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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What did people find so offensive about A Children's Tragedy when it was first written?
(a) The sexual content.
(b) The criticism of Germany's role in Hitler's rise to power.
(c) Wedekind's sexuality.
(d) Wedekind's political alliances.

2. Because of the objectionable content of the play, what did Wedekind have to do for the play to be printed?
(a) Agree to a free commission of another play for the publisher.
(b) Pay for publication himself.
(c) Write out every script used for the first performance.
(d) Marry the daughter of a publisher.

3. What was censored in reissues of A Children's Tragedy?
(a) Sexual words.
(b) Any words that were not German.
(c) Any unflattering references to the adult figures.
(d) Words alluding to the political unrest.

4. What in particular does Bentley highlight in his Moritat?
(a) Brotherly love.
(b) Suicide.
(c) Politics.
(d) Sex.

5. What does Mrs. Bergmann wonder about Wendla in the first scene?
(a) She wonders if Wendla is aware of her changing body.
(b) She wonders if Wendla will survive her adolescence.
(c) She wonders what Wendla will look like in a few years.
(d) She wonders what sort of mother Wendla will make.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Moritz admit to considering if he flunks?

2. What is Wendla's mother doing to her daughter's dress in the beginning of the play?

3. What form does the play evolve into?

4. In what decade did Wedekind write A Children's Tragedy?

5. According to Moritz, what is designed to flunk out the students at their school?

Short Essay Questions

1. How was "Spring Awakening" treated in Germany during both World Wars?

2. What is significant about the number sixty in relation to Moritz?

3. In the introduction, why is this play deemed as widely disliked by feminists?

4. What appears to be a key difference between Melchior and Moritz in their first scene together?

5. According to Bentley, what are some possible identities of the masked man at the end of the play?

6. What happened to "Spring Awakening" in America after publication? Why?

7. How do Mrs. Bergmann and Wendla deal with the girl's maturation in Act I, Scene 1?

8. Why was this play frequently repressed after the initial publication?

9. What are some of the main philosophical influences and allusions in A Children's Tragedy?

10. According to the summary in the introduction, what will happen to Melchior?

(see the answer keys)

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