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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 is the speaker tortured by in "The Room of My Life"?
(a) The people around her.
(b) The objects around her.
(c) Her own thoughts.
(d) Her own creativity.

2. What game does the speaker play with God in "The Rowing Endeth"?
(a) Poker.
(b) Pictionary.
(c) Chess.
(d) Go Fish.

3. What is the focus of the author's version of "Red Riding Hood"?
(a) The wolf.
(b) The grandmother.
(c) The improbability of the outcome.
(d) The relationship between Red Riding Hood and the woodsman.

4. Who eats a magical snake in "The White Snake"?
(a) A king's servant.
(b) A king's cook.
(c) A queen.
(d) A king.

5. What is the purpose of the first poem in Transformations?
(a) To share a fairy tale about the author's daughter.
(b) To create the author as the wicked witch.
(c) To share a fairy tale about the author's son.
(d) To act as an introduction and explanation.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is the first poem in Transformations?

2. What poem has the author wondering if she is becoming an antisocial shut-in like the old woman who used to live in her neighborhood as a girl?

3. What is represented as a pair of applauding hands in "Two Hands"?

4. What does the building represent in "Riding the Elevator Into the Sky"?

5. "The Silence" explains the motivation to write as an attempt to remain occupied so that what remains at bay?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the source material for "The Jesus Papers?" How does Sexton use this source material?

2. What is the main theme of The Book of Folly? Is the theme of The Book of Folly treated the same as in her other work?

3. When was The Death Notebooks published? How does this affect the poems in the collection?

4. Why might Sexton's poem "Sleeping Beauty (Briar Rose)" have special significance for her?

5. Explain the premise of Transformations, and explain the title.

6. How does Sexton view her poetry in relation to her faith?

7. Why does The Awful Rowing Toward God begin with the poem "Rowing"?

8. How does Sexton inject herself into the final poem of "The Jesus Papers?" Why does she do this?

9. Why does Sexton end The Awful Rowing Toward God with the poem "The Rowing Endeth"?

10. How does Sexton deal with feminism in Transformations?

(see the answer keys)

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