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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. What does Ishmael symbolize, in Marx's interpretation of Moby Dick?

2. What does the ocean symbolize in Melville's Moby Dick?

3. Who does Marx say will *not* contribute to reversing the trend toward urbanization and industrialization?

4. What conclusion about technology does the narrator reach at the end of Twain's Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court?

5. Whom does Marx credit with predicting all the evils of industrialism?

Short Essay Questions

1. What was America's first response to steam power in England?

2. How developed was the land at the end of the 18th century?

3. What was Tench Coxe's contribution to the American pastoral ideal?

4. What was the dark side of industrialism, in most writers' eyes?

5. What is the role of industry in Melville's Moby Dick?

6. What is Ishmael's relationship with Ahab, in Melville's Moby Dick?

7. How did the pastoral ideal redeem the horrors of industrialism?

8. How did Emerson react to industrialism?

9. How did Ralph Waldo Emerson see nature?

10. What is complex pastoral ideology, and where does Marx see it in evidence?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Manufacturing was both an evil and a source of national strength in the 18th century. How did manufacturing change the idea of industrialism, and did the acquisition of manufacturing strength redeem the loss of natural land? Who argued that it did? Who argued that it did not?

Essay Topic 2

Some writers describe pastoralism as a contradiction or paradox, between the good life and civilization on one hand and savagery on the other. How do authors strike this paradox, without falling off into a fixed idea, or stable definition, on one hand, or all-encompassing overreach on the other? How do authors keep the paradox alive?

Essay Topic 3

What part of human nature are people like Shakespeare's Gonzalo or Thoreau or Huckleberry Finn trying to escape from in nature? Where in pastoral literature is that trait accounted for?

(see the answer keys)

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