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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 Dr. Benway use to operate on a woman in Chapter 7?

2. Where is Willy the Agent’s detoxification unit?

3. What word does William claim is “English thief slang for inform”?

4. What is William S. Burroughs’s middle name?

5. Which of the following refers to a sensory experience of something that does not exist outside the mind?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does William deal with the deaths of his friends in “The Rube”? Why is this significant?

2. What happens when William Lee meets Miguel in “Lazarus Go Home”?

3. What does the character of Joselito represent symbolically?

4. What are the two nonhuman creatures described by the author in “The Black Meat”?

5. What is symbolized by Dr. Benway’s operation in “Hospital”?

6. What is the significance of Vigilante’s character in the novel? How does the Vigilante change?

7. Why do the Sailor and “Fats” Terminal meet in “The Black Meat”? What takes place in their meeting?

8. What is symbolized by the disease Bang-utot in the narrative?

9. William looks down on the other passengers of the bus because they do not know anything about the drug subculture but pretend to in “And Start West.” Why is this significant to the novel’s themes?

10. How does the narrative style and plot structure change in “Hassan’s Rumpus Room”?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Describe the style of the narrative and its relationship to the Beat Generation movement. What stylistic elements arose in the writing of the Beat writers? What was the critical and public response to Naked Lunch?

Essay Topic 2

Discuss and analyze the symbolism and imagery in “The Black Meat.” What does the Black Meat represent? How are the Reptiles and Mugwumps described? What do they symbolize? How do these creatures compare to one another? How do they compare to “people” in the narrative?

Essay Topic 3

The novel was the first of its kind to use graphic, sexual language. As a reader, what is the effect of the graphic descriptions of sex and violence? How would these factors contribute to the initial public reception of the book in the 1950s?

(see the answer keys)

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