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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. At what moment did Sacks's leg "return" to his body?
(a) When he remembered the rhythm of hiking up the mountain.
(b) When he heard Mendelssohn's music in his head.
(c) When he walked and felt sensation in it.
(d) When he had taken several steps.

2. How much did Sacks walk the day after his second surgery?
(a) Half the length of the hospital hallway.
(b) Half a mile.
(c) Not at all.
(d) Half a dozen steps.

3. Sacks had written to Luria explaining his accident and the subsequent alienation he felt. What was Luria's response?
(a) Sacks' experience was odd but worth writing about.
(b) Luria did not understand Sacks' experience.
(c) Sacks' experience was unique.
(d) Sacks was opening a new medical field.

4. Who, in Sacks's family, had worked closely with Head?
(a) His father.
(b) His mother.
(c) His cousin.
(d) His brother.

5. Why was it so difficult for Sacks to take the first step?
(a) He could not get his sense of balance.
(b) His feet felt too heavy to lift.
(c) He had forgotten how to walk.
(d) He felt that the physiotherapists were pressuring him.

6. What escapade did Sacks try to pull during his last night in the hospital?
(a) Climbing a ladder to the roof.
(b) Walking the edge of his second-story balcony.
(c) Asking the night nurse out for a drink.
(d) Walking around the grounds unattended.

7. What reason did Sacks give for hating any creature with health?
(a) It was the sickness speaking.
(b) The healthy creatures could not understand him.
(c) After everything he went through, he deserved it.
(d) It was one step along the road to recovery.

8. Why could Head not explain the poetry of music and movement the way he felt it?
(a) He had a limited capacity for expressing himself to others.
(b) He could only explain the poetry in scientific terms.
(c) He did not feel music and movement very deeply.
(d) He was essentially a scientist.

9. How do we understand the concepts of time and space?
(a) In context of our scientific understanding.
(b) In reference to the physical world.
(c) In reference to the people around us.
(d) In reference to ourselves.

10. When Sacks talks about the hole in memory and identity, what is he referring to (Afterword, pg 200)?
(a) A hole in his subconscious understanding of the world.
(b) A hole in the primary consciousness.
(c) A hole in the higher-order consciousness.
(d) A hole in his sense of selfhood.

11. Following his second fall, how long did Sacks wait before surgery was performed
(a) Half an hour.
(b) Three hours.
(c) Eight hours.
(d) Two hours.

12. What did Sacks hope to accomplish by reading Head's books?
(a) Learn the emotional intricacies of body alienation.
(b) Divert his thinking from his own past.
(c) Understand how to prevent body alienation in the future.
(d) Receive illumination about his experiences.

13. Sacks references a chapter in Luria's book The Man with a Shattered World that profoundly affected his thoughts about recovery. What was the name of this chapter?
(a) "Reconstruction."
(b) "The Turning Point."
(c) "The Moment of Light."
(d) "Under the World."

14. What was the name of the convalescent home where Sacks recovered?
(a) Kenwood.
(b) Hampstead.
(c) Kenmoore.
(d) Hampstead Heath.

15. How does Sack describe his thoughts during the first moments of standing again?
(a) He was entering the world of the patient from the world of the dead.
(b) He was too excited to remember his thoughts.
(c) His life had been recreated.
(d) The world was again possible.

Short Answer Questions

1. Why was it difficult for Sacks to proceed through the land of limbo?

2. What colors were the Head books which Sacks bought?

3. What group of people did Weir Mitchell write about?

4. While under the spinal anesthesia, how did Sacks perceive his body?

5. While in limbo, what feeling did Sacks have to allow, which he first found humiliating?

(see the answer keys)

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