Literature Subject GRE

[dolorelei]

Did anyone here study for the Lit Subject GRE without buying a bunch of prep books? I'm trying to do some smart-studying by analyzing my incorrect and skipped questions on the practice test, but my studying strategies are this:

- Reviewing trouble areas in the introductions, author notes, historical contexts etc in my different anthologies (Norton,

Comments

[dolorelei]

I may be making this all up in my head, but I thought I read on the GRE site that there weren't any testing dates for the subject test after 4/4 in my area. Maybe I'm wrong. I also might have over-estimated the amount of time that the testing people take to score and report. Whatever the reason, I signed up for this date and my money is already sunk into the exam.

When do most people take it?

[dolorelei]

Like I said, it's very possibly that I'm wrong. In any case, I'd say check their site for your area and be sure.

[apwoh]

I forgot to mention this one too: http://lasr.cs.ucla.edu/alison/hapaxlegomena/index.html

[dolorelei]

win!

[apwoh]

I have to be honest and say that one is so daunting that I mostly just skimmed it!

[dolorelei]

One of my strong points in test taking is that I can memorize stuff like this after looking over it once or twice. This is *perfect* format, I just don't know if I'll want to read the hundreds and hundreds of entries she seems to have created.

The amount of effort that went into this is astounding.

[saunders]

The New York Public Library Literature Companion is a good reference to have on hand--see if you can find a library copy. A high school teacher gave me a copy, and I basically dominated every lit question at quizbowl because of this book. While not exactly comprehensive, it's fantastic for the trivial details (like what novel Bigger Thomas is in or who wrote Eugene Onegin) and has good quick and dirty summaries of many novels. And, about 1/3 of the LitGRE is basically a trivia quiz.

[midnightglobe]

i got my hands on an old copy of ED Hirsch's dictionary of cultural literacy. i keep it in the bathroom and get a recognition level familiarity with a few entries every time i find myself sitting there for a couple minutes.

ymmv.

[greekdaph]

Check out this thread:
http://community.livejournal.com/wgi_lounge_2009/104094.html

Though it addresses a specific question, it also has some really helpful general tips. And I stand by the comment i wrote there--study old tests, study old tests, study old tests. I think it's the single most helpful thing you can do, not just to get an idea of what's on the test but to concretely prepare since so many questions repeat.

For what it's worth, the version of the test I was administered (October 2008) had only about 3 theory questions; some versions seem far more theory-heavy than others. A friend who took the test 3 years ago found it to be very medieval heavy, but I didn't have much of that, either.

Good luck!