View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. In Chapter 8, who is supposed to relieve Paul Berlin of his post?

2. In what American city did Jolly Chand live for a period?

3. In Chapter 16, what do the men start doing to pass time during a period of relative quiet?

4. What is the ratio of support personnel to combat personnel in Chu Lai?

5. When do the the events of Chapter 2 occur in relation to Chapter 1?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why can the Mayor of Ovissil not read Paul Berlin's history?

2. Describe Lieutenant Corson.

3. What is the result of Chapter 3's vote?

4. What difficulty arises when Lieutenant Corson tries to leave Li Van Hgoc's tunnel in Chapter 15?

5. How does the quiet of the village in Chapter 16 become insidious?

6. How does Paul Berlin lose Cacciato in Mandalay?

7. What does Paul Berlin hope regarding Cacciato?

8. Why do living circumstances become awkward for Third Squad in Delhi?

9. What are Sidney Martin's values regarding war as described in Chapter 25?

10. How does Sarkin Aung Wan react to Paul Berlin's description of their mission?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In the longer narrative of Going After Cacciato, Paul Berlin invents a number of figures that do not exist.

Write an essay about three of these figures. What function do they serve in the story? Do they stem from any real experience that Paul Berlin has? What do they say about the political or spiritual realities of the Vietnam War?

Part 1) Jolly Chand

Part 2) Captain Rhallon

Part 3) Sarkin Aung Wan

Essay Topic 2

There are two Paul Berlins in Going After Cacciato: the weak-willed bad soldier of the real chapters, and the one that presses onward and gets the girl in the Cacciato story. Write an essay comparing these two. How does the protagonist of the novel reinvent himself in half the chapters? How does this reinvention help him deal with his desperate shortcomings in the other half of the novel? TO what extent is the second Paul Berlin a defense for the first?

Essay Topic 3

Going After Cacciato is a mixture of fantasy and harsh reality, and the way in which Tim O'Brien interweaves these is as daring as any of the battles in the story.

Write an essay, in which you focus on three moments when fact and fantasy intersect. How does O'Brien make clear to the reader that he is shifting between these two planes? Where do these connections happen, and what characters do they involve?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 938 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample