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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapters 4, 5 and 6.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. At the island on Haro Strait, why would a man overboard die within ten minutes?
(a) The water was very cold.
(b) The whales were numerous.
(c) There were sharks.
(d) The channel made the water unswimmable.

2. Who once said about writing, 'Know your own bone'?
(a) Truitt.
(b) Ibsen.
(c) Whitman.
(d) Thoreau.

3. What does Dillard say that she thinks happens to something, such as a writing idea, that you do not give up freely and abundantly?
(a) Someone else will get it.
(b) It becomes lost to you.
(c) It will be poorly written.
(d) It becomes better with age.

4. What damage did the Smith-Corona typewriter do in Chapter 4?
(a) The table the typewriter was on collapsed.
(b) The writer's shirt was burned.
(c) The curtains were set on fire.
(d) The rug got damaged.

5. What does the novel as a form usually represent, according to Dillard?
(a) Society.
(b) Poetry.
(c) Non-commericialism.
(d) History.

Short Answer Questions

1. Thornton Wilder cited an unnamed writer of sonnets as saying only one line drops from where?

2. How did Dillard get into the library in Roanoke late at night?

3. Why was Dillard's finger in pain at times as she wrote in the university office in Virginia?

4. When Dillard left her cabin for home in Chapter 5 during a northeaster, how was she feeling, walking down the beach?

5. How did Dillard's sentence ('He led him into the water') from the book she was working on during a northeaster sound to her?

(see the answer key)

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