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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through 45-49.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What would best describe how Mencken felt about stage acting?
(a) It is completely unworthy of the price of admission.
(b) It gladdens the heart with falsity.
(c) Like portrait painting, stage acting provides a window into the truth.
(d) It stabs at the soul with genuine feeling.

2. What was the subject of Walt Whitman's "Democratic Vistas"?
(a) Whitman's desire that a class of intellectuals would rise up to rule America.
(b) Whitman's faith in the common man to rule himself.
(c) Whitman's argument that republicanism is much preferred to democracy.
(d) The awe-inspiring beauty of several places in America.

3. Which war was General John Pershing most famously involved in?
(a) The Civil War.
(b) The War of the Roses.
(c) World War I.
(d) World War II.

4. What was Mencken's attitude toward Grover Cleveland?
(a) Smug pity.
(b) Great admiration.
(c) Contempt for his policies.
(d) Enjoyment at his suffering.

5. What was the art discussed in "The Comedian"?
(a) Stage acting.
(b) Pantomime.
(c) Television situational comedy.
(d) Street musicianship.

Short Answer Questions

1. What event did Mencken cover in "The Wallace Paranoia"?

2. Which of the following was NOT an attribute of an artist, as Mencken describes in "The Artist"?

3. According to the editor, why were the 1930s Mencken's "downfall"?

4. How was Theodore Dreiser like Joseph Conrad, according to Mencken?

5. Which is one of the stated reasons the editor put the volume together?

(see the answer key)

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