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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. When is the narrator's birthday?

2. At the school, who knows why Omi has been expelled?

3. When the narrator begins scowling at other people, he does it to appear what?

4. The narrator thinks his involvement in the war will make him what?

5. What word does the narrator use to describe the occupation of a night-soil man?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does the narrator feel he has gone through life fooling not just others, but himself?

2. What impression is left by the narrator's memory of a night-soil man?

3. What type of gender influence does the narrator have as a child?

4. How does the narrator feel about the prospect of grabbing Omi during a game of Dirty?

5. Why is the narrator's opportunity to live with his father cut short?

6. Why is the narrator unable to participate in gym class the day that Omi demonstrates how to use the bars?

7. Why do adults seem concerned at the narrator's insistence that he remembers his birth?

8. Who was Sebastian of Reni's "Saint Sebastian"?

9. After witnessing Omi perform on the gym bars, why does the narrator decide he is no longer in love with him?

10. What attracts the narrator to the disinterested girl on the bus?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Upon meeting Omi, the narrator is confronted with sexual feelings for the boy.

1) What intimate moment do Omi and the narrator share that begins their friendship?

2) What attracts the narrator to Omi?

3) How does this attraction affect the narrator?

Essay Topic 2

Write a creative essay, analyzing what aspects of the narrator's life at school might have been different if he had chosen to reveal his true sexual identity.

Essay Topic 3

The narrator spends much of his early life fantasizing about blood, death, and gore. Because of the war, the narrator is confronted with the reality of this world. Instead of being excited, as the narrator expected he would be, he is repulsed. Examine the dichotomy in the narrator's opinions towards violence.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 669 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample