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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. According to Chapter 12, growing up involves giving up what illusion?

2. Intimate male-female relationships are rare because of what?

3. The title of Chapter 12 lists what?

4. Madame Bovary uses what metaphor to describe marriage?

5. Which famous author wrote this about the loss of his cherished wife: "The first plunge of the knife into the flesh is felt again and again"?

Short Essay Questions

1. What can happen as a result of a mother's fear that her child's psyche is fragile? How can this affect the child?

2. In thinking about losses as a lifelong theme, name some of the juxtapositions that Viorst discusses in Chapter 20.

3. According to Chapter 17, what redefines us throughout our lives?

4. Why does our focus shift in middle age to discovering our family's history?

5. Name two of the stages of mourning that Viorst describes in Chapter 16.

6. What does it mean if a child and mother aren't a good fit?

7. What is the fundamental tension in all man-woman marriages?

8. What does Freud say about religious thoughts of an afterlife?

9. Other than a parent, what other things impact who a child becomes?

10. Name the five stages of dying described by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. Briefly describe each stage.

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Using support from the book, explore the poem by Maxine Kumin entitled, "After Love." How does this poem support the author's stance that we all seek a substitute for the loss of oneness with our mother through other means? How does a moment like the one the poet describes fulfill our need, though temporarily, to feel oneness again?

Essay Topic 2

When mothers who reject our dependency push us from the nest too soon, the author says, we "adapt, or crumple, or compromise." Discuss the ways in which children can respond to each individual situation. In what ways can parents help children through such an experience? Why do you feel parents sometimes prematurely demand independence from their children?

Essay Topic 3

Discuss the six types of friends outlined in Chapter 12. What are they named, what are their characteristics, and how are they different?

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