Raleigh isn’t a huge figure on the GRE, but The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd (see earlier post) is very likely to come up.  You can read his bio on wikipedia here.  You won’t generally need to know any biographical information on the test, but I find that both biographical information and pictures can be very helpful memory aides.

The Author’s Epitaph, written by himself

Even such is time, which takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, and all we have,
And pays us but With age and dust,
Who in the dark and Silent grave
When we have wandered all Our ways
Shuts up the story of our days,
And from which earth, and grave, and dust
The Lord shall raise me up, I trust.

This is a GRE heavy hitter.  You should know that it’s written in response to Christopher Marlowe’s poem “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love.” Donne, Herrick, and C. Day Lewis also parodied Marlowe’s original.