View a FREE sample

This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Letters to publishing houses should ideally be addressed to whom?
(a) Any editor.
(b) A particular editor.
(c) The assistant editor.
(d) The head editor.

2. What experimental writer does Gardner mention having been moved and delighted by in Chapter 2?
(a) James Joyce.
(b) William Glass.
(c) Samuel Beckett.
(d) Tom Robbins.

3. Chapter 3 states that getting any letter at all from an editor is a mark of what?
(a) Ability.
(b) Interest.
(c) Quality.
(d) Luck.

4. In Chapter 2, Gardner writes that the "true young novelist has the stamina, patience, and single-mindedness of a" what?
(a) Elephant.
(b) Draft horse.
(c) Mule.
(d) Mother.

5. Which writer, although thought of as a solitary genius, spent time working in close community with Ford Maddox Ford?
(a) Joseph Conrad.
(b) Ernest Hemingway.
(c) Henry James.
(d) Stephen Crane.

6. Publishing houses tend to have what, according to Gardner in Chapter 3?
(a) Specializations.
(b) Talent.
(c) Egotism.
(d) Discrimination.

7. Which is one of the great graduate programs for writers that Gardner refers to in Chapter 2?
(a) Oxford.
(b) Stanford.
(c) Carnegie Mellon.
(d) NYU.

8. The main commitment of famous writers as teachers is what?
(a) The poor students.
(b) The star students.
(c) Their own work.
(d) Their students.

9. Gardner writes that one editor insisted on changing his punctuation based on some rule he learned where?
(a) NYU.
(b) Rutgers.
(c) Yale.
(d) Columbia.

10. Where did David Segal go after New American Library?
(a) Harper.
(b) Collins.
(c) Simon and Schuster.
(d) Penguin.

11. What does Gardner say brings together groups of young writers who, even in the absence of superb teachers, can be of help to one another?
(a) Graduate programs.
(b) Seminars.
(c) Colleges.
(d) Writers' workshops.

12. Where does the manuscript of a book go after the copy editor is finished with it?
(a) Typesetter.
(b) Author.
(c) Publisher.
(d) Literary editor.

13. Where does Gardner teach workshops, as he claims it has a good program for fiction?
(a) Binghamton.
(b) NYU.
(c) Emery.
(d) Oxford.

14. Gardner claims in Chapter 3 that rejection by an agent means more than rejection by a what?
(a) Editor.
(b) Teacher.
(c) Writer.
(d) Lawyer.

15. What author of experimental fiction teaches at Rice?
(a) Michael James.
(b) Kurt Vonnegut.
(c) Max Apple.
(d) Thomas Pinchon.

Short Answer Questions

1. To which editor at New American Library did Gardner send The Sunlight Diaries?

2. What publishing house did Gardner send Grendel to first?

3. According to Gardner, most rejected fiction is rejected because it's not what?

4. Who did Gardner work with as a publisher following the death of Segal?

5. Gardner states in Chapter 2, "If there are objective laws of ______, not all of theme apply in every instance, and none of them finally have to do with purpose."

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 419 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample