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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What did Orwell say was the primary preoccupation of a single unemployed man in winter?
(a) Begging for money.
(b) Finding food.
(c) Keeping warm.
(d) Finding work.

2. How did a Northerner visiting Southern England see that part of the country?
(a) As snobbish, uneducated and fantastic.
(b) As snobbish, cruel and wealthy.
(c) As snobbish, effeminate and lazy.
(d) As snobbish, wealthy and unconcerned.

3. Where did Orwell go before he turned twenty?
(a) Burma.
(b) Belfast.
(c) Sudan.
(d) Washington D.C.

4. What were the "Clothing Clubs?"
(a) Clubs in industrial towns in which unemployed men could send their wives for clothes.
(b) Clubs in industrial towns in which unemployed men could trade old clothing for new.
(c) Clubs in industrial towns in which unemployed men were given loans for clothing.
(d) Clubs in industrial towns in which unemployed men could buy new clothes.

5. What was one commodity that was less expensive in industrialized parts of England than the rest of the country?
(a) Cable.
(b) Telephones.
(c) Electricity.
(d) Fuel.

6. What famous line came from Greenwood's play "Love on the Dole?"
(a) "Oh God, let me die!"
(b) "Oh God, why have y ou done this to me?"
(c) "Oh God, send me some work!"
(d) "Oh, God, let me get out of here!"

7. What did Orwell cite as a reason class hatred seemed to be diminishing in the late 1930's?
(a) These opinions of hatred were those of only the upper classes.
(b) These opinions of hatred were not real anymore.
(c) These opinions of hatred were those of only old men.
(d) These opinions of hatred were not in print anymore.

8. What did Orwell call "the best example of bourgeois-baiting literature?"
(a) Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet."
(b) Ionesco's "The Bald Soprano."
(c) Shaw's "Major Barbara."
(d) Mirsky's "Intelligentsia of Great Britain."

9. Why did Orwell have the opportunity to receive an expensive public school education?
(a) He was sent to school by his wealthy uncle.
(b) He was allowed to attend the school free because his father was an alum.
(c) He was at the school on a scholarship.
(d) He was at the school as the guest of the Prime Minister.

10. What was "scrambling for the coal?"
(a) Poor men shoveling through the slag from the mines and passing the coal to their wives.
(b) Poor men hijacking train cars and shoveling through them for coins.
(c) Poor men running up the slag piles, digging out coal and putting it in their poclets.
(d) Poor men fighting each other for lumps of coal in the slag.

11. In order to calculate the actual number of people living on unemployment in England, what would one need to do?
(a) Divide the figure by more than five.
(b) Multiply the official figure by 4.5.
(c) Multiply the official figures by over three.
(d) Multiply the official figure by 2.5.

12. How did Orwell describe the attitude toward education in the working class?
(a) A child could not wait to get out of school and move south to Dover.
(b) A child could be educated without ever going to school.
(c) A child could not wait to get out of school and go to work to earn money.
(d) Education was important only to the middle class.

13. What did "The Sleeper Awakes" and "Brave New World" have in common in Orwell's opinion?
(a) Both are written about a pessimistic utopia.
(b) Both are written about the future of mankind.
(c) Both are written about the fall of machines.
(d) Both are written about the future of America.

14. What is left when a slag heap sinks into the ground?
(a) Ugly brown grass and soggy ground.
(b) A small hill of dirt.
(c) Soggy ground and bamboo.
(d) Dry land and weeds.

15. Why were the industrial towns in England so ugly and noxious?
(a) The modern methods of steel construction and smoke abatement were unknown.
(b) The government had given up helping this area of the country to deal with their filth.
(c) The people were so poor they threw trash in the streets and did not paint their houses.
(d) The mayors did not enforce local laws of trash and smoke abatement.

Short Answer Questions

1. What did Orwell think was more important than changes in dynasties or changes of religion?

2. What class did Orwell say he was born into?

3. When asked who the top ten greatest men living in 1920, who was most often named in Orwell's school class?

4. Why did Orwell's parents eventually forbid him to play with certain children in the neighborhood?

5. What did Orwell find was the basis of the diet for families of the unemployed?

(see the answer keys)

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