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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. After a temporary cast was put on the leg, what dream did Sacks have?
(a) The leg was made of bricks and mortar.
(b) The leg was covered with a layer of steel.
(c) The leg was made of cloud vapor.
(d) The leg was being squeezed in a vice.

2. Why did Sacks write to A. R. Luria?
(a) He wanted reassurance about writing his book.
(b) Luria was the leading neuropsychologist in the United States.
(c) He was not getting satisfactory answers from his own doctor.
(d) Luria was a close family friend.

3. What was the primary reason that Sacks and his friends celebrated the evening after his surgery?
(a) They were alive and together.
(b) Sacks had not died on the operating table.
(c) They were drunk and did not care what they celebrated.
(d) Sacks' recovery was expected to take two short months.

4. What was the primary reason that Sacks decided not to yell a second time?
(a) He was too thirsty to yell very loudly.
(b) He was afraid of angering the bull.
(c) He needed to conserve his strength.
(d) He was about ten miles away from the village.

5. How did Sacks meet the bull?
(a) The bull walked out of a stand of trees.
(b) The bull looked like a boulder until he got close to it.
(c) He came over a small rise and the bull was lying in the grass.
(d) He rounded a boulder and it was lying in the path.

6. Shortly after the sun set, what extraordinary auditory experience did Sacks have?
(a) He could not hear anything outside himself.
(b) He could hear every living creature in the area.
(c) He could no longer hear himself.
(d) He could hear the movement of the plants around him.

7. What did Sacks find astonishing about his wound?
(a) The inability of his doctors to understand him.
(b) The pain he felt during his whole recovery.
(c) The long recovery time.
(d) The complexity of effects he experienced during recovery.

8. What book of the Bible does Sacks quote at the beginning of Chapter Three?
(a) Ecclesiastes.
(b) Psalms.
(c) Job.
(d) Proverbs.

9. What role did Mary-Kay Wilmers play in Sacks's recovery?
(a) She nursed him in the hospital after his surgery.
(b) She served as the impetus for his philosophical musings about his injury.
(c) She nursed him in the convalescent home.
(d) She suggested and edited his article entitled "The Leg."

10. What was the occasion for this book?
(a) An accident with expected effects.
(b) An accident with peculiar effects.
(c) Reading a book about an unusual patient.
(d) The study of an unusual patient.

11. Who came up with the phrase "quickening art" which described Sacks's use of music to move down the mountain?
(a) Kant.
(b) Nietzsche.
(c) Pavlov.
(d) Harvey.

12. Sacks climbed a particular stretch of ground in just over an hour. How long did it take him to descend this same stretch?
(a) Three hours.
(b) Half an hour.
(c) Two hours.
(d) Nearly seven hours.

13. After he fell, what story did Sacks recall the villagers telling him?
(a) An Englishman had broken both legs on the mountain earlier, though he survived.
(b) A Scotsman had died on exposure on the mountain exactly one year previously.
(c) An Englishman had died on the mountain two weeks earlier.
(d) A Pole had been gored by the bull and bled to death.

14. When Sacks began to write to Luria, where did Luria live?
(a) Madrid.
(b) Berlin.
(c) Moscow.
(d) Oslo.

15. The night before the operation, Sacks called up his family and friends. What did he tell them could happen if he were to die during the operation?
(a) They could publish anything from his notebooks that they saw fit.
(b) His valuable property should be donated to charity.
(c) His property should be divided fairly among his family.
(d) His property should be auctioned off.

Short Answer Questions

1. How long had Sacks been traveling when he came to the swollen stream?

2. According to the plane captain, what is the first lesson a patient must learn?

3. What instrument did Sacks have for listening to music?

4. What question did Sacks want to ask the surgeon before surgery?

5. What was the first exercise that Sacks tried to do with the physiotherapist?

(see the answer keys)

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