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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. What do the people attribute their sickness of nausea and vomiting to?

2. What do Mr. Tanimoto and Father Kleinsorge eat from the garden on the way to the shelter?

3. At what time does the atomic bomb flash above Hiroshima?

4. Why does Miss Toshiko Sasaki wake up at three A.M. the morning the bomb is dropped?

5. Why does Dr. Fujii like to read the Osaka News?

Short Essay Questions

1. What puzzles Dr. Fujii and his doctor friend about what they see after the bombing?

2. Prior to the bombing, why do the police question Mr. Tanimoto several times?

3. How does Mrs. Nakamura and her children spend the night prior to the bombing?

4. What may have saved Dr. Sasaki's life the morning of the bomb?

5. What is the weather at Asano Park like?

6. Describe Father Wilhelm Kleinsorge.

7. Describe Dr. Terufumi Sasaki.

8. The day of the bombing, what is Mr. Tanimoto's morning like?

9. How does Mr. Fukai, the secretary of the diocese, behave after Hiroshima is hit by the bomb?

10. What is the manner in which Miss Sasaki is rescued?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Weeks after the explosion, people experience radiation sickness.

1. How were some of the characters able to excel despite radiation sickness? Would the characters have been able to push as far had they not experienced the trauma of the atomic bomb and radiation sickness?

2. What immediate actions could the Japanese or other governments, like that of the United states, have done to help ease the peoples' radiation sickness?

Essay Topic 2

People make various theories about what the Americans dropped on Japan on August 6, 1945.

1. What events leading to the bomb and the consequences thereafter cause the Japanese people to be utterly confused as to what the Americans dropped on Hiroshima?

2. What was the purpose behind the American government not warning the people of the bomb?

Essay Topic 3

John Hersey describes the characters as having "good" or "bad" luck.

1. Does this attitude of having "good" or "bad" luck belong to the particular characters' views or is it the author's description? Cite three examples that support your theory.

2. Which characters in the book may, or are likely to, accept the concept of you make your own luck, and why?

(see the answer keys)

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