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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Part 1.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. The author describes The Bluest Eye as having begun as a bleak narrative of what in the Foreword?
(a) Physical burglary.
(b) Physical arson.
(c) Psychological rape.
(d) Psychological murder.

2. The author describes "seeing oneself preserved in the amber of" what, in the novel's Foreword?
(a) “Collective memory.”
(b) “Time.”
(c) “Disqualifying metaphors.”
(d) “Justice.”

3. The author describes the burgeoning self-esteem of children as “before their ego has” what, in the book’s Foreword?
(a) “Arms.”
(b) “A brain.”
(c) “A stomach.”
(d) “Legs.”

4. The narrator in Part I says that for years she believed the reason the marigolds didn’t bloom was because she had done what?
(a) Under-watered them.
(b) Planted them too deep.
(c) Planted them too shallow.
(d) Over-watered them.

5. What does Toni Morrison refer to as the most “vulnerable member” of society in the novel’s Foreword?
(a) Children.
(b) The elderly.
(c) A female.
(d) A male.

Short Answer Questions

1. The author writes in the novel's Foreword that when she began writing The Bluest Eye, she was interested in the "far more tragic and disabling consequences of accepting rejection as" what?

2. In what year does the author say in the Foreword that she began the “story” that would eventually lead to The Bluest Eye?

3. The author states in the Foreword that her concept of breaking the narrative of the novel into parts "didn't work" because many readers "remain touched but not" what?

4. What does Jane’s mother do when Jane asks her to play in the story from Part I?

5. The author states in the book’s Foreword, “Beauty was not simply something to behold; it was" what?

(see the answer key)

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