AccelePrep for the ACT Test 2nd Edition Student Text

C HAPTER 9 | T RY I T O UT ! R EADING P RACTICE • 169

exclamation marks, the rare use of “all” as an adverb, syncopation, and familial affection. In any case, Livingston might have been likelier to employ the anapestic style, but this does not mean that Moore never did so. Setting aside direct testimony of authorship and the analysis of form, an intriguing bit of evidence is names given in the poem, as originally published, to two of Saint Nicholas’ reindeer: Dunder and Blixem . The names are Dutch for thunder and lightning . Moore did not speak Dutch; Livingston’s mother, however, was Dutch. As intriguing as this point may be, it ignores the then-fashionable Knickerbocker movement ™Š‹…Š •‘—‰Š– –‘ ϐ‹† ƒ —–…Š „‡‰‹‹‰ ‹ ‡˜‡”›–Š‹‰ associated with New York. It would have been consistent with the prevailing style for the Troy Sentinel editor to change the German Donder and Blitzen to the Dutch equivalents. In fact, later emendations to the poem, in Moore’s own hand, changed the names back to the original Donder and Blitzen . Moore’s close friendship with the author Washington Irving, who was closely associated with the Knickerbocker trend, may also help to explain any other Dutch elements that are found ‹ Dz ‹•‹–Ǥdz —– –Š‡ —–…Š ‹ϐŽ—‡…‡ ’”‘˜‡• —…Š more. The Livingston family now claims that the poem was written by Henry Livingston around 1808, „—– –Š‡ ’‘‡…Ž‡ƒ”Ž› ”‡ϐŽ‡…–• –Š‡ Žƒ–‡” ‹ϐŽ—‡…‡ ‘ˆ Washington Irving, the New York Historical Society, and the Knickerbocker Movement, which date the poem to 1822, consistent with all the other evidence that Moore penned the classic verse. To be charitable to the Livingston family, perhaps the most likely explanation for the •‡‡‹‰Ž›…‘ϐŽ‹…–‹‰ ‡˜‹†‡…‡ ‹• –Š‡ —”‡Ž‹ƒ„‹Ž‹–› of human memory. Assuming that Livingston read to his children a special verse written in anapestic meter each year, it would not be inconceivable that a quarter of a century later, the then-adult children would have a recollection of the meter and Christmas theme. Upon hearing “A Visit,” the topical and stylistic similarities would make it easy –‘…‘ϐŽƒ–‡ Dz ‹•‹–dz ƒ† –Š‡ Š‘Ž‹†ƒ› ’‘‡• „› –Š‡‹” father.

Items #11–20 are based on the following passage. Humanities: This passage explores the authorship of the poem commonly known as “The Night Before Christmas.” “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” more commonly known as “The Night Before Christmas,” is a poem ϐ‹”•– ’—„Ž‹•Š‡† ƒ‘›‘—•Ž› ‹ ‡™ ‘”ǯ• Troy Sentinel on December 23, 1823, and attributed to Clement Clarke Moore, a professor of Oriental and Greek Literature, in 1837. In that year, Moore claimed authorship and explained that the poem had originally been written for his children and was later sent, without his knowledge, to the newspaper by a housekeeper. The poem was included in an anthology of Moore’s work in 1844. – •‡‡• ‹†‹•’—–ƒ„Ž‡ –Šƒ– –Š‡ ’‘‡ ϐ‹”•– ƒ’’‡ƒ”‡† on December 23, 1823, in the Troy Sentinel , that the manuscript originated in Moore’s home, and that the person giving the poem to the newspaper, without Moore’s knowledge, believed that it had been written by Moore. In 1859, however, 26 years after the poem ϐ‹”•– ƒ’’‡ƒ”‡† ‹ ’”‹–ǡ –Š‡…Š‹Ž†”‡ ‘ˆ ƒŒ‘” ‡”› Livingston, Jr., who was born in Poughkeepsie in 1748, claimed to have heard the poem recited by their father as early as 1807—sixteen years before the poem’s original publication and 37 years before Moore claimed authorship. The Livingston family also claimed to have found a copy of the poem with edits in Livingston’s hand in their father’s desk. There is no evidence that Livingston himself ever claimed authorship of the poem. No print record has ever been found with Livingston’s name attached to it. The manuscript claimed to have been found by Livingston’s family was allegedly destroyed in a Š‘—•‡ ϐ‹”‡Ǥ ‘‘”‡ǡ Š‘™‡˜‡”ǡ ’‡”•‘ƒŽŽ› ƒ†‡…‘’‹‡• of the poem in his own hand as favors for family members and friends. Like Moore, Livingston was an amateur poet with several publishing credits to his name. Unlike Moore, who wrote only one other poem in anapestic form, the meter of “A Visit,” Livingston frequently used the anapest. In fact, Livingston was apparently in the habit of writing a holiday poem for his children each Christmas using anapest verse. Many of them borrowed language and form from Christopher Anstey, an English poet who died in 1805, and so resemble “A Visit.” But, there is also considerable evidence in the poem to support Moore’s authorship: lighthearted, spontaneous-sounding mixed iambs and anapests,

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