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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 does Mailer recall as he walks toward the Washington Monument in Chapter 2?

2. In Chapter 6, how does the audience respond to Mailer's profane tirade?

3. In Chapter 1, Mailer claims that America's New Left is drawing its political aesthetic from what country?

4. In Chapter 3, what concern does does Goodman have about the route to the Pentagon?

5. How many draft cards are turned in at Justice in Chapter 4?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Mailer respond to William Sloane Coffin in Chapter 3?

2. What metaphor does Mailer use in Chapter 5 to describe the Vietnam controvery in America and who takes what sides?

3. What is Mailer's attitude toward protest at the beginning of the novel?

4. What state is Mailer in when he leaves the party in Chapter 4?

5. Describe Mailer's emceeing in Chapters 5 and 6?

6. How does Norman Mailer characterize his hangover in Chapter 2?

7. Why are Mailer, Macdonald, and Lowell ambivalent about getting arrested in Chapter 1?

8. What concerns Goodman about the protest planning in Chapter 3?

9. What happens once the group arrives at the Justice Department in Chapter 4?

10. What rationalization does Mailer give for taking his book from the hostess's house in Chapter 5?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In Armies of the Night, Norman Mailer regularly invokes the history of the United States while he tells the story of the Pentagon March. Write an essay about Mailer's desire to present the March as a link in the development of America's social and political infrastructure, choosing three instances from the novel in which he invokes America's collective past. How does he bring up the past in these instances? What do they have to do with the current events involving the March? What specific point does the author seem to be making in this comparison?

Essay Topic 2

Norman Mailer is a large, robust, arrogant personality. His placement at the center of most of the novel creates a powerful presence the reader must contend with. Write an essay about the divergent components of Mailer's personality. Begin by discussing his engorged id. How does Mailer revel in excess int he early passages of the novel? What is he trying to achieve? In the second half of the essay, discuss the emerging of Mailer's better angels. How does this reflect another side to Mailer, one that wants to show respect and graciousness? How is the novel as a whole a reflection of this desire?

Essay Topic 3

Near the end of the second book, Mailer enumerates the reasons why some people oppose the war in Vietnam. Write an essay about this logic, focusing on three of the groups he mentions. Do you think their reasoning in sound? What organizations and individuals represent this group in the narrative? Are there modern parallels to this group in today's society?

Part 1) Those who want Asia and, eventually, America to turn Communist.

Part 2) Those who are pacifists.

Part 3) Those who think the war is unjust.

(see the answer keys)

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