1. How do Alena and Peter react to the unnamed narrator's response to the art in Alena's apartment?
(a) They whisper.
(b) They laugh.
(c) They cry.
(d) They shriek.

2. When the unnamed narrator feels "too tired to write" (173) one day during his residency he watches The Passion of Joan of Arc, the favorite film of which character?
(a) Sharon.
(b) Natali.
(c) Alena.
(d) Alex.

3. The author worries about "what kind of precedent [he is] establishing" (63) if he deals with the medical operation by taking what action?
(a) Indulging his desire for comfort.
(b) Inducing amnesia.
(c) Going to sleep.
(d) Taking a drug.

4. Alena recently acquired a great deal of what type of art?
(a) Impressionistic.
(b) Baroque.
(c) Pop.
(d) Totaled.

5. What does the unnamed narrator describe in his comments at Columbia's School of Arts as the "shadow language to Reagan's official narrative processing of the national tragedy" (114)?
(a) My Lai jokes.
(b) Oklahoma City bombing jokes.
(c) Iran Contra jokes.
(d) Challenger jokes.

Short Answer Questions

1. On the day the unnamed narrator ventures out to the Marfa Book Company, he has "gone more than" how many "weeks without really speaking to anyone" (175)?

2. In Part Four, the unnamed narrator begins a writers' residency in which Texas city?

3. The reader is reminded that the unnamed narrator had planned to use the name Mary in his novel to represent which of his real acquaintances?

4. At the end of Part Four, the unnamed narrator finally figures out that the man who had greeted him at the bookstore has what name?

5. In what field does Alena's friend Peter work?

(see the answer key)

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