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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 adjective is used to describe the gardener in the narrator's tale?

2. Why did the neighborhood alarms often go unanswered after many had them installed?

3. What instrument does the narrator cite when describing how "the misbeats of [her] heart tailed off" (24)?

4. According to the narrator's tale, who were being shot by the police in the city?

5. Who is the author of "Once Upon a Time"?

Short Essay Questions

1. Despite having the same fears of intruders as other people, what precautions does the narrator say she does not take in her home?

2. At the start of "Once Upon a Time," what does the narrator say someone wrote and asked her to do, and how does she feel about this request?

3. How is the man's mother described and what warning did she give her son and his wife as they start their life together?

4. Describe the sign the man and woman received from the Neighborhood watch. How was it supposed to "prove the property owner was no racist" (25)?

5. What does the narrator do when she is an able to fall back to sleep at the start of the story?

6. After the riots outside the city subsided, what crimes took place in the suburbs?

7. What does the man have installed in their house to ease his wife's fears and what does the boy do with them?

8. Where does the story the narrator tells herself take palce and who is in the story?

9. What recent crimes does the narrator describe at the start of the story?

10. How does the husband try to assuage his wife's fears when she worries people from the cities will tear off their warning sign and "open the gates and stream in" (26).

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Write an essay about the author of “Once Upon a Time.” Who is she? What else has she written? How is “Once Upon a Time” similar or different from her other works?

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay examining security devices as a symbol in “Once Upon a Time.” In what scenes do these devices appear? What is the context? How do these devices develop the narrative?

Essay Topic 3

Write a brief essay analyzing the title “Once Upon a Time.” Explore the ways in which this title connects to the plot and themes of the story.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 722 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample