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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. What does Eric point to as the primary way culture is transmitted?

2. On page 85, what specific expression does the text cite as having been appropriated from drag and ball culture?

3. What is Toby's play called?

4. When Henry learns of Eric's housing situation, what does he offer to do?

5. According to Walter, what is Henry's attitude toward their relationship?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does the proposed beginning of Young Man 1's story echo the opening of one of Morgan's books?

2. What secret does Morgan say Eric is keeping from everyone, and what is Morgan's belief about this secret?

3. After Leo leaves Toby's apartment, what surprising information does Young Man 1 reveal, and how do Morgan and Toby react?

4. What is at the heart of Eric's nostalgia for the gay community's past?

5. At dinner with Henry and his sons, what innocent joke does Eric make and why does it so alarm Paul and Charles?

6. When Adam reveals that he has been offered the Elan role in the Broadway production of Toby's play, how does Toby react, and why?

7. When Walter comes to the apartment for dinner, what similarity do he and Eric recognize in their relationships?

8. How do Charles and Paul's attitudes in the hallway after Eric's brunch foreshadow their actions at the end of Act Two?

9. What advice does Henry offer Eric after Eric says that it feels to him as if the world is falling apart?

10. In what sense does Adam feel he might have played a part in Eric and Toby's breakup?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What is The Inheritance's view of what it means to be a good person and what motivates people to act in ethical or unethical ways? Consider the actions and motivations of main characters like Toby, Henry, Walter, and Eric as well as the actions of any minor characters you find relevant to this question. Think about the impact that characters' choices have on others and the judgments passed by Morgan and the Young Men in their quasi-narrative role. Write an essay in which you make and defend a claim about what this play conveys about "goodness" and its motivations. Remember to stay focused on the play's claims about these issues--you are not writing about how these characters measure up to your own moral standards or your own beliefs about what it means to be a good person. Support your assertions with evidence drawn from throughout the text.

Essay Topic 2

Do some more research into Howards End and Lopez's personal connection to this work. Now that you have finished The Inheritance, how would you characterize the relationship between the two texts? Where do you see echoes of Forster's novel, and how do details of Forster's life influence Lopez's play? Write an essay in which you make and defend a claim about the purpose of basing a contemporary play on Forster's book and show how this impacts the reader's understanding of theme. Defend your assertions with evidence drawn from throughout the play and from your research. Be sure to cite all sources in MLA format.

Essay Topic 3

The Inheritance is very much a play about a narrow segment of New York's gay community at a particular historical moment. How does this specificity in its setting impact the universality of the play's message? What part of New York's gay community is centered in this play, and which members of the community are marginalized? How does the play attempt to remediate this marginalization, and is it successful in these attempts? Do the concerns of the characters in this play, and the play's ultimate message, translate to other gay communities across the nation and the world? Does the play have a message that is more universally applicable to persecuted communities, or does its theme apply only to members of the gay community? Write an essay that takes and defends a position about the universality of the theme of The Inheritance. Support your assertions with evidence drawn from throughout the play.

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