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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What was the name of the newspaper students read aloud each week in the Alliance Dining Hall?
(a) The Weekly Update.
(b) Kenya Weekly.
(c) The Saturday Evening Paper.
(d) The Saturday Evening Post.

2. What did Ngũgĩ say “had come to symbolize continuity despite the many changes in my life” (117)?
(a) His mother’s roasted potatoes.
(b) His bed.
(c) His father’s presence.
(d) His sister’s tea.

3. Which Princess did Ngũgĩ see with the Nairobi scouts in Chapter 34?
(a) Princess Margaret.
(b) Princess Diana.
(c) Princess Kate.
(d) Princess Elizabeth.

4. Who does Ngũgĩ think about while walking home at the beginning of the memoir?
(a) His teachers.
(b) His friend Kenneth.
(c) His brother Good Wallace.
(d) His girlfriend.

5. Ngũgĩ was disappointed in much of the literature he read in school because it used which continent as a reference point?
(a) Europe.
(b) North America.
(c) Africa.
(d) Asia.

6. What is the name of the first full length play Ngũgĩ attended at Alliance?
(a) Maisha ni Nguva.
(b) Maisha ni Kiambu.
(c) Maisha ni Nini.
(d) Maisha ni Nani.

7. What did Ngũgĩ discover when he arrived at his home in the beginning of the memoir?
(a) His sister had a baby
(b) His brother has returned.
(c) It is nothing but rubble.
(d) His mother has made him a special dinner. .

8. What did the boys at Alliance call the girls at the Alliance school for girls?
(a) Acrossians.
(b) Over the Meadows.
(c) Far-a-ways.
(d) Alliance ladies.

9. What was the name of the music festival Ngũgĩ attended that was started by Alliance alum Henry Kuria?
(a) Kuria Fest.
(b) Kiambu.
(c) Alliance Music Festival.
(d) Coachella.

10. What book did the landscape from the scouting event in Chapter 35 inspire?
(a) In the River Between.
(b) The Chanua River.
(c) Between Two Rivers.
(d) The Chanua and Me.

11. What did Ngũgĩ’s mother make for his friends when they visited in Chapter 23?
(a) Roasted potatoes.
(b) Pear Jam.
(c) Mashed potatoes.
(d) Roasted yams.

12. From which country did Ghana gain its independence in 1957?
(a) Italy.
(b) Britain.
(c) France.
(d) The United States.

13. In regards to the play, what did Ngũgĩ say the “political theater onstage was mimicking” (96)?
(a) The real theater of politics outside school gates.
(b) Life in the village.
(c) Dorm life.
(d) The politics of the school.

14. Whose refusal to drive Ngũgĩ and his friends back to school resulted in the boys being late?
(a) Good Wallace.
(b) Wanjai’s brother.
(c) Ngũgĩ’s mother.
(d) Wanjai’s father.

15. Who is the author of In the House of the Interpreter?
(a) Kenneth Wanjai.
(b) Ngũgĩ Wa Thiong’o.
(c) Kenneth Thiong’o
(d) Edward Carey Francis. .

Short Answer Questions

1. Where does Ngũgĩ say he found refuge at the start of Chapter 43?

2. Government officials screened students at Alliance to ensure no student had pledged allegiance to whom?

3. As the focus of school shifted to preparing students for college, local knowledge was replaced by what at Alliance?

4. What was the name of the English teacher who took Ngũgĩ’s class on a tour of a real Englishmen’s house?

5. What is the title of the first section, which begins in 1955?

(see the answer keys)

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