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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What are the central motifs in “Cathedral”?
(a) Strawberries and fruit
(b) Marriage and weddings
(c) Blood and music
(d) Vision and blindness

2. Where in the narrative does the rising action begin?
(a) When the blind man arrives
(b) When the wife gets divorced
(c) When the cathedral has been drawn
(d) When the wife meets the blind man

3. What word from the story refers to a bridge for carrying a road or railway across a valley, consisting of a set of arches supported by a row of piers or towers?
(a) Delta
(b) Well
(c) Viaduct
(d) Tunnel

4. What does the narrator admit he does not believe in when discussing matters with the blind man late at night in the story?
(a) Beauty
(b) The Devil
(c) Anything
(d) Humanity

5. Where does the blind man put his hand as the narrator begins to draw in the story?
(a) On the narrator’s face
(b) On the paper
(c) At the edge of the table
(d) Over the narrator’s hand

6. Along what river does the narrator describe the train going on the route from his home to New York?
(a) The Niagara River
(b) The Snake River
(c) The Green River
(d) The Hudson River

7. What is the name of Raymond Carver’s first published book of poems?
(a) Surrounding Mountains
(b) Near Klamath
(c) Along the beach
(d) Among the Redwoods

8. The narrator says of the “officer-to-be” that he’d been his wife’s what?
(a) Cousin
(b) Familial enemy
(c) Childhood sweetheart
(d) School rival

9. What color is all of the blind man’s attire when he arrives?
(a) Brown
(b) Blue
(c) Black
(d) White

10. What does the narrator give as a response to the narrator’s question of whether he was going to stay with his work?
(a) It would be hard to take a pay cut
(b) It pays the bills
(c) What were the options?
(d) I haven’t had any other offers

11. The narrator notes in the story that “A wink is the same thing as” what “to a blind man”?
(a) A wave
(b) A kick
(c) A jump
(d) A nod

12. Exasperated by his inability to explain a cathedral to the blind man, the narrator apologizes and says, “The truth is, cathedrals don’t mean” what to him?
(a) The world
(b) Anything special
(c) Success
(d) Godliness

13. Where does the narrator’s wife fall asleep after they’ve smoked marijuana?
(a) In the chair
(b) In the bathtub
(c) On the couch
(d) On the floor

14. What did the narrator’s wife’s first husband do when he found her after her overdose?
(a) He said a prayer
(b) He started to cry
(c) He kicked the door
(d) He called an ambulance

15. What question does the blind man ask the narrator as the narrator begins drawing the cathedral in the story?
(a) Where are you going to put the steeple and the people, bub?
(b) Where’s your wife when you need her, huh, bub?
(c) What kind of building are you drawing here, bub?
(d) Never thought anything like this could happen in your lifetime, did you, bub?

Short Answer Questions

1. The narrator feels pity for the blind man when he considers that he lived with and loved his wife without ever having what?

2. The narrator finds a pen for the blind man where in his house?

3. When the blind man smokes his second hit of marijuana, the narrator says, “It was like he’d been doing this since he was” how old?

4. When the narrator’s wife first contacted the blind man after working for him, she called him from what state?

5. The narrator says in the beginning of the story that the last time his wife saw the blind man was when she worked for him in what city?

(see the answer keys)

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