony to speak with someone.
- It shows that the writer dislikes romance of any kind and thinks that texting is silly.
- It sets a grand romantic scene beside a lazy text, so the writer mocks the little effort of this “Romeo”.
Source card (written by PencilGo)
Sherlock Holmes, in Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories, is a detective who solves puzzles by noticing small clues that others miss.
Passage: Our school’s Sherlock Holmes spent two periods searching for the missing sandwich and found it in his own backpack.Ren reads the passage and the card. What does the allusion show about the writer’s attitude?
- It shows that the student hid the sandwich on purpose to look clever in front of the whole class.
- It praises the student as a great detective who solved the case of the missing sandwich with great skill and speed.
- It says that the student wore a detective’s cap and carried a magnifying glass around school.
- It sets a famous skill at finding clues beside a blunder, so the “detective” becomes the butt of the joke.
Source card (written by PencilGo)
In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby (1925), Jay Gatsby stares across the water at a green light on a dock, a sign of the dream he longs to reach.
Passage: Every morning the student stared across the cafeteria at the green light of the vending machine, a Gatsby waiting for the last bag of pretzels.Zee reads the passage and the card. What does the allusion show about the writer’s attitude?
- It says that the vending machine sits on a dock across the water from the cafeteria wall.
- It sets a grand longing beside a snack, so the writer teases the student over pretzels.
- It praises the student for holding a dream as deep and serious as the one Gatsby held for years.
- It suggests that the student will lose the pretzels the way Gatsby lost his dream in the end.