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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 do Mr. Ryan and Mr. Arnold get into a fight about?

2. Why does Kitty tell Will that he can never see Allison again?

3. Will thinks that you don't actually learn anything in life that you didn't already know at what age?

4. Which actor's suicide did Will's father obsess over?

5. What does Allison tell Will she never wants to do?

Short Essay Questions

1. What psychological breakthrough does Will make as he sits in his car thinking?

2. What urgent message does Bernie have for Will when Will gets back home after being away in the cave and the greenhouse?

3. What makes Allison feel like she needs another person in her life?

4. What is the first thing Kitty says after Will recognizes her when she wakes him up in his car in the parking lot?

5. Where has Will's daughter, Leslie, moved while he has been away at the cave and the greenhouse?

6. What news does Kitty tell Will about her family when they talk in the parking lot of the country club?

7. What happens in the secret room that Jack Curl shows Will at the convalescent home?

8. What does Will take with him into the cave?

9. Where does Will take Allison when they leave the greenhouse?

10. What are the two things that Will has to tell Allison when he returns to the greenhouse?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Will's guns become important symbols that we as readers associate with him throughout the novel. Write an essay explaining the significance of each gun (the Luger, the Greener, and the Sterlingworth) and what each comes to mean individually, as well as what the guns represent collectively for Will. Why do you think Walker Percy chose these objects to associate with Will? Does the meaning change over time?

Essay Topic 2

Throughout the novel, the narrator's perspective changes. Discuss how Walker Percy uses narration to help shape his novel. Is it first person or third person narration? Who seems to be the main focus of the novel? How does the perspective shift? Is the narrator sympathetic to the main characters?

Essay Topic 3

In the novel, Allison has lost her memory because of the treatments she received at the mental institution and Will has repressed some troubling memories from his childhood that keep returning to him when he has his spells. Write an essay discussing the theme of memory from the novel, comparing and contrasting how different characters' memories shape the plot and affect how we as a reader react to those characters.

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