View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does "one up, one down" mean?
(a) One ground floor, one basement.
(b) One room in front of another.
(c) One room with a higher ceiling than the other.
(d) One room on each storey.

2. What is a cage?
(a) A steel box in which supplies and personal belongings are kept.
(b) A steel box in which coal is transported to the surface.
(c) A steel box in which the foreman rides through the caverns.
(d) A steel box that is lowered at a fast rate into the caverns of the mine.

3. What is the cause of the great majority of accidents in the mine?
(a) Human error.
(b) Gob fires.
(c) Gas explosions.
(d) Fall of a roof.

4. What did Orwell learn had happened to Wigan Pier?
(a) It was a myth and never existed.
(b) It was converted into a caravan park.
(c) It had been demolished.
(d) It was turned into a diner.

5. What author accused miners of gluttony?
(a) Rev. W.D. Acres.
(b) Rev. W. R. Inge.
(c) Rev. B.W. Smith.
(d) Rev. W. S. Bellows.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is "traveling?"

2. What physical attributes did the fillers share?

3. Why did men chew tobacco in the mines?

4. Why did Orwell believe the return trip through the tunnels was worse than the initial one?

5. What creature did Orwell see a surprising abundance of in the coal mine?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe the meals Orwell was offered while living at the Brookers. Who cooked the meals? What were the boarders given to eat for dinner?

2. Who were some of the boarders at the Brooker's rooming house? How were thought of by the Brookers?

3. Describe the elevator that took Orwell and the miners down to the tunnels.

4. Why were the fillers an important part of the coal mining business? What were their jobs?

5. What difference did Orwell see in the lives of the working class and the bourgeois that had to do with the humiliation suffered by many miners?

6. Why did Orwell make the comparison between the miner's wages and the amount of coal and money the coal mines produce? What did he want the reader to understand?

7. Why did Orwell believe that our civilization is founded on coal? How did he relate this belief to the coal miner?

8. Why did Orwell leave the Brookers? Where did he go? How did he respond to his train trip leaving town?

9. Who were the Brookers? How did Orwell describe them? What did they look like? Behave like?

10. There were three shift in the mines Orwell discussed. What happened in each of the three shifts?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,389 words (approx. 5 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample