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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 old is Etienne Lantier?

2. What does the grocer want in order to help La Maheude?

3. How many members of the Maheu family work in the mines?

4. Who is Souvarine?

5. Who brings in friends from Paris to see the mining town?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Lantier do when the miners begin to reject him?

2. In what type of situation does Bonnemort live?

3. What happens to Catherine at the Jean-Bart mine?

4. How do the miners feel about Etienne Lantier and what do they do about it?

5. What do the Montsou miners do while the miners are working at the Jean-Bart mine?

6. What does Etienne do after he is rescued?

7. What activist does Etienne meet at the Advantage and what do they do?

8. Why does Etienne Lantier set up a meeting with the miners and what happens at that meeting?

9. What does Lantier create for the miners to join and what is one of his first projects?

10. What happens in the mine in November and what was the consequences?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The situation is desperate, with the miners having no food or heat. Zola draws an analogy of lack of coal as a source of collective energy (for the houses), which is correlated with the lack of food, a source of personal energy (for the body).

1. Discuss two other analogies that Zola uses in the miners' situation.

2. Do you think Zola's analogies are meant to be ambivalent to be powerful? Why or why not?

3. Would he have strengthened his position better with more concrete writing?

Essay Topic 2

Pluchart, Lantier's friend and the director of the International for the district, represents the unions and their self-serving attitude.

1. How does the behavior of the union support this statement?

2. Do you think the miners would have been better off if the union had never become involved in their lives? Why or Why not?

3. Do you think unions have a function in today's work world in consideration of all the labor laws? Why or why not?

Essay Topic 3

In the first chapter, everything is set in the dark of night; the only lighting is provided either by the moonlight or by the fire burning inside the chunks of coal.

1. Why do you think GERMINAL starts at night?

2. How does the dark relate to the book's themes?

3. Did you see any foreshadowing from the darkness in the beginning of the book? Why or why not?

(see the answer keys)

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