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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. Where does Cy go after he is thrown out of the hospital?

2. What does Henry notice about the service elevator?

3. What does the city seem to generate?

4. What does Jonesy think is keeping the ladies away from Cy?

5. What hums perpetually, eliciting screams?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Cy first meet Grace?

2. What does Cy think about Coney Island and how do you interpret that?

3. Give a physical and psychological description of Claudia.

4. How is Grace described at the beginning of "The Lady of Many Eyes"?

5. What does the narrator say about the light in Brooklyn?

6. What is the story Henry gives about what happens at the asylum and do the police believe him?

7. Do you think Sedak deserves what they do to him?

8. What secret of Claudia's does Grace hold?

9. When Cy is somewhat inebriated in Vargas, he makes what connection between Grace and his mother and how does he react to that connection?

10. How does Cy feel about tattooing?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In Part 2, "Babylon in Brooklyn," Cy meets Artura and Claudia Overas.

1. Compare and contrast Cy and Artura.

2. Compare and contrast Grace and Claudia.

3. Why do you think Claudia has a larger role in the novel than Artura, who is after all, a tattoo artist like Cy and it is a book predominantly about tattoos?

Essay Topic 2

This book is as much about ideas as action/events, if not more so. Choose one of the following ideas and write a persuasive essay using examples from the text and your research or personal experience:

1. Tattooing is as valid an art form as any seen in an art museum. (An idea woven throughout the entire book).

2. Horror, sin, evil and lunacy is truth on a par with the love of God and beatific goodness. (An idea found in Part 1, "The Kaiser and the Queen of Morecambe.")

3. America requires voyeurism in every attraction, because it substitutes emotion for thought. (An idea found in Part 2, "Babylon in Brooklyn.")

Essay Topic 3

In Part 1, "Salvaging Renaissance," Cy thinks that every stage in the passage of life leaves physical mementos and that tattoos can be briefly upsetting, but eventually they become just part of the anatomy. Answer the following questions and write a well-developed, cohesive essay using examples from the text and your research or personal experience:

1. What do the above thoughts mean to you? Do you believe the ideas to hold truth?

2. When Cy thinks that eventually tattoos become just part of the anatomy, do you think he is suggesting that tattoos have little lasting value? If so, how does he value his work?

3. If tattoos record life's moments, why do you think some people go through much pain and expense to have a tattoo removed later?

(see the answer keys)

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