View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What children does Mrs. Luzhin's visitor have?

2. What is Luzhin's future mother-in-law's prime objection to her daughter marrying Luzhin?

3. Who meets Luzhin and his new wife when they arrive home after their reception?

4. Where does Mrs. Luzhin take her husband that he's never been before?

5. When Mrs. Luzhin comes to bed on her wedding night, where is her husband?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Luzhin think when the lights come on again after Ivan has knocked over the lamp?

2. What does Luzhin's psychiatrist ask him about?

3. How does Luzhin's fiancee's mother react to the idea that Luzhin is drunk?

4. What does Luzhin realize when he overhears his wife talking to her visitor?

5. How does Luzhin's fiancee feel about their new apartment as she furnishes it?

6. How does Luzhin act in the days before his wedding?

7. How does Luzhin read?

8. What is Luzhin doing when Ivan knocks over the lamp?

9. What does Luzhin see in the window of a stationery store that fascinates him?

10. How does Luzhin falling unconscious affect his fiancee?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss art and reflections of reality in the novel.

1) How is Luzhin's father's writing a reflection of reality? How is it a projection of his father's desires, a world of wish fulfillment? How does his writing compare to reality?

2) How do Luzhin's drawings reflect reality, and how do they reflect his perception of reality?

3) How is Luzhin's chess playing an art, and how is it not an art? How does it relate and compare to music? How does it reflect reality? How does it show Luzhin's perception of reality and his own wish fulfillment?

Essay Topic 2

Luzhin is a master chess player. Discuss chess in the novel.

1) When Luzhin sees a chess board, the pieces are just placeholders. He perceives something entirely abstract behind the board. What is it that Luzhin perceives? Why is it appealing to him? What does his relationship with chess show about his personality?

2) Near the end of the novel, Luzhin sees his life as a chess game. How is his life like a game of chess? Who is his opponent? What is he attempting to win? How does the chess analogy show how Luzhin is perceiving his world and his limitations in perceiving the world?

3) Why does Luzhin feel the need to hide his love for chess? In what ways is Luzhin ambivalent about chess? Is chess truly deadly unhealthy for Luzhin, as his psychiatrist says?

Essay Topic 3

Discuss fulfillment in the novel.

1) What motivates characters to pursue the activities they pursue? What motivates Luzhin? What motivates his wife?

2) Where do characters in the novel find fulfillment? Are any of the characters successful in feeling fulfilled?

3) What prevents fulfillment? How do characters perceive others' desires for or quests for fulfillment? How do characters conflict over what makes them fill fulfilled?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 891 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample