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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 teaching technique does Nafisi use in conjunction with the study of "The Great Gatsby"?

2. What gift does Nafisi give to the magician?

3. Why does Yassi walk faster then suddenly stop when she is out with a gentleman caller?

4. Azin is described as having what noticeable characteristic?

5. How does Part 3, Chapter 11 begin?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does Nafisi focus on Azin's painted fingernails?

2. Why does Nafisi call Catherine in "Washington Square" the inverse of our ideas about what a heroine should be?

3. What are the similarities between the lives of the characters in Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" and the lives of Nafisi's students?

4. What does it mean to be complicit in one's own crimes?

5. What does Nafisi mean by her statement that she "left Iran, but Iran did not leave me?"

6. What does the Islamist Iranian regime have in common with the theme of Fitzgerald's novel "The Great Gatsby"?

7. Why does Nafisi describe herself as becoming irrelevant?

8. Why does the magician tell Nafisi to stop blaming the Islamic Republic for all her problems?

9. Why does Nafisi get upset with students in her class at Alzahrah University (Part 3, Chapter 25)?

10. How does Nafisi react to the increase in protests, demonstrations, and violence associated with the revolution?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Nafisi presents several male students as passionate about the values of the Islamist Republic of Iran. In what ways are Mr. Bahri, Mr. Nyazi, and Mr. Ghomi similar? In what ways are they different? Which one of those students is portrayed as being in closest agreement with the regime? What evidence supports your choice?

Essay Topic 2

Throughout the book, Nafisi uses language with strong sensory connections. Choose taste, touch, sight, smell, or hearing and write an essay that discusses the use of that sense in each of the four sections of the book. Why is this sense used? Is the sense always used by the same individual? Is it always used in the same way?

Essay Topic 3

On Nafisi's first day of teaching at the University of Tehran, she asks the students what fiction should accomplish. Using examples from the text, write an essay comparing and contrasting the answer from the perspective of one of the students in Nafisi's student class and the answer from the perspective of Mr. Bahri of Mr. Nyazi.

(see the answer keys)

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