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This test consists of 5 short answer questions and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What cover do the fifteen people use for gathering at Virginsky's house?

2. Where do Lisa and the man she meets rush off to after they meet?

3. What does Stepan ask of the police during the search?

4. What do the police take from Peter Verkhovensky's house?

5. Russia's salvation seems to reside where, in Dostoevsky's opinion?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

What kinds of violence are depicted in The Possessed? Are there different rules and expectations for each kind of violence? Are some kinds of violence more effective in resolving problems than others? Is violence ever a useful tool in The Possessed, or is it always merely destructive?

Essay Topic 2

Following the allegory of the swine from Luke, are the demons cast out of the society of the novel? Are they cast out of Russian society by Dostoevsky's novel?

Essay Topic 3

Peter Verkhovensky exploits the blindness, weakness and gullibility of many characters as he works his wiles. Does the action of the book change any of those characters so that they are immune from Peter's machinations? Asked another way--is The Possessed a moral book that teaches a lesson, or a cynical book that teaches that there are no lessons, only different actors with different motivations?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 311 words (approx. 2 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample