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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. While traveling, why do the father and son leave their fires alight?

2. What do the father and son discover in a doorway?

3. After finding the items from the cart, what does the boy have a bad dream about?

4. Upon reaching the road, what does the father say about States?

5. After the father and son flee the woods and find their cart, why is the boy struggling to walk?

Short Essay Questions

1. Explain why it is difficult for the reader to truly assess how bad things are in the world.

2. Describe what the father makes for their feet in Chapter 20.

3. Explain how the father is failing his son.

4. Give one example from Chapter 5 that demonstrates how the father is not functioning well psychologically.

5. Recall from Chapter 5 what the father remembers his wife telling him about his son.

6. Explain what happens in Chapter 16 when a little boy comes up to the son.

7. Analyze the son's dream about the toy penguin.

8. Describe two things that the father and son see along their journey in Chapters 16 through 20.

9. Describe how the father restricts the son from his humanitarian instincts.

10. Explain what the father does in Chapters 11-15 that accentuates his paranoia, citing an example.

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

From the very beginning of The Road, the author does not give the father and son names, he gives them the generic labels of "the man or father" and "the boy or son."

Part 1) Why did the author choose not to give his characters names?

Part 2) How do the characters' basic names of "the man" and "the boy" affect the way the reader relates to them?

Part 3) How would the reader view the text if the characters had been given names?

Essay Topic 2

Examine the theme of repetition of problems and how it sets the tone for the book. How does the repetition of these problems create a bleak feeling throughout the book? How does this repetition help make their situation seem hopeless? Cite examples from the text.

Essay Topic 3

Analyze the father's psychological state and how it pertains to the story. How does his mental state affect the decisions that he makes? Are these decisions helping or hurting himself and his son?

(see the answer keys)

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