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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. How does driving his car make Boots feel?

2. Why does Lutie allow Boots to stalk her like mere prey when she's completely aware of his intentions?

3. What did Lutie find when she entered her home after receiving her father's letter?

4. What does Boots hand the motorcycle policeman when he is pulled over?

5. Why does Min think Jones kicked her in her bottom?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does Lutie refuse to wear the blouse crushed by Jones?

2. How do Boots' responses to how he gets gas and how he avoided the draft serve the reader? What is the reader able to gather about Boots from his answers?

3. In Chapter 2, Lutie returns from Mrs. Chandler's and arrives in Harlem relieved to be away from white people. How does Lutie believe that white women and men look at her?

4. Lutie slaps Bub when she sees him with a shoe shining kit. Why does a shoe shining kit inspire such rage in Lutie?

5. After reading Chapter 5, it is clear what motivates Min. Using the knowledge you've gained about Min, compare her to Lutie. How do the women differ? What characteristics do they share?

6. In Chapter 1, what idea does the author hope to represent with the shrinking canary, dog, and woman in Jones' apartment?

7. Who does Lutie hold responsible for the end of her marriage?

8. How did the white bartenders treat the patrons of Junto's? How did this treatment differ from the treatment they received in the workforce?

9. Chapter 2 provides Lutie with a valuable lesson: "Anybody could be rich if he wanted to and worked hard enough and figured it out carefully enough." Still, Lutie is often discouraged by the world around her. How does the external world affect Lutie's internal life?

10. Describe how Jones and Lutie view one another.

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Mrs. Hedges is an unattractive woman who has been burned so badly she refuses to show her body to a single soul. Yet, she orchestrates the selling of beauty and women's bodies. In an essay, explain this contradiction and analyze the author's use of it. Specifically, explain what point the contraction makes. You may wish to incorporate some of Mrs. Hedges' other obvious contradictions.

Essay Topic 2

Has Ann Petry written a successful novel? If so, what qualities deem it so? If not, what qualities prevent its success? Support your answer with evidence from the text and your own prior knowledge.

Essay Topic 3

Lutie's grandmother is a significant character in The Street, despite the fact that she has passed before it's telling. How does Petry make the grandmother as concrete a character as the other living characters? What techniques do you notice that allow the reader to feel as though they "know" the grandmother? What purpose does the grandmother serve within the novel?

(see the answer keys)

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