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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapter 1.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Who is the main character in a story told by Ernest Thompson Seton?
(a) An Algonquin woman.
(b) A Native American woman.
(c) A fisherman.
(d) An Eskimo man.

2. According to Dillard, how do painters work as opposed to writers?
(a) Painters work on a blank canvas, writers on a computer.
(b) Painters work with color, writers with black and white.
(c) Painters work from the ground up, writers from left to right.
(d) Painters work with their hands, writers with their heads.

3. What do television and films do to the body's senses, according to Dillard?
(a) Stimulate them.
(b) Numb them.
(c) Make connections.
(d) They make the writer sense the need to write.

4. When Dillard relays a story about a cabdriver singing a boring song, why did the driver sing it twice?
(a) He was stalling for time.
(b) He wanted to bore the author.
(c) It was a throw-away song.
(d) It had taken him a long time to get it right.

5. Who does Dillard say that she believes to be one of the most prolific writers who has ever lived?
(a) William Shakespeare.
(b) Thomas Mann.
(c) James Patterson.
(d) Edgar Allen Poe.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Dillard's "line of words" do with random pictures in the writer's mind?

2. How long does it generally take to write a book?

3. Dillard believes that some writers weaken their resolve to discard parts of their work. Why?

4. As explained by Dillard in Chapter 1, what must be done to a piece of writing after the first draft is finished?

5. In an analogy about a photographer, why did the photographer say he brought the same rejected photograph for judgment every year?

(see the answer key)

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