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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. What does Ivan Ilych do for a few hours after seeing himself in the mirror for the first time in quite a while?
(a) He sleeps.
(b) He screams at anyone who looks at him.
(c) Ivan tries to think positively about his situation.
(d) He cries uncontrollable.

2. Without the distraction of work, what happens to Ivan Ilych?
(a) He discovers what is wrong with his life.
(b) He falls in love with another woman.
(c) He falls into a profound depression.
(d) He realizes how much he loves his wife.

3. When does Ivan Ilych believe his illness began?
(a) When he went back to work.
(b) When he fell off the ladder and bruised his side.
(c) When he bought his new house.
(d) When he moved in with his brother-in-law.

4. Why doesn't Ivan Ilych change his life?
(a) He doesn't have enough money to change it the way he wants it.
(b) He likes his life as it is.
(c) He has no imagination for creating another life.
(d) His wife won't let him change it.

5. When Ivan Ilych looks in the mirror some time after greeting his brother-in-law, what does he see for the first time?
(a) How old he really is.
(b) How thin and yellow he has become.
(c) How healthy he now looks.
(d) A tumor.

Short Answer Questions

1. Who is Ivan Ilych's wife?

2. What does the doctor focus on?

3. After offering his condolences, what does Peter Ivanovich tell Praskovya Fedorovna?

4. In Chapter 6, is Ivan able to replace his thoughts of death?

5. What major theme of the novel is introduced in Chapter 6?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is ironic about the opening of Chapter 3 when it states that 1880 is "the hardest year of Ivan's life?"

2. Discuss the irony in Ivan resenting his dying from something so trivial as falling off the step ladder.

3. How is Ivan's experience of death in Chapter 2 similar to Peter Ivanovich's experience of death in Chapter 1?

4. Explain the mood in Chapter 6.

5. Explain how reactions to Ivan's death by Gerasim and Ivan's son differ from the reactions of all the other characters in Chapter 1.

6. Is the author's definition of the "good life" the same as that of Ivan and his wife? Support your answer.

7. What does Ivan's wife represent to him? Why does Ivan keep sending his wife out of the room?

8. How does the opium affect Ivan?

9. When could Ivan have changed his idea of the "good life" in Chapter 4?

10. Initially, how did Ivan react to this self-revelation in Chapter 5?

(see the answer keys)

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