View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is the Minnie?

2. How accurate is Maturin's watch?

3. What type of vessel does Aubrey wish to capture?

4. Why is Pellworm uncomfortable?

5. For what does Aubrey use Maturin's hack watch?

Short Essay Questions

1. What transpires in the meeting between Sir Joseph Blaine and Maturin?

2. What are a couple ill omens that Aubrey experiences that gives him the jitters?

3. Who does the Ariel encounter and what does Aubrey decide to do?

4. Why is Hyde cutting Jagiello's meat and what happens at dinner one evening when Hyde does so?

5. How does the Ariel slow the Médusae down enough for the HMS Jason to catch the Médusae?

6. How does Lieutenant Grant slander Aubrey's name even further?

7. What happens to several of the French officers aboard the Minnie?

8. Describe the Grimsholm fortress.

9. What happens after the Ariel sails through the narrow Baltic entrance?

10. What does Aubrey give a technical discussion of and how does he replace the broken chronometer?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Most protagonists are a mixture of admirable traits and character flaws, and Jack Aubrey is no exception. Aubrey's insight and a nearly infallible instinct tends to carry him through the various perils he encounters.

1. Trace and analyze situations when Aubrey demonstrates his instinct for handling problems at sea. Give specific examples to illustrate your analysis.

2. Trace and analyze Aubrey's character flaws, especially his ineptness on land, with business ventures and wandering eye as far as women are concerned.

3. Discuss how you think Aubrey's admirable traits helped him obtain a high rank in the Navy? How does Aubrey hide his character flaws so they have not impeded his career. Do any of those under his command seem to notice these flaws? Who? How does the reader know this?

Essay Topic 2

Aubrey is an officer and a gentleman and is therefore accorded more respect and trust even in enemy territory than the common sailor. Discuss the following:

1. Does it seem likely that officers are usually more respectable than enlisted men back then? What about today? Why or why not.

2. Aubrey has an adulterous affair with Amanda Smith in Halifax. Do you think this is how an officer and gentleman comports himself? Why or why not.

3. In the present military in the United States, both officers and enlisted can be held for court martial for adultery or having sexual relations with someone of inferior rank. Why do you think this is so? Do you agree with the policy?

4. In the time in which THE SURGEON'S MATE is set, an officer's word was assumed to always be good; whereas a non-officer was not considered trustworthy. What is the flaw in this standard? Do you think it affects them moral and/or morals of non-officers? How?

Essay Topic 3

During this era in which THE SURGEON'S MATE is set, there are strongly-adhered-to class distinctions. Aubrey and Maturin are both gentlemen. Discuss one of the following:

1. How do the divisions of class tend to make divisions among men? What are the advantages and disadvantages of a class-based society? What evidence is there of those advantages and disadvantages in THE SURGEON'S MATE?

2. In the English military of that era, nobles and gentlemen generally were the officers and very few of the working or peasant class could cross the line into officer territory. What would be the advantages and disadvantages of such a system?

3. Do you think there is a class system in the United States? Does it carry over to the military? Why or why not? (Some research may be required.)

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,204 words (approx. 5 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample