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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Alfa hear the night he approaches the German trenches to avenge Jean-Baptiste's death?
(a) Singing.
(b) Crying.
(c) Snoring.
(d) Angry shouting.

2. How does Alfa sometimes refer to himself in Part II?
(a) The youngest child of the old man.
(b) The second son of the second son.
(c) The seventh child of the sixth child.
(d) The romulan.

3. Whose "more-than-brother" does Alfa become in the wake of Mademba's death?
(a) Prayer's.
(b) Death's.
(c) God's.
(d) Life's.

4. What medal is Alfa told he will be awarded in Part II?
(a) The Croix de Guerre.
(b) The Purple Heart.
(c) The Wallingford.
(d) The Gold Star.

5. What does Alfa do to preserve the hands he severs?
(a) Buries them.
(b) Washes them.
(c) Puts them in clay pots.
(d) Coats them in salt.

6. In Chapter X, what does Alfa know for sure he himself is not, even if everyone else seems to think he is?
(a) A good friend.
(b) A sorcerer.
(c) A very strong man.
(d) An idiot.

7. Why does Mademba leave before the others on the day he dies?
(a) Alfa tells him he will run faster than he can.
(b) Alfa tells him he is sick.
(c) Alfa tells him he is about to run away and desert the war.
(d) Alfa teases him about his totem.

8. Who is Alfa's only real white friend among his fellow soldiers?
(a) Roland.
(b) Jean-Luc.
(c) Jean-Baptiste.
(d) Ibrahima.

9. What earns Alfa his solitude in war in Chapter VII?
(a) His prayers.
(b) His unwillingness to wash.
(c) The enemy hands.
(d) His language.

10. How does Captain Armand signal to his own men that an attack is about to begin?
(a) His fingers snapping.
(b) His whistle.
(c) His hand sign.
(d) His trumpet.

11. Who is Alfa's best friend?
(a) Moby.
(b) Jean-Baptiste.
(c) Captain Armand.
(d) Mademba Diop.

12. What does Captain Armand tell Alfa that he needs in Part II?
(a) Water.
(b) Better food.
(c) Prayer.
(d) Rest.

13. What work of Pascal Quignard's does Diop reference in the beginning of Part I?
(a) Mourir de penser.
(b) Camelot.
(c) The Vase.
(d) Carmen.

14. What does Jean-Baptiste do with the hand he steals from Alfa?
(a) Puts it on a German flag to humiliate the Germans.
(b) Wraps it in bandages and sticks it to his helmet.
(c) Burns it.
(d) Buries it.

15. Where does Alfa get the idea of how to preserve his severed hands?
(a) From the tobacco leaves all the other soldiers hang from the rafters.
(b) From how they dried fish in his village, Gandiol.
(c) From the dried meat they eat in the trenches.
(d) From the dried sheep his first wife taught him how to cure.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Alfa imagine the Germans did for the person who killed Jean-Baptiste?

2. In what way does Mademba actually die?

3. What causes a major change in Jean-Baptiste?

4. What phrase does Alfa end Chapter III with?

5. Why is Alfa missing one of his hands?

(see the answer keys)

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