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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 does the narrator in "The Lightning Rod Man" feel about the storm before the salesman arrives?

2. How does Captain Delano evaluate Benito Cereno's condition when he first meets him?

3. What mythical character does the narrator say would have failed at his task if the chimney had then been in existence?

4. What first attracts the narrator of "The Piazza" to a building far in the mountains?

5. What has Hautboy accomplished in "The Fiddler?"

Short Essay Questions

1. What does the landscape painter, B. Hobbema Brown, believe about the Marquis de Grandvin?

2. What is the figurehead on the San Dominick?

3. What is unusual about the bug that emerges from the apple-tree table in the story of that name?

4. What does the narrator claim shows Jack Gentian's natural gentility?

5. Why is the narrator despondent at the beginning of "The Fiddler"?

6. What seems odd about Benito Cereno's ship when Captain Delano first sees it?

7. According to the deposition in "Benito Cereno," what would have happened to Captain Delano if he had suspected a mutiny aboard the San Dominick?

8. What does the bug in the apple-tree table teach the narrator's daughter, Julia?

9. Why does the narrator of "The Lightning Rod Man" compare the salesman to a worm?

10. What is Captain Delano's intention in boarding Benito Cereno's ship?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Melville's elegaic pieces about the Marquis de Grandvin and others make clear the qualities he most admires. In your essay, use examples from these writings to show what qualities Melville thinks make for human greatness.

Essay Topic 2

Melville often uses a distinctive double negative in description. For example, Captain Delano is described as "undistrustful." Later, he is said to be "not unbewildered," and "not uninfluenced." What is to be gained by using these terms instead of "trusting," "bewildered," and "influenced"? Is there a difference between being undistrustful and trusting? If so, what is it? Find other examples of this peculiarity and analyze its use.

Essay Topic 3

Melville's use of time, switching back and forth between present and past tenses in the same story, is an unusual method to bring the reader a sense of immediacy. Select a story such as "The Two Temples" to analyze the effectiveness of this technique.

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