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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 make of car does the protagonist’s brother buy?

2. How old does the protagonist report being when she learned to read?

3. Where did the protagonist and her brother visit Nina Rindt?

4. To which of the following does the protagonist compare herself?

5. How many books does the protagonist estimate having read in her lifetime?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does the protagonist note she was less disturbed at their father’s death than her brother was?

2. Why does the protagonist object to being put on antipsychotic medication?

3. What purpose does the protagonist posit for her dominant hallucination from early in her experience with it?

4. What does the interlocutor posit should be the defining image of the age in which he lives?

5. How does the protagonist report initially attempting to distract herself from her hallucinations?

6. How does the protagonist explain her father’s recourse to alternative medicines?

7. Why, per the protagonist, do falling climbers feel peace?

8. What “old saw in racing” does the protagonist report (165-66)?

9. Why does the protagonist distrust her doctoral advisor?

10. What value does the protagonist note accrues in not writing down ideas?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Sources attest to the presence of Stella Maris on best-seller lists. Assuming that sales figures reflect popularity, what accounts for the popularity of the novel? How does it do so?

Essay Topic 2

Overall, what is the most important theme of Stella Maris? What in the text indicates as much? How does it do so?

Essay Topic 3

To what other writer’s work in your experience does McCarthy’s seem most similar? What makes the writers similar? What differentiates them? Overall, which do you regard as doing better at the craft of writing, and why?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 525 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample