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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What color does the narrator say Gulliver is dressed in, when he interrupts him on the phone?
(a) Gold.
(b) White.
(c) Black.
(d) Purple.

2. How does Isobel Martin characterize Andrew Martin’s relationship with Daniel Russell?
(a) Deep hostility.
(b) Mutual regard.
(c) Indifference.
(d) Distrust and suspicion.

3. What does the narrator learn from questioning Gulliver?
(a) That Isobel Martin is about to leave him.
(b) That everyone in Gulliver’s school is proud of him.
(c) That Andrew Martin’s family is quite wealthy.
(d) That no one likes him.

4. How does Gulliver answer when the narrator asks what he was doing at the train tracks?
(a) He laments.
(b) He accuses.
(c) He protests.
(d) He groans.

5. What do the narrator’s hosts tell him he should be?
(a) Normal.
(b) Invisible.
(c) Patient.
(d) Malleable.

6. What is the narrator’s mission on Earth?
(a) Enhance human mathematics.
(b) Provide regular reports about political events.
(c) Destroy evidence.
(d) Gather information.

7. What does the narrator say is the most significant of the human languages he will have to master?
(a) The language of frowns.
(b) The language of silent moments.
(c) The language of eyebrows.
(d) The language of sighs.

8. What are the narrator’s feelings about rain?
(a) It makes him nostalgic.
(b) It silences him.
(c) He hates it.
(d) It soothes him.

9. What magazine provides the narrator with the basics of English?
(a) Ladies Home Journal.
(b) Playboy.
(c) Cosmopolitan.
(d) Wired.

10. What happened to cause Andrew Martin to stop liking his son?
(a) Gulliver was expelled from school for arson.
(b) Gulliver got in a bad car wreck.
(c) Gulliver was arrested for smoking pot.
(d) Gulliver ran away from home.

11. How does the narrator justify killing Daniel Russell?
(a) It prevents the spread of misunderstanding.
(b) It puts humans out of their misery.
(c) It saves many lives.
(d) It reduces suffering in the universe.

12. What does the narrator conclude after following Gulliver?
(a) That he is preparing for a weightlifting tournament.
(b) That he is dealing drugs.
(c) That he wants to avoid people.
(d) That he is suicidal.

13. Why does the narrator hang up on Andrew Martin’s mother?
(a) Because Isobel comes into the room with a question for him.
(b) Because he needs to talk to Gulliver about school.
(c) Because he is afraid she will see that he is not her son.
(d) Because there are no cosmic consequences if he does.

14. What is it that impresses the narrator about Grigori Perelman?
(a) He wins enormous amounts of money for solving mathematical problems.
(b) He did not publish his stunning mathematical work during his lifetime.
(c) He donates all the money he wins from math prizes to the poor.
(d) He turns down a money prize for accomplishments in math.

15. What is the first question the narrator feels he has given the right answer to?
(a) Whether he likes being married.
(b) Whether he has been under pressure.
(c) Whether he is having an affair with a student.
(d) Whether he would like to go home.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does the narrator say human news ought to be called?

2. How does the narrator characterize dogs?

3. What does the narrator say is the quintessential experience that defines being on Earth?

4. What are blue lights a sign of, in the narrator’s experience?

5. What assumption in his audience does the narrator seek to overturn?

(see the answer keys)

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