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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. From whom does Paper get news about Fatty and Big Soap’s job loss?

2. On what street does Paper live?

3. What is Bernice’s vocal range?

4. Which of the following is the name of Chona’s local newspaper?

5. How does the text gloss the term “mikvah”?

Short Essay Questions

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

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

3. Why does Anna Morse leave the theatre business?

4. Why does Malachi maintain Black Americans have an advantage?

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

6. What event precipitates Bernice leaving school?

7. Why, per Moshe, is marriage complicated for new Jewish immigrants to America?

8. Why does the local Black community esteem Chona?

9. For what does Moshe take Malachi when the latter first arrives at the Heaven & Earth Grocery Store?

10. Why is Paper thought to be illiterate?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

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?

Essay Topic 2

Assuming that The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store should be standard reading for a given class and level, what class and what level? Why that class and why that level? What in the text suggests as much, and how does it do so?

Essay Topic 3

Explicate the significance of the name of any one character in the text.

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