Part 2: Summarizing Central Ideas about Elizabethan England — Quiz
Question 5 • British Literature and Composition
Read the excerpt from The Time Traveler's Guide to Elizabethan England. Perhaps the most difficult thing to come to terms with is the scale of death. Influenza, for example, is an affliction which you no doubt have come across. However, you have never encountered anything like Elizabethan flu. It arrives in December 1557 and lasts for eighteen months. In the ten-month period August 1558 to May 1559 the annual death rate almost trebles to 7 point 2 percent (normally it is 2 point 5 percent). More than 150,000 people die from it—5 percent of the population. This is proportionally much worse than the great influenza pandemic of 1918–19 ( 0 point 5 3 percent mortality). Another familiar disease is malaria, which Elizabethans refer to as ague or fever. Which sentence best helps readers determine the central idea of the paragraph?
Answer
A
“Perhaps the most difficult thing to come to terms with is the scale of death.”
B
“However, you have never encountered anything like Elizabethan flu.”’
C
“Influenza, for example, is an affliction which you no doubt have come across.”
D
“Another familiar disease is malaria, which Elizabethans refer to as ague or fever.”
Explanation
The paragraph’s central idea is that death and disease were widespread and severe in Elizabethan England. The opening sentence states this idea directly: “Perhaps the most difficult thing to come to terms with is the scale of death.” The details about influenza and its high death rate support that main point; the sentence about malaria begins a new example.
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