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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 do Protestant editorial writers compare the Jes Grew to?

2. Where does the Jes Grew aim to settle?

3. Where does Hinkle Von Vampton work?

4. Where are the Mu’tafikah sending their loot?

5. What does Hinkle Von Vampton ask Biff Musclewhite to do for him?

Short Essay Questions

1. What problem is Hinkle Von Vampton having, in recruiting blacks for the Benign Monster?

2. What affliction is PaPaLaBas trying to relieve the blacks of in North America?

3. Describe the trolley car driver’s strange experience on account of the black freighter.

4. What is Warren G. Harding’s role in Mumbo Jumbo?

5. What changes does Peter Pick recommend for the Plantation House scene?

6. Why does Woodrow Wilson Jefferson leave for New York?

7. How does Black Herman cure Earline of the possession by the scent of the lavender from the Black Plume?

8. What is the meaning when Safecracker Gould says that “the dances were difficult to write down” (p. 103)?

9. What is the Mu’tafikah’s plan?

10. What happens when the Mayor of New Orleans responds to the Jes Grew outbreak?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In what ways is Mumbo Jumbo relevant to contemporary readers? What contemporary issues are in play in the book, and how would the book contribute to contemporary discussion? Cite specific discussions from contemporary sources, and cite specific instances from the book, that describe its contemporary relevance.

Essay Topic 2

What would it mean to ‘write down the dance,’ in Mumbo Jumbo? What efforts are made, to record the gestures of the Jes Grew, and why does dancing elude and representation? How does Ishmael Reed address the irony of writing a novel about a dance that cannot be recorded?

Essay Topic 3

When is Mumbo Jumbo most itself? What is its characteristic passage, or moment? What makes that moment or passage the most representative of the book as a whole? Are there any places where the book seems to depart from its typical self, as if to become a different book?

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This section contains 900 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample