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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. In what year did Sedgwick’s paternal family arrive in Massachusetts?

2. From which port does William purpose to leave for New England before he breaks ties with his uncle?

3. Which of the following does Karcher note that Charles Sismondi critiques in the novel (35)?

4. To what does Sedgwick ascribe “the difference of character among the various races of the earth” in her preface (49)?

5. In what year was Sedgwick born?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Sedgwick remark would be a gratifying result of reading her novel (49)?

2. What justification for revenge is accorded to Mononotto (106)?

3. With what do Everell and Digby entertain themselves while on watch against attack (92)?

4. Why does Karcher relate one early critic as stating that Sedgwick provides for early American women writers (10)?

5. In what way, per Karcher (27), do “‘Friendly’ whites like Hope and Everell” imperil native peoples?

6. What reasons does the novel note for William Fletcher to have “fixed his residence a mile from the village” (62)?

7. How is Bertha Grafton described at her first appearance in the novel (74)?

8. Explain the metaphor in Digby’s comment that “it’s a bad ware that needs a dark store” (104)

9. What does Karcher note as Sedgwick’s refocusing of “the emergent national literature” of her era (12)?

10. What prank does Martha Fletcher note in her letter that Everell plays on Grafton?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The novel depicts Winthrop as commenting on “that passiveness, that, next to godliness, is a woman’s best virtue” (208). Does the novel support or reject the assertion that such passiveness is a virtue for women? What in the text confirms the support or rejection? How does it do so?

Essay Topic 2

Digby remarks that “It is one thing to know what danger is, and wish to shun it; and another thing to feel like you, fear-nought lads, that have never felt a twinge of pain, and have scarce a sense of your own mortality” (89). Does the novel agree or disagree with the assertion? What in the text indicates it? 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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