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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 value did Thomas espouse in running his farm?

2. How does Gawande say his father found peace and gave him and the other around him peace as well?

3. What does Gawande say being mortal is about?

4. What does Gawande say happens in the third stage of a country’s health care development?

5. What definition of courage does Gawande arrive at, after considering Plato’s dialogue “Laches”?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the cause that Gawande says Josiah Royce described as keeping people engaged in their lives?

2. What are the priorities Gawande says people have, at the end of their lives, that go beyond “prolonging their lives” (155)?

3. What are the instructions Gawande’s father left, for the disposal of his remains?

4. What does Gawande say are the advantages of the New Bridge on the Charles retirement community?

5. How does Gawande characterize his daughter’s piano teacher Peg Bachelder’s final days?

6. How does Gawande characterize his faith in his people’s religion, and how does he describe his participation in the Hindu ritual for dispersing his father’s remains?

7. What does Gawande say was the mistake his father made in his medical care?

8. What stance does Gawande take on the concept of “assisted suicide” (243)?

9. What does Sara Monopoli’s story illustrate?

10. What triumph of Gawande’s was Gawande’s father able to witness, in his declining health?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Think about how you would like your own life to end. What decisions can you make today that will make “a good death” a likely outcome of your decisions? In what ways does our culture encourage this kind of thinking? In what ways does it distract from it? Where are the “good life” and “good death” valued?

Essay Topic 2

Write an evaluative review of Being Mortal. What is this book’s place in our culture? Who will find this book most useful? What are its uses? What are its limitations?

Essay Topic 3

Gawande does not say too much about the economic aspects of the questions he addresses, but families from different economic classes experience these problems differently. How does economics affect the outcome for aging and dying? How different are the poor from the middle class or from the wealthy, in this regard? Why do you think Gawande neglected to discuss class as an aspect of this problem?

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