View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Felice learn about the ring's location?

2. What sort of present does Acton buy Dorcas?

3. What does Vera Louise do with True Belle's wages?

4. What does Felice say Dorcas does for Acton?

5. How does True Belle know Vera Louise Gray is pregnant?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe the birthing scene of the naked black girl in Chapter Seven.

2. Describe what Golden Gray sees in the forest as he approaches his father's cabin in Chapter Six.

3. What happens to the cotton plantation thirteen years after Golden Gray confronts his father?

4. Who are the only people who do not know that Vera Louise has a son with a black man?

5. What does Vera Louise's mother do when she finds out Vera Louise is pregnant?

6. What sorts of things to Joe and Violet do together once their relationship is renewed?

7. Describe the way Dorcas is feeling at the party in the beginning of Chapter Eight.

8. In Chapter Eight, why does the narrator say Dorcas is getting tired of Joe?

9. In Chapter Nine, how does Felice describe Dorcas?

10. In Chapter Seven, what does Henry Lestory find when he gets back to his cabin?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What is significant about Dorcas's clothespin dolls? What role do they play throughout Dorcas's life? Why do you think Morrison chooses this particular symbol?

Essay Topic 2

The mothers of Violet, Joe, and Dorcas die tragically, abandon their children, or kill themselves. Why do you think Morrison includes this similarity between these three characters? What does the loss of one's mother symbolize? Do you think it effectively unites the characters, or does it pull them apart?

Essay Topic 3

How do you describe the development of the relationship between Alice and Violet? Why do you think Violet is so determined to befriend Alice? What benefits do both women derive from the relationship?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 603 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample