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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. Why does Frieda say her mother has decided to kick K. out of the house?

2. What does K. hope to ask Klamm for, when he meets with him?

3. What does Klamm try to find on the wall in the taproom?

4. What reason does Frieda suggest for letting the assistants return?

5. What does K. tell Schwarzer he is?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Klamm look like?

2. What is K.'s attitude toward the gentleman in Chapter IX?

3. How does K. feel in the village?

4. What reason does the teacher give that the chairman wants to help K.?

5. How does K. discover that Klamm is staying at the Gentlemen's Inn?

6. How does the chairman characterize the Castle's bureaucracy?

7. What reason does K. give for refusing to let the assistants come back?

8. How does the chairman's wife act during K.'s visit?

9. What happens when K. first wakes up the morning after meeting Frieda?

10. Who are the people in the house K. stops at on his way toward the Castle?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Prestige is an important element of culture in the village surrounding the Castle. Discuss the role of prestige in the novel.

1) What increases or decreases prestige in the novel?

2) Which characters value prestige and which do not?

3) What role does prestige play in the material position of the characters? Do the characters benefit by prestige?

Essay Topic 2

Discuss the role of social rules and pressure in THE CASTLE.

1) How does the community impose unwritten laws in THE CASTLE?

2) What are the consequences of defying unwritten laws in THE CASTLE? How do the consequences differ for K. and for Amalia's family?

3) What are the benefits and drawbacks of social conformity in the novel?

Essay Topic 3

The bureaucracy of the Castle seems to have no guiding force or leader, and is self-reinforcing, following only rules and regulations. Discuss the leaderless nature of the machine of bureaucracy.

1) Who assesses how well the bureaucracy of the Castle is functioning? What are the consequences?

2) How does the Castle itself function as a leader for the village? What are the consequences of the fact that the Castle is not a person, but an institution? What difference would it make if instead of a Castle, the village followed a King?

3) What controls the Castle? How is bureaucratic control different than control by a leader?

(see the answer keys)

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