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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. Why does Doodle cry when Brother takes him to see the "only beauty" Brother knows (3)?

2. Why does Mama make Brother return to the table when he is trying to get outside to see the ibis?

3. What are Brother and Doodle doing on the day when Doodle cannot keep going and falls to the ground, crying?

4. What does Daddy have Mr. Heath make for Doodle?

5. Why does Brother think that it is a good thing for Doodle to have a silly name?

Short Essay Questions

1. In what ways is the summer of 1918 hard on the family's crops?

2. How does "Brother" go about teaching Doodle to walk?

3. What images of death does the story open with?

4. When Doodle collapses during their "training," what conversation do he and "Brother" have and how does the conversation show their different attitudes about Doodle's disability?

5. When Doodle and "Brother" take up telling one another stories to pass the time, what story does Doodle tell?

6. What does the narrator make Doodle do in the barn loft, and how does Doodle react?

7. When Doodle learns to walk, where does the family put his cart, and why is this symbolically appropriate?

8. What do Doodle and "Brother" do with the flowers at Old Woman Swamp?

9. When "Brother" dances around with Aunt Nicey to celebrate Doodle walking, what happens, and why it is it ironic?

10. What "training" plan does "Brother" come up with for Doodle, and what is his motive?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The narrator feels responsible for his brother's death. Do you agree? Write an essay using evidence form the story to argue that "Brother" is or is not responsible for Doodle's death.

Essay Topic 2

Brother says, on page 4, "There is within me (and with sadness I have watched it in others) a knot

of cruelty borne by the stream of love, much as our blood sometimes bears the

seed of our destruction, and at times I was mean to Doodle." Write an essay in which you explain the meaning of this quote and make an argument for or against the narrator's ideas about cruelty and love. Be sure to use textual evidence in support of your claims.

Essay Topic 3

Is there any defense of "Brother's" actions where Doodle is concerned? Write an essay in which you consider both why "Brother" did what he did and what effects his actions had in Doodle's life. Be sure to use textual support for your claims.

(see the answer keys)

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