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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. Lloyd loses a son to which of the following?

2. To what years does Little America III date?

3. What is Lloyd’s middle name?

4. What sobriquet is applied to Addison Graves?

5. Which of the following sends Marian to Geraldine?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Marian note is the “great unifying thesis” of Marx’s teaching (184)?

2. What does Thompson report telling the indigenous people he encounters alongside Gone-to-the-Spirits?

3. How does Hadley describe glowworms?

4. How does Hadley describe the feeling of confronting choices at college?

5. What reason does Hadley cite for leaving Oliver?

6. In what hiding places does Marian secret money?

7. What reasons does Hadley cite for having taken up with Oliver to begin with?

8. How do Hadley’s parents die?

9. How is the term “great circle” defined?

10. What childhood reaction to Marian’s logbook does Hadley report to Hugo?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Typically, an epigraph is expected to speak to or set the tone for the work it introduces. Does the epigraph of Great Circle do so for the present novel? How or how not?

Essay Topic 2

Hadley makes the following comment: "The fantasy, I said to Oliver [after watching a movie], is that you—you, Joe Moviegoer—might also possess extraordinary powers and not even know it, or you might at any moment be transformed into someone who does. But the fantasy is also about containment. Ungovernable forces come to roost inside heroic human bodies or are shrunk down and carted around in vials and briefcases. The end of everything is held inside a tiny ball of light" (107).

Does the novel confirm or deny the assertion made in the comment? How does it do so? To what effect?

Essay Topic 3

Jamie is reported to comment that “Some people are rotten inside, and the rottenness will never go away” (137). Does the novel bear out the comment? How or how not?

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