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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. What does the narrator say "usually promises to be interesting" (19)?
(a) A hurricane.
(b) A flood.
(c) A death.
(d) A religious crisis.

2. Why does the main character find that the story she is working on is not an easy one to write?
(a) It is about friendship.
(b) It is about death.
(c) It is about religion.
(d) It is about fear.

3. What detail does the story give about the shape of the tape on the windows?
(a) It is shaped like crosses.
(b) It is shaped like diamonds.
(c) It is shaped like asterisks.
(d) It is shaped like the letter "x."

4. Where is the woman's landlady from?
(a) Trinidad.
(b) Cuba.
(c) Jamaica.
(d) Barbados.

5. What does the woman suspect that the man believes about his blasphemy?
(a) It is no one's business but his own.
(b) It caused his illness.
(c) It caused the hurricane.
(d) It is the reason she is angry at him.

Short Answer Questions

1. What can be inferred about the woman from the description of the women who try to get her to sit down at their church?

2. In what religion are the High Holy Days a sacred time?

3. What detail in the description of the man indicates how ill he feels?

4. Who is the author of "The Center of the Story"?

5. Besides reading the Bible, what else does the woman spend her time doing in the period of time her story is about?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the woman's story about, and what is its major flaw?

2. What did the woman originally begin her story with that she later decides to edit out?

3. What book has the woman been reading, and what story is she specifically interested in?

4. Why does the woman watch the news so often, and what does she hear on the news that makes her feel exicted?

5. What comment does the story make about paring a story down to the essentials, and what does this have to do with Davis's own style?

6. Explain what the "yellow pall" is and what things in Davis's story it is attached to.

7. Who are the people in the story that the writer is working on?

8. When the woman is riding the train, after the hurricane has passed, what two realizations does she come to?

9. What arguments for and against including the newscasters in her story does the woman entertain?

10. In the end of "The Center of the Story," what does the woman realize about the emptiness at the center of her story?

(see the answer keys)

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