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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Part 1, The Seer and the Seen, Section 4.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. For Ellison a primary difference between Twain and Hemingway is what?
(a) Twain was trained in writing and Hemingway was not.
(b) Twain was creative and Hemingway factual.
(c) Twain was an abolitionist and Hemingway was a prohibitionists.
(d) Hemingway writes about his own personal myth and Twain writes about the national myth.

2. As a child what do Ellison and his boyhood friends believe they are to do?
(a) Negros could never equal the lives of white Americans.
(b) They were doomed to hard manual labor and suffering.
(c) Be whoever they would and could be.
(d) Negros had no chance of doing anything interesting in life.

3. What does Ralph Ellison's father hope that Ralph will grow up to be?
(a) College professor.
(b) Jazz musician.
(c) Police officer.
(d) Poet.

4. Where is the essay "Stephen Crane and the Mainstream of American Fiction" published?
(a) In the Harvard Review of Literature, 1950.
(b) As an introduction to "The Red Badge of Courage" 1960 printing.
(c) It was never published.
(d) In the Atlantic Monthly.

5. Who is Stanley Edgar Hyman?
(a) The prominent Negro intellectual who wrote "Santa Claus is Black."
(b) Ellison's uncle who has a good sense of humor.
(c) A lyricist and comedian in the 1930's.
(d) A scholar who wrote on the relationship between Negro literature and folklore.

Short Answer Questions

1. What are the three themes of "Shadow and Act" according to the Introduction?

2. Where does Ellison grow up?

3. What is the relationship between Ellison and Stanley Hyman?

4. Who is Stanley Hyman's favorite archetypal figure?

5. Why do Crane and his wife move to England?

(see the answer key)

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