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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. The narrator in Part II describes the adults as treating illness in children with what?
(a) Contempt.
(b) Empathy.
(c) Mercy.
(d) Sympathy.

2. What is the narrator of Part II’s sister’s name?
(a) Pecola Breedlove.
(b) Frieda MacTeer.
(c) Maureen Peal.
(d) Rosemary Villanucci.

3. How old is Pecola when she lives by the pizza parlor in the narrator’s description in Part II?
(a) 6.
(b) 11.
(c) 10.
(d) 8.

4. What kind of car is Rosemary sitting in while she eats bread and butter in the beginning of Part II?
(a) A 1939 Buick.
(b) A 1937 Cadillac.
(c) A 1930 Chevrolet.
(d) A 1932 Ford.

5. In speaking of Pecola’s father in Part I, the narrator says, “Our innocence and faith were no more productive than his” what?
(a) “Evil and sadness.”
(b) “Immoral thinking.”
(c) “Lust or despair.”
(d) “Criminal behavior.”

Short Answer Questions

1. In what year does the author say The Bluest Eye began to take the form of a book in the Foreword?

2. Where is the abandoned store that is described in Part II as “on the southeast corner of Broadway and Thirty-fifth Street”?

3. According to Toni Morrison in the book’s Foreword, “The extremity of Pecola's case stemmed largely from" what?

4. Who owns the grocery store down the street from Pecola in Part II?

5. The author states in the book’s Foreword that in constructing the narrative she did not want to do what to "the characters who trashed Pecola and contributed to her collapse"?

Short Essay Questions

1. Is the setting of the novel focused on a specific societal group, or is the setting inclusive of different racial groups?

2. What information is related to the reader in the brief italicized preface before “Autumn”?

3. What is the primary setting for the novel? How is the author connected to this setting?

4. How is the MacTeer home described in “Autumn”? How are the relationships between the children and the adults characterized?

5. What important symbolic images are presented in the opening “Dick and Jane” reader and the preface in Part I?

6. How is the apartment of the Breedlove family described in “Here is the House…”?

7. What does Pecola pray for every night, according to the narrator in “Here is the Family…”? Why?

8. Who takes control of the situation when Pecola suddenly begins menstruating in Part II? How?

9. According to some critics, the three versions of the reader presented on the first page of The Bluest Eye represent three lifestyles presented in the novel. What does the first version represent?

10. How are Claudia’s feelings about Shirley Temple and about baby dolls illustrated in “Autumn”?

(see the answer keys)

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