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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Part I: Letters 1 through 15.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Madame de Tourvel promise to Madame de Volanges in letter 11?
(a) That she will consider no one's feelings, but her own.
(b) That she will request that Valmont leave the estate.
(c) That she will do everything Valmont asks of her.
(d) That she will treat Valmont coldly.

2. Who or what does Coward see as at fault for the events of the novel?
(a) The natural, undeniable human sexual curiosity.
(b) The pressures of the social caste system.
(c) The fate handed down by God.
(d) The actions of individuals.

3. What literary tradition does Coward see as applicable?
(a) Sentimentality.
(b) Elegiac poetry.
(c) Romanticism.
(d) Don Juanism.

4. Who are the two people Cécile admits she likes best?
(a) Valmont and Merteuil.
(b) Merteuil and Danceny.
(c) Merteuil and Madame de Rosemonde.
(d) Danceny and Madame de Volanges.

5. How does Coward recommend the novel should be criticized?
(a) By referencing only the text itself, and no outside information.
(b) By using a variety of critical theories and methodologies.
(c) By placing the novel only in the context of 18th-century France.
(d) By employing only what the reader knows about Laclos' life.

Short Answer Questions

1. What euphemism does Merteuil use to refer to her lover?

2. What else does David Coward, author of the Introduction, insist is a factor in libertine novels?

3. What is a "little house?"

4. How do today's readers of Laclos interpret his novel?

5. What does Madame de Volanges say about Valmont to Madame de Tourvel in letter 9?

(see the answer key)

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