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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 was the name of the protagonist’s older brother?

2. How tall is the Kid?

3. To which of the following tests had the protagonist been subjected?

4. How many fire extinguishers is Los Alamos reported to have?

5. What label does the interlocutor apply to the figures in the protagonist’s hallucinations?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does the protagonist report having little contact with her father’s family?

2. How does the protagonist explain Grothendieck’s activism?

3. What purpose for entertainment does the interlocutor posit?

4. How does the protagonist purpose to protect the violin she buys?

5. What compelled the protagonist’s family to move to Wartburg?

6. Why did the protagonist’s father hide his first marriage?

7. How does the protagonist note arriving at the Kid’s height?

8. How does the interlocutor note patients surprise him?

9. What attitude toward war does the protagonist report?

10. What work did the protagonist’s father do after the use of atomic weapons in World War II?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In the novel, some characters are given but one name, while others are given first names and surnames, and still others are accorded names and titles. What significance, if any, accrues to patterns of naming in the novel? If no significance accrues, what purpose might be served by the patterns of naming in the novel? How does Stella Maris bear as much out?

Essay Topic 2

Consider the ending of the novel. Does it satisfy? How or how not?

Essay Topic 3

Assuming that Stella Maris should be standard reading for a given class and level, what class and what level? Why that class and why that level? What in the text suggests as much, and how does it do so?

(see the answer keys)

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