View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Next to what are Tommy and his wife seated before their first concert at Carnegie Hall?

2. In which of the following does Percival claim to have published?

3. With whom does Peggy initially voice concern?

4. Which of the following does Nell invoke in an argument with Jeremy?

5. Which of the following concert series are advertised to Tommy?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does Jeremy recommend against taking a bottle of water when surveilling others?

2. How does the narrator note Tommy takes after his father?

3. How does the narrator contrast popular and Classical music?

4. Why does Fein record concerts at Carnegie Hall?

5. What had Peggy summoned Nell to discuss most recently prior to the beginning of “I Will Survive”?

6. To what does Percival ascribe the decline of appetites with age?

7. What does the narrator note Tommy wore to propose to her?

8. What is the usual topic of Peggy’s complaints to Nell?

9. Why does Nell initially laugh off Peggy’s suspicions?

10. How does Percival get into clubs of which he is not a member?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In “I Will Survive,” as well as in some other places in the text, the narrator directly addresses the reader: “If this summary strikes you as rather cold and abrupt, imagine how it sounded to Peggy” (113). What effect does the direct address have on the reader, and how is the effect achieved?

Essay Topic 2

To what other writer’s work in your experience does Towles’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?

Essay Topic 3

Overall, how does the anthology present the use of alcohol and other drugs? What significance accrues to that presentation—or, if no significance accrues to that presentation, to what effect is the presentation made?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 536 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample