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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is said to be at Kuantan where Nisui sends them next?

2. What do the women find when they reach the highway at Maran?

3. Seeing the suntanned Jean with a baby on her hip, what does Harman think she is?

4. Where was the legacy to go originally?

5. How does Jean carry baby Robin Holland?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does the real story of the novel begin?

2. When the group reaches the northeast coast of Malaya, what helps the women?

3. When they finally come to a paved road, who do the women meet?

4. What suggestion from Jean meets with the approval of the villagers and the Japanese invaders?

5. How does Shute show there is compassion among the Japanese?

6. Describe how Jean Paget becomes the heir to Douglas Macfadden's estate.

7. Explain why N. H. Strachan decides to handle the details of administering the will?

8. Why and how is Jean able to do something special for the women and children?

9. Why is Strachan more or less retired?

10. How do Jean and the group she is with get captured by the Japanese?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay on modern day chivalry. Use Joe Harman to show his chivalry in Malaya in trying to make life easier for the women and children. Then show his chivalry in being protective of Jean's reputation in Willstown. Finish your essay with an evaluation of chivalry today where practices such as opening doors for women have almost gone out of use. Explain whether you think the world should return to some of that chivalry.

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay on human cruelty. Use the crucifixion of Joe Harman as an example of the extent some people will go to in order to harm other people. In your essay express your opinion whether most people have that ability to be cruel in them. Go into what causes some people to be cruel to others and what the results of that kind of behavior often are like the eventual disgrace of Capt. Sugamo.

Essay Topic 3

Write an essay on human kindness. In your essay mention the few Japanese who showed some kindness toward the women and children. Also mention the Malay people and why their sympathy for the group was tempered by fear. Show how even small kindnesses may mean a great deal to the recipient. Conclude with how a kindness may result in something coming back to the giver, like the well Jean Paget had dug for the Malay women.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 746 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample