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| Name: _________________________ | Period: ___________________ |
This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.
Short Answer Questions
1. What new piece of art does Boomer create?
2. What surprises Raoul about Ellen Cherry's appearance?
3. What do Painted Stick and Conch Shell do for the other objects immediately after meeting them?
4. What does Ellen Cherry invite Boomer to do in order to seduce him?
5. Where is Painted Stick abandoned?
Short Essay Questions
1. When Buddy goes to answer a knock at his door, he has an erection from reading about a Christian wife who goes to bed with her make-up on. What does this incident tell us about Buddy?
2. The Third Veil turns out to be the veil of political illusion. Robbins says that politics is "the compulsion to preside over property and make other people's decisions for them." He says that liberty can't be a result of political action. In what ways does this seem true and in what ways not true?
3. Describe Ellen Cherry's eye game.
4. What do we learn about Boomer Petway in the first few sections of the novel?
5. Describe Ellen Cherry and Boomer's relationship since he's become an well-known artist.
6. Why does Boomer turn an airstream into a Turkey?
7. What do we learn about Buddy and Verlin when they forcefully remove Ellen Cherry from her art class?
8. The first line in this section is "the pendulum swung yet again." It is referring to Can 'o Beans account of religious history. What does this suggest about religion?
9. What does Robbins say about religion at the end of the Fourth Veil?
10. All of the objects are given a gender except Can 'o Beans. Why is this significant?
Essay Topics
Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:
Essay Topic 1
Compare and contrast the historical account in this novel, including Robbins' interpretations of the events with the generally accepted historical view. This requires some basic research. Be careful to limit your comparison to a manageable sequence of events. For example, do not try to track the entire historical background from the first temple to modern day Jerusalem. Choose a coherent part of the history detailed in the novel and limit yourself to that. You could, for example, choose to focus on the Jerusalem from the first temple to the second. Or, you might focus on the 20th century conflict between Israel and Palestine.
Essay Topic 2
Explore the significance of the title. Ellen Cherry comments that Salome has skinny legs for a belly dancer. Why do you think that Robbins chose this as the defining moment of the novel?
Essay Topic 3
Several ideas about art and the role of the artist are explored throughout the novel. Choose three characters and compare their ideas of art and the artist. In order to accomplish this, you have to define or characterize each character's theory or art. You may choose any character that you can develop a coherent theory of art for, but some of the more obvious choices are Ellen Cherry, Boomer, Ultima, and Buddy.
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This section contains 1,355 words (approx. 5 pages at 300 words per page) |
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