View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What day of the year does Ironweed start on?

2. How do Francis and Rudy characterize themselves?

3. What role had Dick Doolan played in Francis’ life?

4. Why does Francis work in the cemetery?

5. What does the narrator say came from Rowdy Dick Doolan’s head when Francis saw him in a vision?

Short Essay Questions

1. How did Francis end up killing Harold Allen?

2. What state is Sandra in when Francis, Helen and Rudy and Pee Wee return from the Gilded Cage?

3. What is Reverend Chester’s policy about drunks, and what effect does it have?

4. What does Francis’ conversation with Rudy tell us about his relationship with Helen?

5. What misfortune besets Helen after she returns to the Mission with Francis and Rudy?

6. Describe the environment of the Gilded Cage.

7. What does Francis say is the curve of Clara’s life?

8. How did Francis’ father die?

9. How does the narrator describe Gerald’s body in the grave?

10. How did Francis end up with a job shoveling dirt at the cemetery?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What is the genre of Ironweed? What type of story is it, and how does it resist categorization? What kinds of evidence does William Kennedy give you, as a reader, for placing the novel in a genre category? Using examples from the text, make an argument for what category of novel Ironweed belongs to.

Essay Topic 2

What is missing from this book? What should have been covered or presented that was not? What is the effect of this absence? Describe an element that ought to have been covered, and explain why it would have made the book stronger.

Essay Topic 3

Ironweed takes place over three days: Halloween, All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day. What is the role of these Catholic holidays in Ironweed? What do these holidays explain in the novel?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 891 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample