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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. How does Ottilie respond to Luciane's arrival?

2. Whose appearance do the painted decorations of the restored building seem to have?

3. What specific form of memorializing does Charlotte admit having an aversion to?

4. What event marks the newborn's baptism with foreboding?

5. Which of Luciane's "experiments in moral regeneration" goes badly wrong?

Short Essay Questions

1. Which of Luciane's experiments in "moral regeneration" goes wrong, which Charlotte hears about after Luciane leaves the estate?

2. What plans does the architect have for the church?

3. What foreign visitor comes to the estate, and how do his views impact Charlotte and Ottilie?

4. What are Charlotte's views of memorials?

5. What does Ottilie decide to embark upon as a career, and why?

6. What amusement does the Count suggest should occupy Luciane's energies?

7. What is the substance of Eduard's proposition to the Major, and the Major's response to it?

8. How does Charlotte discover Eduard has rejoined the military, and how does she respond to this news?

9. How does Charlotte respond to the tragedy involving Ottilie and Otto?

10. What is problematic about Luciane's interactions with other people, and what is one example of this?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Examine Ottilie's journal entries, which appear in Part II, Chapters 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, and 9. How do they offer insight into Ottilie's character? What is the significance of the style she writes in? What type of language does she use? What subject matter does she consider? Why might the narrator decide to place them where he does (at the ends of several chapters in Part II)? What is the significance of the context of each letter? Do these letters function to give Ottilie a new role in the novel? Discuss these letters' significance to the themes of fate and of personal agency in the novel, as these themes relate to Ottilie herself. Concentrate on Ottilie's specific word choice, subject matter, context, metaphorical or figurative language, and tone.

Essay Topic 2

Compare and contrast Eduard and the Captain (later the Major). What is the relationship between the two men and does this relationship change over the course of the novel? How are their characters similar, and how do they differ? What informs each man's thoughts, feelings, and decisions? How does each man react to his own desires, and to adversity? Does the narrator describe each man and his respective feelings, thoughts, and actions in any particular way that offers insights or critiques into his character?

Essay Topic 3

Examine the themes of embodiment, physicality, sexuality, and sensuality that are present in the novel. How do the characters' physical presence sometimes influence the thoughts, feelings, and actions of other characters? What is the significance of inanimate objects such as letters, contracts, and trinkets embodying certain characters? Why might the narrator find it important to note, in Part II, Chapter 13, that just before Otto dies Ottilie experiences two distinct moments of true sensuality? How do Eduard and Charlotte interact each other in Part I, Chapter 11 by imagining their lovers embodied in each other? What episodes of, or references to, frank sexuality and sensuality do you think are important to an understanding of the novel?

(see the answer keys)

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