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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 is the one difference between Marthe's two identical twin brothers?

2. What does Pierre say was the main evidence against him?

3. What job does Cincinnatus take on in his twenties?

4. What does Cincinnatus do outside the new prisoner's cell?

5. What does Cincinnatus do to try and look out the window?

Short Essay Questions

1. How do all the prison guards react to the new prisoner?

2. Describe Cincinnatus's early days with his wife.

3. Describe Pierre's circus performance.

4. What is the new prisoner doing when Cincinnatus walks past his cell after meeting Emmie in the hallway?

5. Besides how long Cincinnatus has until his execution, what else does Cincinnatus want to know from his captors? What is their response?

6. Describe the view of the surrounding land that Cincinnatus sees.

7. How does Cincinnatus' father-in-law say goodbye to him?

8. Describe Cincinnatus's walk through the prison staircase.

9. What does Cincinnatus hope to get out of seeing Marthe?

10. What memory of his wife does Cincinnatus recall in his writing?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss Cincinnatus's own role in his imprisonment.

1) How does Cincinnatus's crime make him impossible to imprison? Why does Cincinnatus remain in the prison, hoping for help of escape from Emmie or Pierre?

2) What implications does Cincinnatus's escape from his execution at the end of the novel have about Cincinnatus's imprisonment? If he were able to simply walk away from the executioner's ax, couldn't he simply walk away from his cell?

3) What aspects of Cincinnatus's own personality and character imprison him, literally and metaphorically?

Essay Topic 2

Cincinnatus longs to make a true human connection with his wife. Discuss the role of human connection and its opposite, isolation, in the novel.

1) What inherent conditions of being human contribute to isolating human beings from each other? How do these forces affect Cincinnatus and the novel?

2) How does society and culture work to isolate human beings in the novel and prevent human connections?

3) Are the other characters in the novel truly empty, without a real human being below the surface, as Cincinnatus sometimes declares?

Essay Topic 3

Discuss the hope of escape in the novel.

1) How does Cincinnatus interpret the drawings that he finds in the library catalog? How does he interpret the scratching sounds he hears in the wall?

2) Does hope of escape play a role in keeping Cincinnatus in prison? What would be necessary, in order for Cincinnatus to escape?

3) Who does Cincinnatus put his hope into? What does he expect from Emmie, Pierre, or other characters who might help him in some way?

(see the answer keys)

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