Customer Reviews

GRE Literature in English (REA) - The Best Test Prep for the GRE (GRE Test Preparation)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

When REA (Research & Education Association) released its initial version of GRE LITERATURE IN ENGLISH in 1989, I bought it to prepare myself for that test. I was not particularly impressed with the organization or the lack of suggestion as to how to best make use of the material presented. Still, authors Beard, Kennedy, Liftig, and Malek included six full length exams with explanations. That was 230 x 6 or 1,380 test prep questions. I took the test and scored middlingly. Years later, I learned to "psyche" out the test and was surprised to discover a new and supposedly updated version. In this newer version, Malek cuts down the number of tests from 6 to 3. Nearly every one of the regurgitated questions is a reprint from nearly 15 years ago, thus ensuring that this text does not reflect any of the major changes in test content during that time. What Malek does try is to emulate the far more successful paradign put out by the Princeton Review's CRACKING THE GRE LITERATURE by codifying the vast array of western literature: genres, timelines, book and author lists, literary terms, schools of literary criticism, etc. The problem is that Malek did not do half as thorough a job as the Princeton Review did. Malek does little more than to use an overly broad brush to skim a distressingly long list of required readings without giving any hint as how to best do that. True, neither did the Princeton Review, but at least the latter presented a methodology that was reasonable. This is not to say that Malek's updated text is useless. Anything, no matter how scant, that prepares you for a mind-numbing test has its uses, but if you insist on using Malek, you might prefer to go to the library to find the 1989 version that gives more preparation than its more recent cousin. By the way, Malek's test questions themselves: many of them are so outlandish that one is amazed that he thinks ETS will ask such trivia.

You have been warned.

It seems the flurry of GRE prep book reviews were in 2001, but since ETS hasn't updated the test since then, none of the major publishers have come out with a new book. I've tried both this one and McMullen's Princeton Review book, and Princeton's is far superior. I usually don't write reviews, but I feel morally compelled to prevent you from spending your money on this book.

Comparisons aside, even if I had never laid eyes on any test prep book before, I would recognize REA's book for the shoddy and unprofessional publication it is. A good example is the exact same question that appeared twice in the same practice exam. Most publishers prefer to edit their books before publication, but clearly REA has their own awful way of doing things.

Half of the practice exams more closely resemble the AP English Literature test than the GRE, with questions that test high school favorites, distracter choices that border on satire to the extent that they are incorrect, and (IMHO) more obvious references to Satan (in Paradise Lost) than an Ozzfest concert. Honestly, I half-expected to see a John Grisham quotation on their practice exams. The other half of the questions test material only specialists would be expected to know. Many questions focus on knowing obscure vocabulary (NOT literary terms) and plot details that would never appear on a real test. (Can you remember if King Arthur gave his sword to Sir Bedivere or Sir Galahad? You think ETS cares?) Also, in a surprising twist, these practice tests were even MORE Eurocentric than the ETS-authored sample tests I've taken. (One question asks you to identify Frederick Douglass not as a memoirist or author, but simply as "an escaped slave.")

If you're like me, and you think maybe you'll just get the book for the practice exams because the ETS book is out of print, think again! Honestly, you'd be better off with Norton anthology flashcards. (If they made them.)

I just took the 1998 Subject test last week, and I can tell you it does not at all resemble the practice tests in this book. Although this book has a 1997 copyright date, I discovered after months of studying and stressing out that it contains practice tests which are clearly extremely out of date. I took four of the six tests in the book and scored in the 50-60th percentile each time. This surprised me since I have quite a good background in English lit. So I set to work cramming all kinds of obscure authors and literary terms. Then I got the official practice book from the ETS, and surprise! It contained a very different practice test, with much more contemporary questions on literary theory, non-canonical writers, etc. I sat down and took that practice test and scored in the 99th percentile! All that pain for nothing...Don't make the mistake I made! Find another practice book, and make sure it contains test questions similar to those in the official ETS book.

Save your money on this dog of a test guide and instead, check out the Magill Masterpieces of World Literature, ed. by Frank Magill. Well written, concise, pertinent, and more timely for what the test covers. Good luck.

This awful book receives two stars from me only because of the serious paucity of other study guides for this exam. I won't say that it was completely useless--going through all the practice tests did alert me to some areas that I needed to review, and prepared me well in advance for the stress of the 230-questions-in-170-minutes format--however, as other reviewers point out, this was accomplished with the maximum pain and minimum impartation of useful information possible. The explanations to the (hair-splitting, uninformed) questions were generally more frustrating than the questions themselves, and were often amibiguous when not downright incorrect. I did poorly on all three practice tests, and while this may have been helpful in that it spurred me to more and more panicked last-minute study, I can't say that unnecessary fear and rage are particularly desirable additions to my GRE experience. If you are knowledgeable about literature, skip this book or be prepared to throw it down and gnash your teeth on a regular basis. If you are already using the book, don't despair: I scored a good 220 points higher on the real test than on any of the practice tests in this book (the Princeton review practice test and the one that ETS sends with registration were much better predictors of my actual score). You are probably much smarter than this poorly written book will make you feel. My advice is to stick with the Princeton Review book, which is much friendlier and more accurate (though it needs a few more practice tests and some updating in the contemporary lit. and criticism sections) and to read, read, read those Nortons. If you do decide to use this book for the reasons mentioned above, just remember that it REALLY does not reflect the difficulty or quality of the actual test questions.

As part of my preparation for taking the GRE Literature Subject Test, I bought this book, in addition to McMullen's "Cracking the GRE Literature" and the official ETS study guide. My advice: save your money and buy the latter two books, the "Best Test Prep" is nothing of the sort, providing no strategies for reviewing for the Test. Instead, the reader gets six exams that inaccurately reflect the questions most likely to appear on the test. Read the McMullen book or the ETS book for a better reflection of what the actual test will look like. The reading list, for all its prodigious length (seven pages) actually seems inadequate for reviewing for the test.

I did, however, find the explanations for each question in the book useful and if nothing else, the book provides a wealth of questions and answers on English, American, and World Literature to supplement your study elsewhere. Borrow it from a friend rather than buying it.

I'm with many of the other reviewers: stick with the Princeton Review's test prep, and the Norton Anthologies. This book is trash. I'm infuriated that it's considered a valid study guide and continues to be published. Here's a sample practice test question:

Which three elements best define Post-Modernism?

a) Randomness, excess, discontinuity
b) Flashback, fragmentation, humor
c) Nature, faith, solidity
d) Immorality, sense of loss, meaninglessness
e) Montage, metaphor, absurdity

I was longing for an answer choice f) that might read "One adjective from each of the above. A pastiche of the pre-existing choices."

The Research and Education Association lists a) as the correct answer. If you buy this book, you'll be answering questions that would never be asked on the GRE in English Literature, and you'll be scouring the answer choices for the incorrect answer that the slip-shod REA would call correct.

REA, the publishers of this wreched thing, claims that this book differs from other GRE Lit test books in that it "presents test that accurately depict the official exams in both degree of difficulty and types of questions." Of course, the aspiring graduate student of litterature should have a discerning eye for rhetoric, and this case, this particular piece of rhetoric most closely resembles sarcasim.

To wit: this is a bad book. The kinds of questions, the types of questions, and the explanations provided for the questions are not only not representative of what the actual test looks like, but many of the questions and explanations are just plain wrong. Who wrote "An Atatomy of the World"? Ask REA, and they're bound to tell you that this poem is "indicative of Dryden's poetic genius." It's a nice line, again, but it's wrong (A: John Donne). Little pieces of misinformation sprinkled amongst the the equally innane and copious aracana of this book make it an irritating piece of fiction.

There aren't many test prep books for the GRE Lit test out there. This book contains three tests. Seriously studying from this book might augment your knowledge of lesser known (and tested) topics, and it might, in the end, temper your expectations (these tests are HARD), but apart from this, I can find no redeeming qualities in this book.

You need this book if you are studying for the Literature GRE.

A couple things about this book:
1) Yes, the review chapters are not very good.
2) Yes, you will do relatively poorly on the practice tests. They are pickier and more difficult than the actual exam.
3) Yes, the seven-page reading list at the beginning is something of a joke, although you should really only be using it to pick out the handful of authors you know nothing about to see which of their books might be worth skimming.
4) Yes, the "explanations" for why an answer is correct or not is lacking, and the de-emphasis on literary theory is a bit out of date.

However, the book's been a bit unjustly maligned by other reviewers, some of whom seem a bit bitter that they did badly on its (completely meaningless) practice tests. The fact is, having three full-length practice tests for the Literature GRE, when the Princeton Review book contains only one, is worth the cost of the book alone. You simply need to cover the broadest range of stuff possible in studying, and this book, by its very nit-pickiness, will help make you aware of some holes in your knowledge you didn't know you had. (In my case, early American, where I wouldn't have even known half the names to look up to find more about.)

My advice is not even to score the tests; seriously, it will depress you. But take them! And after each one, go through answer by answer with a reference like the Norton Anthology or Oxford Companion to British Literature in your other hand, and look up each and every answer choice you didn't know (whether it was correct or incorrect). You will cover a lot of ground very quickly, and it will make a difference on the actual exam. That is a smart way to use this book.

Also if you are studying for this exam, read (or re-read) King Lear. Now. Forget that the Princeton Review book tells you not to read any Shakespeare.

The review material and explanations were scarce and hardly helpful. The test questions ignored many aspects of the test (including grammar questions and general theory questions) while stressing elements that are not tested on the real ETS version of the test. In fact many of the questions I found many of the test questions to be illogical compared to the real test (In a few cases more than one answer could have been arguably the correct answer).

Another aspect of this book that I found annoying was the layout; many of the questions and/or passages were cut off and continued on the next page. This is extremely annoying and distracting while your taking the "practice" tests.

The only redeeming quality of this book is that it will give a literary workout of sorts--even if its not giving you questions that might be found on the real GRE Lit test. I suggest going for the Princeton Review book following their advice and taking their test as a diagnostic. Also, take the test that the ETS sends to get an accurate picture of what the test will be like.