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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 does Christmas do as he stands underneath Miss Burden's bedroom window?

2. Who does the dietician approach to exact her revenge on Christmas?

3. Why does Mr. McEachern then go to church?

4. Why does Byron not tell Miss Burden about Christmas and Brown's illegal whiskey business?

5. Christmas walks into the woods and reaches a point by a small stream where he ___________________.

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Christmas realize that racial prejudice is not as strong in the North as it is in the South?

2. What internal conflict does Christmas begin to experience this night?

3. Why does the fourteen-year-old Christmas beat the Negro girl instead of having sex with her like the other boys do?

4. What drives Lena to keep moving on her quest?

5. Why is McEachern's death symbolic in this chapter?

6. How do the other men at the planing mill learn more about Christmas' background?

7. How does the Hightower marriage eventually end?

8. Why does Christmas take Mrs. McEachern's hidden money as she watches him do it?

9. Why is Christmas attracted to Bobbie?

10. How does trouble find Byron anyway?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Christmas has a few dreamlike episodes where he disassociates himself from his actions. Why do you think he does this? Are these situations really just dreams or are they really happening?

Essay Topic 2

Another literary technique Faulkner uses is to give a voice to the towns of Jefferson and Mottstown. Why does Faulkner do this? How can one voice encompass the opinions and feelings of all the people in a town? What would the reader not know if these voices were not apparent in the story?

Essay Topic 3

Why does Byron assume that the stink coming from Hightower's house is that of goodness? Why can he not identify the odor as the stink of an unclean bachelor? Why does Faulkner use this imagery to drive home his points about the relationship between Byron and Hightower?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 716 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample