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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Which of the following is NOT a reason Arthur mentions in his paper that whites need to take responsibility for helping blacks?
(a) Because people who consider themselves Christians should not subjugate others in the name of God’s will.
(b) Because of blacks’ inferior intelligence and inability to help themselves.
(c) Because whites destroyed blacks’ tribal life in the first place.
(d) Because whites have actively suppressed the education of blacks out of fear.

2. What day is Absalom set to be executed?
(a) None of the above.
(b) The first of the month.
(c) The fifteenth of the month.
(d) The thirtieth of the month.

3. Who does James Jarvis surprise with a large financial donation to further the cause of blacks?
(a) Msimangu.
(b) John Harrison, Jr.
(c) John Kumalo.
(d) Stephen Kumalo.

4. Where does Kumalo keep vigil during Absalom’s execution?
(a) By the sea.
(b) Up a mountain.
(c) Deep into the forest.
(d) The Jarvis fields.

5. What is the rumored purpose of the ground markings left by Jarvis and the magistrate in Ndotsheni?
(a) They mark out a new church.
(b) They mark out a dam.
(c) They mark out a village dairy.
(d) They mark out a new village school.

Short Answer Questions

1. At whose house did the police eventually find Absalom?

2. What word does Kumalo use to describe a quality about Arthur to James?

3. What made-up story does Kumalo tell his brother during their last meeting out of spite?

4. What is the name of the Jarvis farm?

5. What building does Jarvis’ wife want to finance for Ndotsheni?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe the final meeting between Stephen and John Kumalo.

2. Compare and contrast Napoleon’s and Kumalo’s attitudes towards James Jarvis.

3. How does the village chief’s interaction with the magistrate and James Jarvis support John Kumalo’s earlier statement about chiefs, “He is a trick, a trick to hold together something that the white man desires to hold together.”

4. Compare and contrast the ways the novel ends “happily” versus the way it ends “unhappily.”

5. What does Absalom give as his defense for owning a gun when the Judge asks him about it?

6. Describe the incident Kumalo tells his friend about as a way of explaining his idea that James Jarvis is a compassionate man.

7. Describe Barbara Smith’s response to Kumalo’s question about her servant, and explain the significance of James’ translation of this answer to Kumalo.

8. What becomes Kumalo’s obsession when he returns to Ndotsheni, and what ways does he act on it? What are the results of his efforts?

9. Describe the villagers’ reaction to Kumalo’s return to Ndotsheni, from the time he gets off the train until he reaches the church.

10. Compare Arthur Jarvis’ son’s attitude toward Kumalo and by extension blacks, to the attitude of the generations above him.

(see the answer keys)

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