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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Mr. Partridge tell the narrator when he inquires at the Sokolow house in Chapter 10?
(a) Where to find Ishmael
(b) That Mr. Sokolow’s daughter had died
(c) Where he can find Mrs. Sokolow
(d) Why the rent was cut off

2. What scenario does Ishmael describe in Chapter 7, which horrifies the narrator?
(a) The meetings of the gods, where the gods do nothing but bicker
(b) A city where every plant and tree is ordered
(c) A jungle where the animals have committee meetings
(d) A city where the neighbors eat each other

3. When does Ishmael say the event he put at 8,000 B.C. on his timeline ended?
(a) 5,000 B.C.
(b) 2,000 A.D.
(c) He says that it has not ended yet
(d) 500 B.C.

4. What scenario does Ishmael introduce to test the narrator’s ideas about his imaginary culture?
(a) An election
(b) A warmonger
(c) A sick person
(d) An execution

5. What is the narrator’s first strategy for reconnecting to Ishmael in Chapter 10?
(a) Driving around looking
(b) Finding Mrs. Sokolow
(c) Posting an ad
(d) Apologizing to him

6. In Chapter 12, how does Ishmael say man became man?
(a) By reassessing tradition every generation
(b) By taking his fate upon himself
(c) By following his intuitions
(d) By living in the hands of the gods

7. How does Ishmael say the aeronauts proceeded to learn to fly?
(a) By research and observation
(b) By controlled experiments
(c) By following inspirations from their dreams
(d) By trial and error

8. What does Ishmael say is ironic about the story the Takers adopted about two thousand years ago?
(a) The story did not originally have anything to do with them
(b) It had started as a joke
(c) It had been created by their enemies
(d) It did not represent their beliefs

9. What does the narrator say is the first thing that the Takers do that no one else in nature does?
(a) Execute murderers
(b) Claim territory for themselves
(c) Exterminate competitors
(d) Rationalize their murder

10. What does the narrator say, in Chapter 7, Mother Culture says about humanity’s relation to nature’s laws?
(a) That they can never be broken
(b) That wise men and criminals can get away with breaking them, but the general populace cannot
(c) That there is always a price for breaking them
(d) That they do not apply to man

11. How does Ishmael characterize the gods in his description of their debates?
(a) As squabblers
(b) As troublemakers
(c) As wise men
(d) As short-sighted people

12. What new name for the Takers do Ishmael and the narrator arrive at in their discussion in Chapter 12?
(a) Those who know good and evil
(b) Those who follow the old ways
(c) Those who live in the gods’ hands
(d) Those who invent themselves

13. What does the narrator say when Ishmael asks if he would go back to prehistoric times?
(a) He says that he would go gladly
(b) He refuses
(c) He qualifies his agreement
(d) He hems and haws and does not answer

14. Why is Ishmael reticent about telling the narrator what he wants to know in Chapter 11?
(a) He is afraid that the narrator will stop coming to him once he knows
(b) He is irritated by the narrator’s failure to prevent his eviction
(c) He feels the narrator is merely curious
(d) He does not want to divulge the information

15. What does the narrator tell Ishmael he wants to know in Chapter 11?
(a) Where Ishmael’s other students are
(b) The Leavers’ story
(c) Why he decided to teach
(d) Where the Sokolows have been

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Ishmael say has been the result of the Takers’ interpretation of the law he and the narrator discuss in Chapter 8?

2. How does Ishmael describe the first farmers?

3. What does the narrator talk to Art Owens about?

4. What does Ishmael say a community lacks, when it has lost its diversity?

5. What explanation does the narrator ultimately give for why he wants to know a specific question in Chapter 11?

(see the answer keys)

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