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

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Julius say he was sent to the Nigerian Military School to get?

2. Julius says that the world seems to fall under Obatala’s influence: what is Obatala responsible for?

3. What does Julius say explains the sense of hermeticism in the paintings of John Brewster?

4. What effect does Julius’ father’s death have on Julius’ studies?

5. What does Julius reflect on, after seeing the film The Last King of Scotland?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is it about Coca-Cola that the younger Julius found so appealing?

2. How does Farouq surprise Julius?

3. What is the feeling Julius wakes up from his dream with, in the beginning of Chapter 10, in his first days in Brussels?

4. What are Julius’ thoughts on the weather and global warming?

5. What does Julius say his work requires of him, and what does he say he enjoys about it?

6. What does Julius contemplate doing when he thinks about his patient, M., at the boat basin behind the World Financial Center?

7. Who is V. and what is her relationship with Julius?

8. What does Nadège’s limp make Julius think about, and what does it make him see about Nadège?

9. What theme emerges in the clothing Julius notices on the people all around him in his wanderings through the city at the beginning of Chapter 4?

10. What are the advantages and disadvantages of Teju Cole’s internal, peripatetic style in Open City?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Would you recommend Open City to a friend? What kind of friend would you recommend Open City to? What kind of friend would you not recommend this book to? What does this distinction tell you about the qualities of the novel itself? What does it tell you about your own critical values?

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

How does Julius grow or change over the course of the novel? What is he like at the start of the novel, and what is he like at the end? What are the main events that may have changed him? How do you account for the changes he undergoes? Or, how do you account for his lack of change?

(see the answer keys)

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