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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. When do Tarby and Lewis decide to raise the dead in Chapter Four?

2. What is the passage about that Lewis reads at night in Chapter One?

3. Who was the previous owner of Barnvault’s Folly as said in Chapter Two?

4. Who does Lewis become friends with in Chapter Three?

5. How does Uncle Jonathan tell Lewis in Chapter Two that magic works?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Lewis do to resurrect the dead in Chapter Five? What does he have to do to complete the spell and how does he do this?

2. Why does Uncle Jonathan have so many clocks as he tells Lewis in Chapter Two? How does this relate to the previous owners of the mansion?

3. What is the first illusion scene that Uncle Jonathan pulls up in Chapter Four? What happens in it?

4. What does Lewis say he will do in Chapter Four in an attempt to keep Tarby’s interest? What does he plan with Tarby and how does he carry out this plan?

5. What does Lewis find Mrs. Zimmerman doing in Chapter One when he first sees her? Why does he feel embarrassed at this?

6. What does Lewis do when he gets home in Chapter Five? What does he dream about that night?

7. What does Lewis hear when he is up reading a book at night in Chapter One? What does he see when he goes to investigate?

8. What does Tarby say about Uncle Jonathan’s magic in Chapter Four? What does Lewis say to change Tarby’s mind?

9. What happens when Uncle Jonathan hears a clock when he picks Jonathan up in Chapter One? What does Lewis observe about Jonathan when he is walking with him to the mansion?

10. What is Lewis’ impression of Uncle Jonathan at the end of the night in Chapter One?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

While John Bellair’s the House with the Clock in Its Walls is in the Gothic tradition, it combines elements of different Gothic genres and also has introductions of new themes. Write a definition of the new form of Gothic Bellair is making in the novel, what traditions he is pulling from or transforming, what he adds, and why he adds this. Write four pages with at least four textual examples.

Essay Topic 2

A house in literature can stand as a metaphor of a mind, and in the Gothic tradition, what is trapped inside of a house may represent what is trapped within a mind. A locked door may be a part of the brain that is locked away, a corridor may be a shortcut from one thought to another. Apply this understanding of a haunted house to the novel. What is trapped inside, how is it trapped, and whose mind, or minds, does this represent? Write three pages with at least four textual examples.

Essay Topic 3

While the novel is a mystery about the clock in the walls, as it says in the title, the main events of the novel are written on the book cover. How does this change what it means to read a mystery? Why is it changed in this way? Write three pages with at least four textual examples.

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