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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 the animal in question #1 do to to get Dillard's attention?

2. How does Dillard visualize the present?

3. What is figurative seeing?

4. In addition to form and texture, what does the author believe influences beauty?

5. What does Dillard suggest is a similarity between her and plankton?

Short Essay Questions

1. Dillard spends the entire chapter dealing with the passing of a hurricane. How does the theme of "floods" relate to other parts of the book?

2. What does Dillard believe about flowing water?

3. Dillard states that once one accepts the inevitability of death, the rest is easy. What might she mean by that?

4. Dillard watches a mosquito feed on a copperhead snake. What does she think of the act?

5. Write a brief description of what Dillard knows and observes about monarch butterflies.

6. Up to now Dillard has tried to just "notice" creation. In Chapter 8, Section 2, her focus changes. How does her focus change and what might it symbolize?

7. Why does Dillard question both the morality and the compassion of nature?

8. Dillard remembers once seeing migrating Canadian geese fly, speeding across the duck pond which leads her to think what?

9. Dillard uses stories from the pre-modern Eskimo culture throughout this book. Why do you think she connects so strongly with this culture?

10. Why do you think the story about the coot might be significant?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss "literal" seeing and "figurative" seeing as Dillard uses them. Give examples of each. How do these two terms relate to your life?

Essay Topic 2

Write an essay about praying mantis. Include Dillard's observations, her knowledge from other sources, her reactions and feeling towards praying mantis and any beliefs she may have formed because of her thoughts on this insect.

Essay Topic 3

Describe Dillard's encounter with the circular snake skin. How did she use it in thinking about time? Do you agree with her beliefs about time? Why or why not?

(see the answer keys)

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