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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What school of thought gave Alpha the tragic language he needed?
(a) Agnosticism.
(b) Capitalism.
(c) Fascism.
(d) Catholicism.

2. Witkiewicz thought art and philosophy were living out their last days, and how did he see their end?
(a) He found life without them unbearable.
(b) He tried to speed their demise.
(c) He couldn't wait until they were gone.
(d) He tried to slow their decay.

3. Dialectical materialism appeals to the Eastern man because it is, in Milosz's term, what?
(a) Timely.
(b) Mathematical.
(c) Earthy.
(d) Heavenly.

4. Walking in the ruined city in 1945, what emotion did Alpha feel primarily?
(a) Confusion.
(b) Anger.
(c) Despair.
(d) Sadness.

5. The purpose of Chapter 2 is to compare and contrast what two groups?
(a) Eastern and Western communists.
(b) Communists and fascists.
(c) Communists and capitalists.
(d) Eastern Europe with Eastern Asia.

6. Milosz compares the Method to what animal?
(a) An ox, strong enough to bear the weight of reality.
(b) A snake, for which the tail begins at any point.
(c) A powerful bird whose wing is broken.
(d) A fox, wily enough to deceive those who are skeptical.

7. Fifty years of re-education within the party can change entire nations so that they become what?
(a) Fearful.
(b) Utterly subservient.
(c) Sly and vicious.
(d) Docile and obedient.

8. Which Ketman asserts that men do not know how to rule themselves or properly distribute goods?
(a) Ethical Ketman.
(b) Sceptical Ketman.
(c) The Ketman of revolutionary purity.
(d) Metaphysical Ketman.

9. Milosz ends Chapter I with the question:
(a) What else could man ask for?
(b) What the devil does a man need?
(c) How long must communism continue?
(d) How long until man accepts the party?

10. As explained in Chapter 2, the party considers _________ one of the highest virtues.
(a) Silence.
(b) Restraint.
(c) Compliance.
(d) Informing.

11. What is the basis of dialectical materialism, in Milosz's understanding?
(a) History will again favor the bourgeois.
(b) History favors communism but allows capitalism to remain.
(c) Fascism paves the road for communism.
(d) History has condemned capitalism.

12. Why did the new communist government have a difficult time in Poland after World War II?
(a) The citizens did not want them there.
(b) They were unprepared for the hardship.
(c) The modes of transportation were insufficient.
(d) Moscow had sent too few leaders.

13. Why did Alpha eventually become a communist?
(a) He thought it was best for his family.
(b) He was tricked into it.
(c) He had no other choice.
(d) The party threatened his life.

14. Chapter 2 opens with the picture of the Eastern communists looking to the West with what emotion/s?
(a) Unabashed hope.
(b) A mixture of hope and despair.
(c) Anger and confusion.
(d) Disillusionment.

15. Milosz says that an individual has no more significance to the muse of history than what object?
(a) A weed in a field.
(b) A cog in a machine.
(c) An instrument in an orchestra.
(d) An atom in space.

Short Answer Questions

1. The Ketman of revolutionary purity holds that a tyrant's reign may be justified in what circumstances?

2. The atmosphere in a collective society is one of what?

3. The "accidental unmaskings of Ketman," Chapter 3, are called _________ .

4. Taking joy that one's life occurs within the stream of life is what type of Ketman?

5. In order to kept his apartment and good political standing, the man practicing aesthetic Ketman is willing to do what?

(see the answer keys)

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