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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 is unusual about the recruiter of which Gerry Evans learns as he writes his name?

2. What role does Gerry Evans love to play?

3. Which sister does Gerry Evans dance with first?

4. What bad news does Chris have from Vera McLaughlin?

5. How does Maggie feel about Michael's kites?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does the Industrial Revolution affect the lives of the Mundy sisters?

2. Why did Kate believe Agnes could not work in a factory?

3. What has changed about Rose's appearance when she comes home from her meeting with Danny Bradley?

4. What news does Rose bring her family about the boy who was burned during the Lughnasa fires?

5. What do you make of the kites as a symbol or metaphor, and of the fact that they wouldn't fly?

6. What has Rose forgotten when she comes home from her meeting with Danny Bradley?

7. What does it tell you about Gerry Evans that he says he will check the ignition and sparking plugs of the radio?

8. What does Uncle Jack reveal about his relationship to Okawa when he speaks about his time in Uganda?

9. What significance do you make of the fact that the recruiter who enlists Gerry Evans in the war effort is, unnoticed by Gerry Evans until after he is writing his name, a midget?

10. Maggie asks Michael a riddle about the apples on a tree. What might those apples symbolize?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The character of Uncle Jack has paid a heavy cost in both body and mind to serve the lepers in Ryanga. He has also learned different ways of looking at the world than he had when he left Ireland. Do you see his character as a failure? Why or why not?

Essay Topic 2

What irony do you see in the fact that Kate eventually finds work as a tutor for Austin Morgan's young family? Explain whether this is an example of situational or dramatic irony and why you think so (or do not think so).

Essay Topic 3

The playwright, Brian Friel, uses the character Michael to tell the audience the eventual fate of the characters before the play itself is finished. How did knowing where the characters' actions would lead them affect you as a reader? Did you find it an effective dramatic device?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 889 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample