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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Who has written about the "occasions of poetry" (pg 9)?
(a) Admiral Nelson.
(b) William Shakespeare.
(c) T. S. Eliot.
(d) Thomas Gunn.

2. How is the material in the last chapter presented?
(a) Concisely.
(b) Poetically.
(c) Randomly.
(d) Systematically.

3. What book of the Bible does Sacks quote at the beginning of Chapter Three?
(a) Job.
(b) Psalms.
(c) Ecclesiastes.
(d) Proverbs.

4. Why did Sacks have strong legs?
(a) He was a veteran hiker.
(b) He had worked out at the gym for many years.
(c) He swam regularly.
(d) He ran marathons.

5. How did Sacks splint his leg?
(a) With his walking stick.
(b) With a stick he found on the ground.
(c) With his right leg.
(d) With his umbrella.

Short Answer Questions

1. What would happen if Sacks were not found by nightfall?

2. What word does Sacks use most to describe the bull?

3. What book does Sacks plan to write in the future?

4. What town's hospital was Sacks taken to first?

5. What was the occasion for this book?

Short Essay Questions

1. What meals does Sacks describe most from his time in the hospital? What do these meals say about his frame of mind at each time?

2. During the first night in the hospital whom did Sacks see in his dream? How did Sacks live to imitate this person?

3. How does the quote at the beginning of Chapter Four compare to Sacks's own words which begin the chapter?

4. At his arrival to the Odda hospital, what was Sacks's experience with Nurse Solveig? How did this exemplify the prostration he began to feel in the hospital?

5. What did Sacks think when he saw his left leg for the first time in two weeks? How did his own thoughts tie into the doctor's summary of the recovery?

6. Chapter Two begins with the idea that Sacks's story was over. How might the readership have been different if he had actually ended the story here?

7. Sacks's description of the Caster, Mr. Enoch, is amusingly melodramatic and terrified. In your opinion, why was Sacks scared of Mr. Enoch?

8. How does Sacks describe his first few steps? How might this description be applied to another time in life, one which has never been described?

9. What is anosognosis? What problem does this state present to medical researchers?

10. What timeline does Sacks establish for the development of neurology? What is still lacking from this branch of science?

(see the answer keys)

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