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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. Which woman in the cast serves as Marat's nurse?

2. In Scene 6, Jacques Roux protests that the ruling class controls all of the following except which?

3. What was Jacques Roux's former profession?

4. Which of the following is one of the actions that Corday accuses Marat of inciting in Scene 7?

5. How many years after the Revolution do the events of the play-within-the-play take place?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the state of the Revolution in 1793, according to the Singers in Scene 5?

2. What recommendation does Duperret make to Corday in Scene 17?

3. How doe Marat and Sade differ in their attitudes toward violent action?

4. Why does Marat regret the inclusion of private property in the Declaration of Human Rights?

5. To what extent are Coulmier's fears throughout the play well-founded?

6. In 1793, what is the common people's attitude toward the new ruling class in France?

7. What recommendation does Coulmier make to Sade and the assembled actors at the end of Scene 6?

8. What interrupts the murder of Marat in Scene 31?

9. What point about social status does the Herald make when he introduces the Singers?

10. How does the unrest begin in the Epilogue?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Interruptions are common throughout the Marat/Sade. The play-within-the-plsy is stopped several times int he middle of the action. Write an essay about these interruptions:

Part 1) Coulmier is the character that most often interrupts the action of Sade's play. What are his concerns and grievances? How are they received by the actors and Sade? Are these concerns well-founded?

Part 2) Which inmates interrupt the performance? Why dot hey do so, and how do these unexpected interruptions reflect something essential about the action onstage? What effect do they create?

Part 3) There is one planned interruption in the play-within-the-play, right before the death of Marat. Why does Sade include this interruption? How is it intended to inform the action of the final moments of the play?

Essay Topic 2

In Weiss's play, sex and violence are intertwined in a way such that one cannot exist without the other. Write an essay on this inextricable link, focusing on these three points:

Part 1) How does Charlotte Corday represent the perfect balance of sexuality and destruction? How does her plan to murder Marat hinge on her sexual allure? How does her religious fervor play to both of these attributes?

Part 2) The Marquis de Sade was infamous for his linking of sex and violence in his writing. How does the Sade of Weiss's play explain this fascination? What is his attitude to either sex or violence individually?

Part 3) Focusing on Sade's speech to Marat before Corday's third visit, discuss both sex and violence as driving forces both in the play and the play-within-the play.

Essay Topic 3

The theme of subjugation and captivity is pervasive in Weiss's play. Write an essay in three parts discussing the theme of captivity:

Part 1) How are the poor of 1793 constantly held in captivity? Who were their oppressors before the fall of the Bastille, and who have there oppressors become int he Revolutionary era? How does Marat decry both in the play?

Part 2) The story of Mart's death is performed by inmates in a mental asylum. How does the the life of the inmate reflect the life of the poor in 1793? In what way is the play-within-the-play an act of revolution against captivity?

Part 3) What is Sade's notion of captivity? How is it different from Marat's? What is the prison that every man inhabits in Sade's worldview?

(see the answer keys)

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