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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. In Chapter Five: Gravity, what does Deborah say she looked through?

2. In Chapter Six: The Body Electric, what does Deborah say she thought of Holloway Road as?

3. In Chapter Six: The Body Electric, how does Deborah say her father had taught her to check if fruit was ripe?

4. In Chapter One: The Big Silver, who does Deborah say she overheard?

5. In Chapter Six: The Body Electric, who does Deborah say bothered her?

Short Essay Questions

1. In Chapter Five: Gravity, what did Deborah say she started going through? What does she say the paragraph she read reminded her of?

2. In Chapter Six: The Body Electric, who does Deborah say she met later at the party? What did this person update her about their life?

3. In Chapter One: The Big Silver, what does Deborah say the young woman talked about? What did the man say in response?

4. In Chapter Three: Nets, what does Deborah say she and her ex-husband did to the family home? What did this action send her back to?

5. In Chapter Two: The Tempest, what does Deborah say she resented most about her divorce? How does she say she thought of her unhappiness?

6. In Chapter Three: Nets, what does Deborah say holds together the family home? What does Deborah say is the disintegration of this story?

7. In Chapter Two: The Tempest, what does Deborah say she had seen in Brazil? How had she applied this to her divorcee life?

8. In Chapter Six: The Body Electric, what metaphor from earlier in the book did Deborah apply to the party she went to? How did she apply this metaphor to women?

9. In Chapter Five: Gravity, who does Deborah say came to her rescue? How did this person rescue her?

10. In Chapter Six: The Body Electric, what does Deborah say she bought? Why did she buy this?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

At the end of Chapter Twelve: The Beginning of Everything, Deborah says:

"The fog had not yet lifted, but I could see a plump cockatoo perched in the middle of the line. It had raised its crested head and was shaking itself from the core of its being. A fine white powder fell from the depth of its feathers and fell like salt at its feet" (126).

Think of the symbolism of birds throughout the book. What do you think the end of this chapter represents, for Deborah, and for the autobiography where it is placed? Write a paper about the metaphor of birds throughout for Deborah and this changing time in her life, and include this image as one of the three to five instances of bird symbolism throughout.

Essay Topic 2

Throughout the autobiography, Levvy uses many different metaphors to discuss writing: gardener, looker, gazer. What is the portrait she crafts about who a writer is and what they do? How is the role of the writer related to the role of the actor? How is the role of the writer related to the roles of women and men, mothers and daughters, mothers and fathers, as discussed throughout the book?

Essay Topic 3

Read the short story, the Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In the autobiography, there are several instances of wallpaper discussed. First, Deborah has a problem with her walls being painted yellow, then she references the short story, by Gilman. Alongside the metaphor of the Family Home being taken apart, Deborah also talks about her writing student having, "torn the wallpaper off the walls of her family house and slipped her hand inside the naked bricks for something she knew was there" (71).

After reading Gilman's short story (it is 10 pages), write on what is happening. How does Deborah transform Gilman's metaphor into her lived reality? How is it similar or different how Deborah applies this metaphor for her own use to how she sees it in her student? How does the continued metaphor reflect the evolving struggles that a woman feels trying to be herself? (consider how Gilman uses the wallpaper and what her character experiences versus Deborah, her student, and other women you may want to bring into the conversation, such as Deborah's mother).

(see the answer keys)

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