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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. How old are Fusako's children?

2. How many children were in Kikuko's family?

3. What type of nut fell when Yasuko and Shingo were married?

4. What does Kikuko prepare to give Shuichi for his hangover in Chapter 8?

5. When did Yasuko begin to look younger than Shingo?

Short Essay Questions

1. What does Shingo struggle to remember at the beginning of Chapter 1?

2. Describe Shingo's family.

3. How did Shingo come to hire Eiko?

4. How does Shingo attempt to make his wife stop snoring?

5. Why does Kikuko go to the University Hospital?

6. Describe the photograph of Toriyama that was at his funeral.

7. Why would it be difficult for Fusako and Aihara to flee if the typhoon should get really bad?

8. Why was Kitamoto put in a mental hospital?

9. What does Mrs. Ikeda think would help get Shuichi to leave his mistress?

10. What sound does Shingo hear when he wakes in the night in Chapter 1?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss how the phrase "calmly swam through while everyone else was going under" applied to Shingo and his friends.

Essay Topic 2

Shingo appears to have changed the most in the novel. Discuss how characters did or did not change through the course of the novel.

Essay Topic 3

Shingo refers to Kikuko as both injured party and absolver. Discuss what Shingo means when he refers to Kikuko as an injured party and an absolver.

(see the answer keys)

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