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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What is different about Jesus versus the actor speaking to him in the meme Smith saw during the pandemic?
(a) He is praying.
(b) He is kneeling.
(c) He is soaked in blood.
(d) He is on a cross.

2. The day Smith looked at the peonies in the Jefferson Market Garden was just a few days before what Smith refers to as what?
(a) The Global Submission.
(b) The Global Humbling.
(c) The Worldwide Humbling.
(d) The Global Fumbling.

3. Though the “bubble” of privilege can be penetrated, what bubble does Smith say cannot be penetrated?
(a) Self-hate.
(b) Inadequate education.
(c) Suffering.
(d) Isolation.

4. What is one of the ways in which Smith said she had tried to resist her own nature?
(a) By speaking with a fake accent.
(b) By dying her gray hair.
(c) By wearing fake nails.
(d) By not keeping track of her menstrual cycles.

5. What is the setting at the start of “Peonies”?
(a) The Brooklyn Gardens.
(b) Jefferson Market Garden.
(c) The Manhattan Garden.
(d) The New York Botanical Gardens.

Short Answer Questions

1. While looking on at the garden, Smith thinks of a quote by Nabokov regarding his inspiration for which novel?

2. What does Smith say she believed to be the “cage of her circumstance” (3) when she was younger?

3. Which writer does Smith quote in her essay “Something to Do”?

4. What does Smith liken Trump’s speech to after coming to her senses after the first part of his speech?

5. Who did people “thank God for” (16) after the pandemic when, Smith says, they were not seen as worthy of a $15/ hour minimum wage prior to the pandemic?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Smith describe the similarity and difference between privilege and suffering in “Suffering Like Mel Gibson”?

2. Why does Smith say it was hard for Americans to fathom a plague?

3. What does Smith say artists of all kinds are asked at some point in their lives?

4. Describe the article Smith references in “Suffering Like Mel Gibson” about a 17-year-old during lockdown.

5. Whose speech does “The American Exception” begin with and what it is in regards to?

6. What does Smith say is the only relief people in lockdown have from one another?

7. Describe the moment Smith realized her own privilege in a Subway shop.

8. What is one of the societal issues Smith says the pandemic lockdown has forced many people to face?

9. What does Smith say the country had begun to learn or discuss in regards to privilege prior to the virus?

10. What does Smith say she does not need “a Freudian” to tell her regarding herself and the two other women her age staring at the tulips in Jefferson Market Garden?

(see the answer keys)

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