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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 did people say the Japanese created small artwork?

2. What were the golden serving dishes shaped like?

3. What is the name of the book Herr Wessel made Viktor translate from English into German?

4. Which of Charles' brothers was a playboy?

5. Which does the author state the one thing Emmy was very good at?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does Charles buy a vitrine in Chapter 6?

2. What did Drumont write about Jews in his anti-Semetic newspaper?

3. How does the author describe Proust?

4. Why did Westerners view Japanese art as so different?

5. What does Edmund learn about Charles at the end of Chapter 3?

6. What was the family's goal in terms of their grain business?

7. What problems were Charles and his relative having at the end of Chapter 20?

8. How did the Dreyfus affair effect Jewish people?

9. How does Edmund imagine the house was like when Charles and his brothers lived there?

10. How did the Dreyfus affair change Charles' attitude towards life?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Identify the main themes of the story. In what way are these themes relevant to the period? How does the author use character and setting to express these themes?

Essay Topic 2

Examine the book's chronological setting.

1. What were the main concerns during the early part of the 20th century? How does the author express these concerns?

2. How would the author change the book if it was set in today's society?

Essay Topic 3

Choose one of the city's de Waal's family lived in and examine how anger towards the Jewish population developed. Why were the originally accepted into the city? Why were the eventually ran out of the city?

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This section contains 848 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample