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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. How many years separate the writing of Henry James and Samuel Richardson?

2. What is the name of the popular text William George Clark wrote?

3. Considering literature on the basis of time periods is the act of the ________________.

4. What are flat characters called in the seventeenth century?

5. Flat characters are seldom used in what type of novels?

Short Essay Questions

1. According to Forster, what is the purpose of food in fiction?

2. What is the tone that Forster notes both in the writing of Laurence Sterne and Virginia Woolf?

3. What are the guidelines William George Clark requests for the lecture series he began at Trinity College?

4. What two things does Forster say daily life is comprised of?

5. What does Forster say is the difference between a novel and a memoir?

6. How does Forster say that Scheherazade avoids her fate?

7. What is striking about the funerals described in the excerpts by H.G. Wells and Charles Dickens?

8. How does Forster define the novel in its most basic terms?

9. According to Forster, what does a good novel do?

10. What does Forster believe is part of the genius of Dickens' characters?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

How does Forster tie in his main theme that the purpose of novels is to allow the reader a deeper, broader understanding of life with his discussion of the People aspect of the novel?

Essay Topic 2

What does Forster contend is the important difference between real people and people in novels? Why is this an important distinction? Using research on Forster himself, what is the irony of his discussion of the importance of real people keeping their secrets?

Essay Topic 3

Does being a novelist himself make Forster more qualified to present this lecture series or cloud his objectivity? What are specific examples of both?

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