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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. Which of the following does Karcher note that Charles Sismondi critiques in the novel (35)?
2. The comment that “the little girl received it from him as passively as the young bird takes food from its mother” (127) offers an example of which of the following?
3. Which author does Karcher quote as calling Sedgwick “our most truthful novelist” (10)?
4. In what year, per Karcher (19), does Sedgwick meet a descendant of Eunice Williams?
5. Which of Sedgwick’s writings was erroneously attributed to James Fenimore Cooper?
Short Essay Questions
1. What is the primary rhetorical appeal made in Karcher’s discussion of Sedgwick’s Redwood (17-18), and why is it the primary appeal?
2. Prior to the attack on Bethel, how does Digby note that Everell and Oneco ridicule Grafton (108)?
3. What reasons does Magawisca report her father citing for refusing the pardon of the English after the Pequod War (100)?
4. What does Sedgwick remark would be a gratifying result of reading her novel (49)?
5. Which historical antecedent does Karcher identify for Faith Leslie?
6. What does Karcher identify as the primary thrust and intent of the seduction plot, which had been the focus of the American women novelists prior to Sedgwick (12)?
7. What justification for revenge is accorded to Mononotto (106)?
8. What does Karcher note as Sedgwick’s refocusing of “the emergent national literature” of her era (12)?
9. What reasons does the novel note for William Fletcher to have “fixed his residence a mile from the village” (62)?
10. In what way, per Karcher (27), do “‘Friendly’ whites like Hope and Everell” imperil native peoples?
Essay Topics
Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:
Essay Topic 1
Sedgwick takes many words to describe the physical scenery of the natural world in her novel. What effect would the descriptions likely have had on Sedgwick’s ORIGINAL readership? What in the text would prompt that effect? How would the effect have been achieved?
Essay Topic 2
Consider Magawisca’s question that “here is my mother’s grave; think ye not that the Great Spirit looks down on these sacred spots, where the good and peaceful rest, with an equal eye; think ye not their children are His children, whether they are gathered in yonder temple where your people worship, or bow to Him beneath the green boughs of the forest?” (243) Does the novel as a whole respond in the affirmative to the question, or in the negative? What in the text indicates the response? How does it do so?
Essay Topic 3
Karcher notes that “The main imperative of Sedgwick’s era was to create a national literature that differentiated itself from British and European precedents by capitalizing on what made America unique: its landscape, history, folk heroes, regional idiosyncracies [sic], potpourri of races and ethnic groups, and democratic social structure” (12). Does the novel successfully contribute to that imperative? What in the text indicates whether it does or not, and how does it do so?
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This section contains 849 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) |
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