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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 was the narrator’s response when the blind man asks if he likes his work?

2. The narrator says in the beginning of the story, “My idea of blindness came from” what?

3. The narrator states after the blind man’s arrival that he’d always thought what “were a must for the blind”?

4. Where does the narrator go to find a pen and paper when the blind man suggests it at night?

5. On the television show about the Church, the narrator describes a famous cathedral shown in what city?

Short Essay Questions

1. What drives the narrative plot of “Cathedral”? What effect does this have on the plot’s structure?

2. What is symbolized through the television set in the story?

3. How are the narrator’s perceptions of race illustrated in “Cathedral”?

4. How does the narrator’s wife respond to the marijuana downstairs when she returns?

5. What prompts the narrator to begin speaking during the television show?

6. How is the theme of alienation illustrated through the protagonist in the story?

7. How does the narrator describe his experience in the final lines of the story?

8. Where in the story do you see the first elements of transformation in the protagonist?

9. How are the characters in “Cathedral” representative of Raymond Carver’s style?

10. How is the theme of transformation illustrated through the narrator’s wife in the story? When did her “transformation” take place with the blind man?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Compare and contrast the marriage of the narrator and his wife and the marriage of Robert and Beulah as seen in the text. How are these relationships similar? How do they differ?

Essay Topic 2

Describe and discuss the setting of “Cathedral.” Of what importance is the setting of the story? Could the story be set in a different time and place? How would this change the story?

Essay Topic 3

Examine and discuss correlations between the biography of Raymond Carver and the narrative of “Cathedral.” In what ways do you think Carver resembles the narrator of the story? How is alcohol a theme in Carver’s life and in the story? How does the epiphany in the story relate to Carver?

(see the answer keys)

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