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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 danger does Gladwell say T. E. Lawrence’s men encountered along the way to Aqaba?

2. Who does Gladwell say was the ring-leader of the Impressionist group that met at Café Guerbois?

3. What percentage of successful entrepreneurs does Gladwell say are dyslexic?

4. What aspect of law did Boies’ talents fit best with?

5. What does Gladwell say Goliath’s attendant was acting as?

Short Essay Questions

1. What was the strategy Ranadivé used so effectively?

2. How does Gladwell say dyslexia prepared Brian Grazer to be a movie producer?

3. Gladwell seems to want it both ways, valuing poverty and celebrating wealth. Does Gladwell acknowledge or try to resolve this contradiction?

4. What does Gladwell say caused the changing demographics of Shepaug Valley Middle School in Connecticut?

5. How does Gladwell say dyslexia helped prepare David Boies to be a trial lawyer?

6. How does Gladwell explain Ikea’s success through “disagreeableness” (118)?

7. In what way does Gladwell say Ranadivé’s girls are similar to Lawrence of Arabia?

8. What are the challenges Gladwell’s powerful Hollywood friend experienced, in raising his children?

9. What are the factors that this conventional wisdom overlooks, in Gladwell’s account?

10. What does Gladwell say about Gary Cohn’s relationship with failure?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Gladwell urges us to look at life—our own lives—through the lens of the parables and their morals, in David and Goliath. How do you see the themes he traces, about the limits of power, or the advantages of disadvantages, in your own life? Does your own life prove or disprove Gladwell’s theories?

Essay Topic 2

What are Gladwell’s intellectual blind spots? What are the kinds of behavior or complexity he tends not to see?

Essay Topic 3

Malcolm Gladwell uses one particular mechanism to great effect in David and Goliath: He says This phenomenon is exactly the same as That phenomenon, then pulls out the law or reason or pattern that unites them. Sometimes this is highly effective, but sometimes it creates some unusual comparisons or elisions. Where in David and Goliath is this similarity effect most illuminative, and where is it most troublesome to whatever point it is that Gladwell is trying to make at the time?

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