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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. Which of the following groups does Moshe try to appease via theatre bookings?

2. From which of the following does Malachi write Moshe?

3. What kind of flower does Dodo favor?

4. What fruit does Malachi note having only tasted in America?

5. To which of the following does Moshe take Chona for treatment?

Short Essay Questions

1. What rumor surrounds Norman Skrupskelis?

2. Why does Chona speak against her teacher on Bernice’s behalf?

3. Why did Moshe have trouble advertising his first major show?

4. What does Nate use as a euphemism for his sister-in-law’s death?

5. Why does Chona have standing among the local Jewish community?

6. Why does Paper not work as a maid?

7. Why does Anna Morse leave the theatre business?

8. What occasions Dodo’s deafness?

9. What story about his family does Moshe tell to keep his audience amused as they await a show?

10. How does Isaac stereotype Bulgarians?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

To what other writer’s work in your experience does McBride’s seem most similar? What makes the writers similar? What differentiates them? Overall, which do you regard as doing better at the craft of writing, and why?

Essay Topic 2

The novel comments repeatedly on the South, despite taking place in what is clearly the North. How is the South figured in the novel? What effect on the reader does that figuration have? How is it produced?

Essay Topic 3

Much is made in the novel of the difference between the rural and the urban. Does the novel privilege one over the other? If so, how and to what effect? If not, how not and to what effect?

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This section contains 524 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample