View a FREE sample

This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Part 3, The Shadow and the Act, Section 4.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What do all American Negros share?
(a) Religious and political beliefs.
(b) Educational and economic level.
(c) Genetic links to Central Africa.
(d) A hatred toward European colonization and slavery.

2. What do the blues capture?
(a) The time period in which they were written.
(b) Religion of the Negro people.
(c) Personality of the singer.
(d) Tragic and comic sense of the human condition.

3. What assumption does Ellison start with when writing about Negro persons?
(a) Men with black skins are unquestionably human.
(b) They are his responsibility to explain.
(c) His task as a writer is to save them from the white world.
(d) Only he, as a Negro writer, can find truth and beauty in their lives.

4. How does Ellison describe his boyhood experience in Oklahoma?
(a) Series of mind numbing and violent episodes.
(b) Poverty stricken existence with little enjoyment.
(c) Very controlled and regimented experience.
(d) Romantic aspirations in the spirit of frontier adventurousness.

5. Why does Ellison choose to analyze William Falkner?
(a) Falkner is a great artist and could not be left out of the discussion.
(b) Falkner is a close personal friend of Ellison.
(c) Falkner writes about Negro life with mixed motives but also with great success.
(d) Falkner is very critical of Ellison's novel.

Short Answer Questions

1. Hemingway carries on Twain's technical discoveries in writing but loses what?

2. What is Ellison's original career direction?

3. What does Ellison say slaves had in place of freedom?

4. Where is Ellison living in the essay "Living with Music?"

5. What is minstrel show black face?

(see the answer key)

This section contains 343 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample