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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Why would Proust sometimes examine a mundane train timetable?
(a) To fall asleep.
(b) To keep his brain active.
(c) To go crosseyed.
(d) To keep learning.

2. How many years had it been since Proust visited the Louvre when he responded to the newspaper's poll?
(a) He had never been.
(b) 5 years.
(c) 10 years.
(d) 15 years.

3. When did Proust begin to work on his masterpiece?
(a) When his dad died.
(b) After both of his parents died.
(c) After he quit working at the library.
(d) When his mom died.

4. Who is Albertine?
(a) Proust's girlfriend.
(b) Proust's sister.
(c) A character in Proust's book.
(d) Proust's mother.

5. What was Proust's perception of his own sexuality?
(a) He was numb to himself.
(b) He self loved.
(c) He self loathed.
(d) He was narcissistic.

6. What was Proust's father's occupation?
(a) He was a writer.
(b) He was a doctor.
(c) He was a lawyer.
(d) He was a teacher.

7. What would Proust write to his mother and tell her about?
(a) His last writing.
(b) The quality of his stool.
(c) His latest girlfriend.
(d) His most recent friendship.

8. What was Proust's view towards romance like?
(a) Opitimistic.
(b) Outgoing.
(c) Pessimistic.
(d) Negative.

9. How old was Proust when his attacks began?
(a) 12 years old.
(b) 11 years old.
(c) 10 years old.
(d) 9 years old.

10. When was a brief bulletin written about a boy Proust knew murdering his mother?
(a) January 1917.
(b) February 1907.
(c) January 1909.
(d) January 1907.

11. Where does Proust suggest people would travel to in his response to the newspaper's poll?
(a) China and the Louvre.
(b) India and China.
(c) The Louvre and India.
(d) The Louvre and Rome.

12. How did Proust feel in response to the article about the boy murdering his mother?
(a) Depressed.
(b) Unaffected.
(c) Sick.
(d) Disturbed.

13. What was Proust's father in particularly concerned with?
(a) Public learning.
(b) Public broadcasting.
(c) Public sanitation.
(d) Public intellect.

14. In response to the newspaper's poll, what did one person think would happen to people's inhibitions?
(a) People would become less inhibited.
(b) People would become more inhibited.
(c) All social inhibitions would utterly fall away.
(d) Nothing was said about social inhibitions in this text.

15. What was Proust's response to the newspaper's poll?
(a) That people would go into mass panic.
(b) That knowledge of imminent death would cause humans to apprciate life more fully.
(c) That people's social inhibitions would fall away.
(d) That people would begin to mend and repair estranged relationships.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Proust find the newspaper reduces murders, tragedies, and the whole human experience to?

2. What was the newspaper's popular column at the beginning of "How Proust Can Change Your Life ; Not a Novel"?

3. What does Proust's description of the Duchesse de Guermantes reminds De Botton of?

4. What does Proust urge his readers to focus on?

5. When was Proust's father's best selling book published?

(see the answer keys)

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