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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What do some critics argue has been absent from Russian literature?
(a) Sexually-charged dialogue.
(b) Political dissent.
(c) Religious fervor.
(d) A particularly Western type of humor.

2. Bakhtin connects Medieval "seriousness" most closely to:
(a) Fear, weakness, and violence.
(b) Feasting, spectacles, and sex.
(c) Inspiration and hope.
(d) Scholarly activities.

3. During Bakhtin's time, what genre was being closely defined by the Soviet government?
(a) The lyric.
(b) The biography.
(c) The novel.
(d) The epic poem.

4. Bakhtin associates Friar John's beating of the men with:
(a) Market vendors who assault non-paying customers.
(b) Juvenalian satires of public figures.
(c) The Dionysian feast of the grape harvest.
(d) The last charge of Charlemagne.

5. How does Rabelais accomplish the grotesque degradation of his target in the prologue to the Third Book?
(a) By declaring the targets incapable of the basest bodily functions.
(b) By accusing the targets of paganism and crimes against the Church.
(c) By insulting the targets' mothers.
(d) By declaring the targets to be empty-headed.

Short Answer Questions

1. What are the "Catchpoles" of which Rabelais writes?

2. What are the "intelligentsia"?

3. With what portion of the body is grotesque debasement most concerned?

4. What does Bakhtin consider the most indispensable element of folk culture?

5. How did Rabelais obtain the material for his writings?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does the marketplace become an indicator of folk culture in general?

2. Describe two episodes of beatings or injury are specifically centered around the theme of feasting.

3. Why does Bakhtin state that in Rabelais' novel everyday kitchen implements and foods have an intrinsic value?

4. What is Bakhtin's general idea about the purpose of art?

5. Why do modern readers find it difficult to read Rabelais' novel?

6. What was Bakhtin's relationship with the Russian Union of Writers?

7. What is the underlying nature of all of Rabelais' images?

8. What was the "feast of fools," and why was it a particularly festive laughter in the Middle Ages?

9. Describe Friar John.

10. How does Rabelais describe the human body in the context of grotesque realism?

(see the answer keys)

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