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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Who is Hannah Peace?
(a) A Black writer that Morrison admires.
(b) The inspiration for Sula.
(c) A literary scholar.
(d) A character in Beloved.

2. In "The Site of Memory," Morrison proposes to show how memoir is similar to and different from what?
(a) Poetry.
(b) Fiction.
(c) History.
(d) Literary criticism.

3. In "Invisible Ink," what word does Morrison object to when it is applied to reading?
(a) Challenge.
(b) Art.
(c) Participation.
(d) Pleasure.

4. Morrison's novel "Paradise" is set where?
(a) In an unnamed kingdom.
(b) In an all-Black town.
(c) In Jerusalem.
(d) In New York during the Jazz Age.

5. In "Unspeakable Things Unspoken," Morrison introduces Rafferty's criticism of Milan Kundera's Eurocentrism because she says that it can do what?
(a) Demonstrate why the American canon is an illusion.
(b) Serve as a model for African American writers seeking inclusion in the canon.
(c) Motivate a re-imagining of the role of scholarship in shaping the canon.
(d) Highlight the need for a new appraisal of European contributions to the canon.

Short Answer Questions

1. Why is "panoply" a clever piece of diction as used in "Unspeakable Things Unspoken"?

2. In "The Trouble with Paradise," what does Morrison call "a realm that is no realm at all"?

3. In "The Source of Self-Regard," Morrison recounts being asked how to teach one of her books when what was true?

4. John Gardner's novel Grendel uses the original story as a source for what?

5. In "Unspeakable Things Unspoken," Morrison says that what is different about the discussion of including African-American literature in the canon is that unlike earlier arguments over expanding the canon, this one does what?

Short Essay Questions

1. According to “The Writer Before the Page," what is the relationship between Hannah Peace and Sula?

2. In “Grendel and His Mother," what does Morrison say is interesting about the Danes' reaction to Grendel, and what does she say this shows about the nature of evil?

3. In “The Source of Self-Regard," what does Morrison describe as some of the contradictions that jazz contains?

4. In “Academic Whispers," what three reasons does Morrison say are poor reasons to include African American literature in the canon?

5. In “Academic Whispers," what does Morrison say used to annoy her about being asked to speak about racism?

6. In “The Site of Memory," what does Morrison say about how image and memory interacted for her in relation to her father's death and Song of Solomon?

7. In “Memory, Creation, and Fiction," what Black cultural aesthetic expectations does Morrison discuss as important in her work, and why is it important to her to use them?

8. In "On Beloved," Morrison discusses Sula and Beloved in the context of feminism; what is the relationship of these two texts to feminism?

9. In “The Trouble with Paradise," what does Morrison mean when she says that fiction writers have to stare unblinking into the "realm of difference"?

10. In “Gertrude Stein and the Difference She Makes," Morrison says that the two responses to chaos are "renaming" and "violence." What does she mean by this?

(see the answer keys)

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