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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 French scholar envisioned a fortress town based on the spiral design of shells?

2. Sartre was struck by what realization of Hughes's literary character, Emily?

3. Baudelaire used the term "vast" to describe what?

4. Why does a conchologist classify shells?

5. Bachelard theorizes that an observer must pass through what sort of threshold to experience an inversion of perspective?

Short Essay Questions

1. How are the hermit crab and cuckoo bird similar?

2. What does silence allow a person to do in the opinion of Bachelard?

3. For Milosz's cynical character, what is contained in the corners of the palace?

4. How does Paris manage to make the tiny stature of Tom Thumb seem believable?

5. What does Bachelard propose, to give a door sacred character? What is sacred about doors?

6. As described by Bachelard, what is the forced-choice form of geometric reasoning associated with inside and outside that clouds metaphor?

7. How do a psychologist and a phenomenologist differ when viewing a poetic image in Bachelard's opinion?

8. Why did Diole, an expert on under-sea life, write about the desert?

9. Bachelard compares what images of nature put forward by Robinet and Michelet?

10. In the opinion of Bachelard, how do dreams of the shell affect the mind? What Baltrusaitis notion illustrates this effect?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss the concept of "invented childhood," as mentioned in "Corners." How does this relate to daydreaming and memories?

Essay Topic 2

Discuss Bachelard's view of cellars and cellar fears as described in "The House, from Cellar to Garret, The Significance of the Hut." How does he use the works of Bosco and Poe to reinforce his view?

Essay Topic 3

What is the main theme of "The Poetics of Space"? What main points are raised by Bachelard to support this theme?

(see the answer keys)

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