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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 happens to Oscar while in Reformatory?

2. What was Pretty Preston's career before Sweet Jones double-crossed him?

3. Before sending Runt out for her first night of work for him, what does Blood tell her?

4. When Runt doesn't return after the wire beating, what does Blood realize about his relationship with Runt?

5. Where has Runt recently come from when she first meets Blood?

Short Essay Questions

1. Diamond Tooth Jimmy and Party Time (Chapter 2), Weeping Shorty (Chapter 3), Poison, Sweet Jones, Glass Top and Pretty Preston are all street names for pimps and other characters of the underworld that Blood inhabits. What are some other professions that prefer or require nicknames for their operatives and why?

2. How is Bobby "torn from the nest"?

3. Steve is never given a last name. What might be some reasons for this in the author's mind?

4. How is Pretty Preston used as a foil for Sweet Jones?

5. Many characters come and go in the story without being given names, even if they play a reasonably memorable role for the author (like the banker with the big tip in Chapter 1). However, in Chapter 9, Silas plays a singularly minor role and yet is given a name and place in the story. What significance could be attributed to this?

6. Apart from a beating, what does Sweet Jones provide for Blood during their first meeting?

7. Who are the first pimps and prostitutes in young Bobby's life and how is his encounter with them a generally positive experience?

8. What is the essence of the "cop and blow" scheme in Chapter 10?

9. How does it speak to Blood's salesmanship that he is able to score Runt as his own working girl after such a short period of time?

10. Blood gets up on his second day in Chicago and immediately gets high before going out for the night in Chapter 7. How does this sequence of events foreshadow a potential for backfire in Blood's plan to befriend Glass Top to get to Sweet Jones?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Describe and comment on the irony in the fact that when Slim is released from Leavenworth, he has lost everything and everyone in his life except Mama, the person who, in his mind, drove him into the life he now leads.

Essay Topic 2

Only eight of the prostitutes in Slim's life are given names, generally those with whom he has the longest or most pivotal relationship (No Thumbs Helen would be an exception to this). Otherwise, he goes through hundreds of girls and none of them are named and few are even relevant to the story. How is this a reflection on the real motivation behind a pimp? Is pimping really about women or sex or relationships?

Essay Topic 3

In Chapter 1, Bobby Beck's father suggests to his mother that they should leave Bobby on the steps of the Catholic church since they cannot afford him. Given the childhood violence Beck is exposed to and life that Beck subsequently leads, would this perhaps have been a better alternative leading to a better life? Consider what the upbringing of a black boy in a 1920's Catholic orphanage would have been like, the damage (or lack of) Beck/Blood/Slim inflicted on those around him and the ultimate result of his decisions and life path.

(see the answer keys)

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