UGC NET December 2026 – English Paper II

Mock Test 9: Unit III – Fiction and Short Story

Examination Instructions

Subject

English – Paper II

Unit

Unit III: Fiction and Short Story

Total Questions

20 MCQs

Maximum Marks

40 marks

Suggested Time

25 minutes

All 20 questions are compulsory.
Each question carries 2 marks.
Each question has four options: (A), (B), (C), and (D). Choose the single most appropriate answer.
There is no negative marking in this practice test.
The paper includes factual, conceptual, matching, chronology, assertion–reason, statement-based, and passage-based questions.
These are original practice questions based on important syllabus areas. They are not actual or officially predicted UGC NET questions.

Section A: Multiple-Choice Questions

Question 1. (Early English Novel)

Which author wrote Evelina, a novel that explores the social experiences of a young woman entering fashionable London society?

(A) Frances Burney

(B) Aphra Behn

(D) Maria Edgeworth

Question 2. (Literary Concept: Epistolary Novel)

An epistolary novel is primarily characterised by:

(A) A story narrated exclusively by an omniscient narrator.

(B) A narrative presented through letters, diary entries, or other documents.

(D) A narrative that contains no communication between characters.

Question 3. (Assertion–Reason: George Eliot)

Assertion (A): George Eliot's novels often examine the moral consequences of individual actions within complex social relationships.

Reason (R): Eliot's fiction frequently combines psychological insight with detailed representations of community life and social obligations.

Choose the correct answer:

(A) Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A.

(B) Both A and R are true, but R is not the correct explanation of A.

(D) A is false, but R is true.

Question 4. (Match the Following: Authors and Works)

Match List I with List II.

List I: Author	List II: Work
1. Thomas Hardy	a. The Woman in White
2. Wilkie Collins	b. The Return of the Native
3. E. M. Forster	c. The Handmaid's Tale
4. Margaret Atwood	d. A Room with a View

Choose the correct code:

(A) 1–b, 2–a, 3–d, 4–c

(B) 1–a, 2–b, 3–c, 4–d

(D) 1–c, 2–d, 3–b, 4–a

Question 5. (Short Story: O. Henry)

Which statement best describes the narrative effect of the ending of O. Henry's “The Last Leaf”?

(A) It reveals that the central conflict was entirely imaginary.

(B) It reinterprets an apparently ordinary act as a profound sacrifice.

(D) It resolves the story through a supernatural transformation.

Question 6. (Narrative Technique: Omniscient Narration)

What is a major characteristic of third-person omniscient narration?

(A) The narrator can provide access to the thoughts and experiences of multiple characters and may offer broader commentary.

(B) The narrator is necessarily a minor character who witnesses only one event.

(D) The narrator must use the first-person pronoun “I” throughout.

Question 7. (Statement-Based Question: Modernist Fiction)

Consider the following statements about modernist fiction.

It often experiments with chronology and narrative structure.
It may emphasise subjective consciousness, memory, and fragmented experience.
It always follows a simple, strictly linear plot.
It frequently questions traditional ways of representing reality.

Which statements are correct?

(A) 1 and 2 only

(B) 1, 2 and 4 only

(D) 1, 2, 3 and 4

Question 8. (Indian English Fiction)

Who wrote The Guide, a novel featuring Raju, a tourist guide whose life develops through changing roles, personal failures, and spiritual expectations?

(A) Mulk Raj Anand

(B) R. K. Narayan

(D) Arun Joshi

Question 9. (Short Story: Nathaniel Hawthorne)

Nathaniel Hawthorne's fiction frequently explores:

(A) The moral and psychological consequences of guilt, sin, and secrecy.

(B) Scientific descriptions of space travel alone.

(D) The comic adventures of aristocrats without moral conflict.

Question 10. (Match the Following: Critical Terms)

Match each term with its most appropriate description.

List I: Term	List II: Description
1. Satire	a. A significant moment of sudden recognition
2. Epiphany	b. A narrative that exposes or critiques human folly and social abuses
3. Allegory	c. A character, event, or narrative with a second, often abstract meaning
4. Cliffhanger	d. A suspenseful interruption that leaves an outcome unresolved

Choose the correct code:

(A) 1–b, 2–a, 3–c, 4–d

(B) 1–a, 2–c, 3–d, 4–b

(D) 1–d, 2–b, 3–a, 4–c

Question 11. (Assertion–Reason: Magical Realism)

Assertion (A): Magical realism can present extraordinary or supernatural occurrences within an otherwise recognisable everyday world.

Reason (R): In magical realist fiction, extraordinary events are always explained away as dreams and are never treated as part of the narrative's reality.

Choose the correct answer:

(A) Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A.

(B) Both A and R are true, but R is not the correct explanation of A.

(D) A is false, but R is true.

Question 12. (Case Study: Characterisation)

Read the following passage:

Whenever the villagers gathered to discuss the damaged bridge, Arun remained silent. One evening, however, he spent the night repairing its weakest section, using his own tools and refusing payment. The next morning, he left before anyone could thank him.

Which conclusion is best supported by the passage?

(A) Arun is characterised indirectly through his actions and choices.

(B) Arun is characterised only through a narrator's explicit description of his appearance.

(D) Arun is necessarily an unreliable narrator.

Question 13. (Postcolonial Fiction: Cultural Identity)

Which novel by Jean Rhys reimagines the life of Bertha Mason, the Creole woman confined in the attic in Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre?

(A) Wide Sargasso Sea

(B) The Golden Notebook

(D) The Waves

Question 14. (Feminist Literary Criticism)

A critic examines how marriage laws, inheritance practices, and social expectations limit a female protagonist's independence. Which approach is most directly relevant?

(A) Feminist literary criticism

(B) Phonological analysis alone

(D) A purely chronological study of publication dates

Question 15. (American Fiction: John Steinbeck)

Which novel by John Steinbeck portrays the Joad family's migration during the Great Depression and exposes the hardship faced by displaced agricultural workers?

(A) The Grapes of Wrath

(B) The Great Gatsby

(D) Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Question 16. (Chronology: English Fiction)

Arrange the following novels in chronological order of their first publication, from earliest to latest.

Pamela — Samuel Richardson
Evelina — Frances Burney
Jane Eyre — Charlotte Brontë
The Time Machine — H. G. Wells

Choose the correct answer:

(A) 1, 2, 3, 4

(B) 2, 1, 4, 3

(D) 3, 2, 1, 4

Question 17. (Short Story: Saki)

Which short story by Saki is famous for its use of a fabricated hunting story and a final twist that exposes the listener's credulity?

(A) “The Open Window”

(B) “The Lottery”

(D) “The Garden Party”

Question 18. (Application-Based: Focalisation)

A story is narrated in the third person, but readers receive information only through the perceptions and knowledge of a young child. The narrator does not reveal facts beyond what the child can understand.

Which concept best describes this arrangement?

(A) Zero focalisation

(B) Internal focalisation

(D) Multiple narrators by definition

Question 19. (Contemporary Fiction: Narrative and History)

Which novel by Arundhati Roy explores family, social hierarchy, caste, and forbidden love in Kerala?

(A) The God of Small Things

(B) The Shadow Lines

(D) The Inheritance of Loss

Question 20. (Comprehension and Critical Interpretation)

Read the following passage carefully:

Each winter, the residents of a small coastal town painted the names of lost fishermen on the harbour wall. A developer proposed covering the wall with advertisements and building a modern shopping complex nearby. He argued that the town needed employment and investment. The fishermen's families did not reject development, but asked that the names remain visible. “The harbour is not merely a place where boats arrive,” one woman explained. “It is where our history returns to us.”

Which interpretation best captures the central conflict in the passage?

(A) The passage suggests that economic development and historical memory can never coexist.

(B) The passage explores the tension between commercial development and the preservation of collective memory and community identity.

(D) The passage presents the harbour only as a natural geographical feature without emotional significance.

Section B: Answer Key with Explanations

Q. No.	Correct Answer	Explanation
1	A	Frances Burney wrote Evelina (1778), which examines manners, class, social expectations, and a young woman's entry into London society.
2	B	An epistolary novel presents its narrative through letters, diaries, or related documents. Samuel Richardson's Pamela is a major example.
3	A	Eliot combines psychological analysis with detailed representations of social relationships and moral responsibility. The reason explains the assertion.
4	A	Thomas Hardy—The Return of the Native; Wilkie Collins—The Woman in White; E. M. Forster—A Room with a View; Margaret Atwood—The Handmaid's Tale.
5	B	The ending reveals the sacrifice behind the leaf painted by Behrman, transforming an apparently small artistic act into the story's central expression of devotion.
6	A	An omniscient third-person narrator can move beyond one character's knowledge and may describe the thoughts of several characters.
7	B	Statements 1, 2, and 4 are correct. Modernist fiction often challenges linear chronology and conventional representations of consciousness and reality.
8	B	R. K. Narayan wrote The Guide (1958), which explores Raju's changing identity and the uncertain relationship between performance, personal transformation, and spiritual authority.
9	A	Hawthorne's fiction often investigates guilt, moral responsibility, secrecy, and the psychological effects of wrongdoing.
10	A	Satire critiques folly or social abuses; epiphany is sudden recognition; allegory conveys additional abstract meanings; a cliffhanger interrupts the narrative at a suspenseful point.
11	C	The assertion is true. Magical realism may present extraordinary events as part of the fictional world's reality rather than explaining them away as dreams.
12	A	Arun's behaviour reveals generosity and responsibility without the narrator explicitly naming those qualities. This is indirect characterisation.
13	A	Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea (1966) reimagines the background and perspective of the woman known as Bertha Mason in Jane Eyre.
14	A	Feminist criticism examines how gendered laws, customs, institutions, and power structures shape women's choices and opportunities.
15	A	Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath (1939) follows the Joad family amid displacement, economic hardship, and migrant labour during the Great Depression.
16	A	Pamela (1740), Evelina (1778), Jane Eyre (1847), and The Time Machine (1895).
17	A	Saki's “The Open Window” uses a fabricated story and a final twist to expose Framton Nuttel's credulity.
18	B	Internal focalisation restricts the information presented to a character's perspective or knowledge, even when the story uses third-person narration.
19	A	Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things (1997) examines caste, family, social hierarchy, and forbidden love in Kerala.
20	B	The passage presents a conflict between investment and development on one hand and the preservation of collective memory and community identity on the other.

Section C: Score Evaluation

Each correct answer carries 2 marks.

Score	Performance	Suggested Action
34–40	Excellent	Continue with advanced comparative and passage-based questions.
26–32	Good	Revise narrative terminology, author–work associations, and chronology.
16–24	Moderate	Strengthen foundational knowledge of fiction and short-story techniques.
0–14	Needs improvement	Review major authors, works, literary movements, and critical concepts before progressing.

These are informal practice bands, not official UGC NET qualifying thresholds.

Section D: Important Revision Topics

Eighteenth-century fiction: Samuel Richardson, Henry Fielding, Laurence Sterne, Frances Burney, and Aphra Behn.
Victorian fiction: George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Wilkie Collins, Charles Dickens, and Charlotte Brontë.
Modernist and twentieth-century fiction: Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, E. M. Forster, H. G. Wells, and John Steinbeck.
Short-story writers: O. Henry, Guy de Maupassant, Edgar Allan Poe, Saki, Anton Chekhov, and Katherine Mansfield.
Indian English fiction: R. K. Narayan, Mulk Raj Anand, Raja Rao, Amitav Ghosh, and Arundhati Roy.
Postcolonial fiction: Jean Rhys, Chinua Achebe, J. M. Coetzee, and the representation of cultural identity.
Narrative techniques: Epistolary narration, omniscient narration, focalisation, indirect characterisation, irony, and narrative twists.
Critical approaches: Feminist criticism, realism, modernism, postcolonial criticism, and the relationship between fiction and social history.

Preparation tip: Revise each work through five points: author, publication date, major characters, narrative technique, and central themes. Pay special attention to the difference between the narrator and the focaliser, as well as between direct and indirect characterisation.

Labels Mock Test

slider4

✍️ ई-पत्रिका

📌Research Article