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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What detail is the narrator uncertain if he is remembering correctly?
(a) Ivanovich's name.
(b) The time of day the tour departed.
(c) The source of the tour tickets.
(d) The destination of the tour.

2. What is discovered when the group members pool their food for dinner?
(a) The women are unwilling to prepare the food for the men.
(b) Ivanovich is the only one who has brought something different.
(c) Some have brought very little food along.
(d) Most of the food has been spoiled by the long journey.

3. What is the job of the older man who talks to Ivanovich about Russia?
(a) Post-office clerk.
(b) Paper manufacturer.
(c) Accountant.
(d) Produce distributor.

4. From context, what is the likely meaning of the word "dactyl" in "On the other side...towered, arising from dactyl to dactyl, an ancient black castle" (14)?
(a) A type of stone used in medieval constructions.
(b) An architectural figure of a bird.
(c) A tower in the shape of a digit, like a toe or finger.
(d) An image found in a metrical foot of poetry.

5. What is the tour group doing in the passage that says "they raised dust along a highway" (12)?
(a) Fighting.
(b) Riding in a car.
(c) Walking.
(d) Digging.

6. How does the text's language change when the group gets off the train at the last stop on the first day?
(a) The language becomes more lyrical.
(b) The language becomes more circuitous.
(c) The language becomes more conversational.
(d) The language becomes more grandiloquent.

7. What is unusual about the four people who work together?
(a) They work for the same employer but have never met until this trip.
(b) Two have the same last name and two have the same first name.
(c) The men are married to the two women's sisters.
(d) All of them quit their jobs right before this trip.

8. At what time of the morning is Ivanovich supposed to report for the tour?
(a) 7 a.m.
(b) 5 a.m.
(c) 11 a.m.
(d) 9 a.m.

9. How does Ivanovich get to the train on the morning of his departure?
(a) He walks.
(b) He takes a streetcar.
(c) He takes a taxi.
(d) The narrator drives him.

10. Who hosted the charity ball where Ivanovich won the tour?
(a) Russian refugees.
(b) The narrator's business.
(c) A German tourism trade group.
(d) The German government.

11. The group leader is "lanky" (5). What does this mean is true about him?
(a) He is athletic.
(b) He looks unhealthy.
(c) He is tall and thin.
(d) He moves stiffly.

12. What instrument does one of the men insist on teaching Ivanovich to play?
(a) Ukulele.
(b) Mandolin.
(c) Balalaika.
(d) Fiddle.

13. Who is the author of "Cloud, Castle, Lake"?
(a) Ivan Turgenev
(b) Anton Chekhov.
(c) Vladimir Nabokov.
(d) Leo Tolstoy.

14. What does Ivanovich think "must be oriented toward something or someone" (4)?
(a) "Things seen in a dream."
(b) "Creatures still unknown to us."
(c) "The really good life."
(d) "Some wonderful, tremulous happiness."

15. When Ivanovich falls asleep on the third day of the tour, how do the others wake him up?
(a) By pouring water on him.
(b) By singing loudly in his ear.
(c) By throwing a sausage at him.
(d) By slapping him.

Short Answer Questions

1. What technique is used in the story's title?

2. What is the "unusual expression" of the lake's water (14)?

3. When the man tells stories about his "philanderings," what is he talking about (5)?

4. What detail of Ivanovich's appearance seems to impress the narrator?

5. What word does the narrator say describes the appearance of "all creatures still unknown to us" (4)?

(see the answer keys)

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