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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 criticism of Schubal does the captain make?

2. What happens as Karl steps out onto the stairs leading into the smaller boat that will take him to shore?

3. What has the servant woman named the child that she alleges Karl fathered?

4. Which is the most accurate description of the stoker's room?

5. What kind of business does Jakob own?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Karl's uncle happen to be present on the ship that Karl sailed on?

2. What unexpected news does Klara give her father when he and Karl arrive at the Pollunder home, and how does Pollunder react?

3. What does the letter from Jakob to Karl say?

4. Why is Karl on the ship?

5. What bizarre interaction does Karl have with Klara after dinner?

6. What does Karl imagine about his parents when he is in the office with the stoker?

7. Describe Karl's first vision of the Statue of Liberty.

8. What mixed messages does Karl get from Jakob about the visit to Pollunder's country home?

9. How does Schubal's manner when he enters the office tend to support the bursar's version of events?

10. Why is Karl so exhausted when the story opens?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay in which you create a continuum of Amerika's female characters--based on a single criterion of your choosing--and then explain what this ordering of the characters conveys about the role of women in this text. Include, at a minimum, the following characters in your discussion: Therese, Line, Klara, Johanna, Brunelda, and the head cook. Be sure to offer textual evidence to support your assertions.

Essay Topic 2

The end of Kafka's novel introduces the Theater of Oklahama--but is there a sense in which the entire novel can be appropriately called "theatrical"? If so, what purpose would this serve? In what ways is Karl like a puppet or actor throughout the novel? In what ways are the other characters often like stock characters in a melodrama? In what way are the settings more like stage sets than like realistic settings? Write an essay in which you consider the novel's theatricality and what relationship this has to the novel's ending. Make sure that as you discuss theatricality in relationship to the novel's ending, you take and defend a clear position regarding whether the Theater of Oklahama has something to do with religion and an afterlife. Support your ideas with textual evidence.

Essay Topic 3

Some critical approaches to Amerika consider Karl to be a kind of "genderless" character. Does your reading of the text support or challenge this interpretation? Write an essay that takes and defends a position about Karl's gender performance and its meaning. Support your assertions with evidence from the text.

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