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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through 40-44.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Which book was Mencken's touchstone into literature?
(a) Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.
(b) Alexander Dumas' The Three Musketeers.
(c) Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn.
(d) Thomas Paine's Common Sense.

2. What might Mencken say about a writer's sense of beauty?
(a) The writer has an average sense of beauty.
(b) The writer has a profound sense of beauty.
(c) The writer has a very poor sense of beauty.
(d) Beauty is irrelevant to the writer, who must deal with cold, hard facts.

3. What part of Mencken's work is NOT included in the volume?
(a) Mencken's work on language and grammar.
(b) Mencken's esoteric views on art and art history.
(c) Mencken's nostalgic musings on Baltimore.
(d) Mencken's political discourse of the 1920s.

4. What criticism did Mencken have for the effect of the Emancipation Proclamation?
(a) It freed all slaves, when to preserve peace it should have freed only some.
(b) It only freed specific slaves, and not all slaves.
(c) It directly led to the Battle of Shiloh.
(d) It freed slaves all at once, when it should have done it in a gradual way.

5. Where did the Scopes monkey trial take place?
(a) Dayton, Tennessee.
(b) Chicago, Illinois.
(c) St. Louis, Missouri.
(d) Baltimore, Maryland.

Short Answer Questions

1. What might Mencken say was Grover Cleveland's defining trait?

2. What was the source of Oliver Wendell Holmes' allure?

3. According to Mencken, what was Christianity's history with lying?

4. What was the name of H. L. Mencken's brother?

5. Why was Theodore Dreiser compared to Franz Schubert by Mencken?

(see the answer key)

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