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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. In The Only Animal, what does Oskar say elephants may have?

2. What phrase does Thomas Schell point to over and over as he and Grandma cry in My Feelings?

3. What does Grandma notice about Thomas's clothes in My Feelings?

4. What does Grandma regularly ask Thomas Schell to pick up at the airport for her?

5. In which borough does Aaron Black live?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Grandma convince Thomas to marry her in My Feelings?

2. What surprise awaits Grandma the day of her son's funeral?

3. What happens to Oskar when he arrives home on September 11, 2001?

4. Describe Thomas's decision to leave Grandma in Why I'm Not Where You Are.

5. How does Grandma write her memoirs in Why I'm Not Where You Are?

6. What is the purpose of the drain system Oskar imagines in Googolplex?

7. What is Oskar's attitude toward Jimmy?

8. How do the Blacks of chapters past reappear in this chapter?

9. How does Grandma find Oskar in My Feelings?

10. How does Thomas Schell Sr. speak after losing his voice?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay about the marriage between Grandma and Thomas Schell, Sr. How do they find their way into each other's lives and to what extent does the tragedy of Dresden's demise play a central role in bringing them together? Chart the progression of their relationship in America form reconnection to courtship and through their marriage. How does the development of rules lead to the eventual end of their marriage? What happens when he returns to her?

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay about the character of Grandma. To what extent is she portrayed as woman who beholds all the pain of the world and continues to love? Who does she lose over the course of the novel, and how does she lose each of these loved ones? What fear does this create in her? Discuss in a paragraph how her relationship with Oskar allows her to continue on in the face of heartbreak and loneliness. Who returns to her in the end of the novel, and how does she react?

Essay Topic 3

The structure of the novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is unusual from the beginning, with the mixing of different narrators and syntax styles, but Jonathan Safran Foer further muddies the narrative waters by having the narrative regularly interrupted by pages that contain something other than plot. Write an essay about these pages, discussing what their connection to the narrative is. Who, presumably, has inserted them into the novel and why? How does their inclusion affect the way the novel is perceived as an object? What does it become?

Part 1) Photos

Part 2) Pages with a single phrase on them.

Part 3) Blank pages.

(see the answer keys)

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