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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. When did the Swiss writer Henri Amiel write about sadness and tuberculosis?

2. What does Sontag compare illness and being well to?

3. How old was Marie Bashkirtsev when she died?

4. Until what time are the main symptoms of cancer usually invisible?

5. When did Shelley write to Keats and comment on his appearance of consumption?

Short Essay Questions

1. When and why was it possible to separate the definitions of cancer from TB?

2. What example does Sontag provide of sex being prescribed to tuberculars as therapy?

3. How did the metaphor of TB provide for two contradictory applications?

4. How did "romantic agony" (29) derive from tuberculosis and its metaphors?

5. How does Sontag compare illness to a kingdom?

6. How did Sontag see people treated who had cancer, and why?

7. What passion did people think would given them cancer if not discharged, and what example is provided of that belief?

8. Which economic spheres are affected by tuberculosis and by cancer?

9. How might the name of a disease seem to have a magic power?

10. What stages does cancer have and how does it progress?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Some scientific studies seemed to link emotion and cancer. How did some scientific studies seem to link emotion and cancer? Why does Sontag believe that any apparent link between cancer and emotion is due to incomplete knowledge about cancer, its causes, and a cure?

Essay Topic 2

Illness has frequently been used as metaphor. How does Sontag use metaphors in the book? Why does she believe that illness is not a metaphor? Why does she think that it was wrong to use illness as a metaphor?

Essay Topic 3

How did the idea that man created his disease lead to the concept that the sick person caused his illness? What dangers were there in this concept?

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