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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 were the names of Pauline Williams’s parents?

2. Geraldine lives with her family next to the playground of what school, according to the narrator in Part III?

3. When describing the girls who come from places like Mobile and Aiken, Claudia says in Part III that they go to what kind of colleges?

4. Which of the prostitutes in town does Mrs. MacTeer say is a “ruined” woman?

5. Where did Pauline Williams’s family move after World War I for the mines and millwork?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does Frieda tell Claudia has happened with Mr. Henry in the beginning of Part IV?

2. How does the narrator distinguish the difference between “colored girls” and “black girls” in “See the Cat…”?

3. What leads to Claudia and Frieda buying snacks at Miss Bertha’s in Part III?

4. Where do Frieda and Claudia go to find Pecola after their exchange with Maginot Line in “Spring”? How is this setting described?

5. To whom do Claudia and Frieda turn in order to obtain whiskey in “Spring”? Why?

6. What are the perceptions of Claudia and Frieda as they wait to leave with Pecola from her mother’s workplace in “Spring”?

7. Who do Claudia and Frieda encounter leaving their house when they return from Miss Bertha’s store in Part III?

8. What does Frieda say is the real reason she is crying when Claudia finds her in bed after Mr. Henry’s been kicked out in Part IV?

9. “See the Cat…” begins with a discussion of what “types of girls”? Where are these individuals from?

10. How is Maureen Peal described when she is first introduced in “Winter”?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss Claudia’s hatred of baby dolls and the metaphorical meaning behind this hatred. How does Claudia explain her disdain? What does she do with the dolls she’s given? Why?

Essay Topic 2

Define “narrative point of view,” and identify this in The Bluest Eye. Is the narrative of the “Dick and Jane” related in first, second, or third person? How does the narrative point of view change in the italicized preface in Part I? How does the narrative point of view and tense fluctuate within the novel?

Essay Topic 3

Discuss the theme of “the other” in The Bluest Eye. How is Pecola a metaphorical representation of “the other”? How is her outsider status important to the novel’s narrator? Why do Frieda and Claudia attempt to make Pecola feel less like an outsider?

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