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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What type of jug does Ellison believe young Negro writers, such as himself, are in?
(a) Small overcrowded jug.
(b) Broken jug, leaking and being wasted.
(c) Transparent jug, stuck inside but able to see out.
(d) Expensive jug, one to be carefully guarded.

2. Why does Oklahoma hold some freedom and equality for Negroes at the time Ellison lived there?
(a) There are almost no Negroes in Oklahoma.
(b) It is fully integrated and equality was legislated.
(c) It has no tradition of slavery.
(d) Oklahoma is founded on Mormon principles which forbade prejudice.

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

4. What book does Hemingway believe all modern American fiction sprang from?
(a) The Bible.
(b) Huckleberry Finn.
(c) Moby Dick.
(d) The Red Badge of Courage.

5. Where does Ellison give the public address "Hidden Name and Complex Fate?"
(a) Rutgers University Convocation on Race and Entitlement.
(b) nternational Peace Conference in Geneva, New York.
(c) National Association of the Advancement of Colored People.
(d) Library of Congress in 1964.

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

7. Where is the essay "Richard Wright's Blues" published and when?
(a) The Cleveland Plain Dealer, Summer 1935.
(b) The Antioch Review, Summer 1945.
(c) The New York Times, Fall 1955.
(d) The Oklahoman Messenger, Winter 1919.

8. Ellison says Hemingway sought technical perfection rather than what?
(a) Moral insight.
(b) Lyrical qualities.
(c) Financial gain.
(d) Fame and notoriety.

9. Why do Crane and his wife move to England?
(a) He was wanted for several crimes.
(b) It was more exotic to Crane than New York.
(c) To escape rumors that she was an ex-madam.
(d) It was more civilized.

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

11. Hemingway carries on Twain's technical discoveries in writing but loses what?
(a) Twain's understanding that technique is to be used in the service of truth.
(b) Twain's humor and light approach to storytelling.
(c) Twain's focus on American subjects.
(d) Twain's political and social construct.

12. Why does Ellison choose to analyze Ernest Hemingway?
(a) Hemingway ignored the dramatic and symbolic possibilities a Negro character would present.
(b) Hemingway sold more books than any other American author.
(c) Hemingway was not American.
(d) Hemingway grew up in Oklahoma City also.

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

14. Falkner writes exclusively of the southern experience yet Ellison believes him to be addressing what?
(a) Northern Negro experience.
(b) Effect of war upon culture.
(c) Inevitable rise and fall of every civilization.
(d) Nature of man.

15. What does Huckleberry Finn recognize about the Negro character, Jim?
(a) Jim knows the landscape and can take Huck anywhere.
(b) Jim is not only a slave, but a human being.
(c) Jim is very ill and near death.
(d) Jim can make him lots of money if Huck will return him to his owner.

Short Answer Questions

1. What work of literature seizes Ellison's young mind early on?

2. How many children are in Stephen Crane's birth family?

3. What does Ellison believe is the true "Negro experience?"

4. That Ellison's first novel might win a prestigious award makes him think what?

5. Why does Ellison choose to analyze Mark Twain?

(see the answer keys)

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