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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. Ballard notes that most of the celebrities listed for imaginary crashes in Vaughan's questionnaire are what?

2. What fantasies does Vaughan teach Ballard to visualize?

3. At the Road Research Laboratory, who does Helen stare at "almost as if they were patients whom she hoped to treat"?

4. When Ballard drives home with Catherine and Vaughan in the backseat, what does he notice for the first time since his release from the hospital?

5. What kind of alcohol does Ballard buy from the bar?

Short Essay Questions

1. What kinds of pictures does Ballard find in the questionnaire and what do they signify?

2. How do the prostitutes Vaughan picks up begin to change in appearance and why is it significant?

3. What kinds of photos are in the album Vaughan shows Ballard at Seagrave's house and what does Ballard notice about them?

4. How does Gabrielle respond to Ballard's staring at the scars on her legs and how does Ballard interpret her response?

5. How does Vaughan pose the prostitutes for his photographs and why?

6. Why is Seagrave's disappearance important to the plot?

7. What type of questions from Vaughan's questionnaire is Ballard specifically drawn to?

8. Why is Ballard attracted to Gabrielle?

9. When Ballard and Vaughan arrive at the accident site involving a minor accident, what do they discover?

10. Where do Catherine and Vaughan have sex and why is it significant?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

How did readers respond to "Crash" when it was first published? Discuss the critical response of the novel, including reviews, interviews with Ballard, and other readers' response to the novel. How was the novel both vilified or censored as well as hailed by the reading public?

Essay Topic 2

Compare Vaughan and Ballard as characters. Define their major character traits and discuss their similarities and differences. What is the nature of their relationship? Is Vaughan or Ballard the hero of the novel? Give examples of each character to help support your statements.

Essay Topic 3

Discuss surveillance as a major theme in the novel by comparing two characters.

1) How do these characters survey others?

2) What are the motives for the characters' surveillance?

3) What do the characters learn by surveying others?

4) What devices, mechanical or otherwise, does Ballard use as instruments of surveillance?

(see the answer keys)

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