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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. Approximately how many new blind internees arrive at quarantine in Chapter 7?

2. Which of these is not a condition the Doctor asks if the First Man has?

3. To what does a radio commentator compare the blindness epidemic?

4. What item does an anonymous person wish was around near the end of Chapter 8?

5. Where does the Girl with Dark Glasses go immediately after leaving the Doctor's office?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the government's plan for dealing with the outbreak at the end of Chapter 3?

2. What is the Thief's reaction to the suggestion that the Doctor be leader of the quarantined inmates?

3. What does the Doctor do when his Wife tells him that a Man with an Eye-Patch has arrived in the ward?

4. Describe the First Man's Wife's reaction to her husband when she comes home.

5. What bit of knowledge does the Thief reveal to the Doctor's Wife on the night of his death? What will he do with this knowledge?

6. Describe the humiliation that occurs when the Doctor tries to use the toilet in Chapter 6.

7. What is the Thief's state of mind at the beginning of Chapter 2?

8. Describe the final moments of the Thief's life.

9. Describe what happens when the Doctor's Wife wakes up in the morning.

10. Who in the first ward dies in the hail of fire?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Consider the government's plan for dealing with the white sickness. Knowing what transpires as time goes on, what steps could be taken to avoid the spread of the disease? If none, what course of action could have been taken to protect the population of the unnamed country?

Essay Topic 2

The beginning of the novel is marked by a sense of helplessness and shame associated with the inability to see. Explore the unifying embarrassment characters feel in these chapters through the following:

Part 1) How would you describe the character of the First Man? Though we do not know anything of him prior to going blind, does he seem like a man used to asking for help? How does he respond to being helped home by the Thief and stumbling around his apartment?

Part 2) In what state are both the Thief and the Girl with Dark Glasses when they go blind? What - in both of their lives - are they hiding from most of the world which is impossible to hide when they are in this helpless state?

Essay Topic 3

Saramago makes several references to the old cliche: "in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king." In the central section of the novel, he pits two characters with sensory advantages against each other: the Doctor's Wife, who can see, and the Chronicler, who was born blind and can read and type braille. Compare and contrast these two "one-eyed men" and how they use or do not use their advantages. Is either truly a leader or "king" in the quarantine? What does each hope to achieve for their constituency?

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