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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. What information has Kumiko just received in Chapter 38?

2. In Chapter 38, what choice of hers does Kumiko blame on her brother's sins?

3. What sound awakens Toru at the end of Chapter 37?

4. What is missing from the bottom of the well in Chapter 31?

5. Whose voice does Toru Okada hear at the beginning of Chapter 34?

Short Essay Questions

1. What new offer does Ushikawa make to Toru Okada in Chapter 16?

2. How does Lieutenant Mamiya meet Boris the Manskinner for the second time?

3. How does May Kasahara express her attitude to her wigs in Chapter 15?

4. What war atrocity occurs in Chapter 26's story?

5. Describe Cinnamon.

6. What does the tabloid in Chapter 21 determine about the dummy corporation that owns the hanging house?

7. Describe Mamiya's assassination attempt on Boris in Chapter 32.

8. What sad reality does May Kasahara admit to in Chapter 18's letter?

9. How is Toru implicated in an assassination attempt in Chapter 33?

10. What questions about The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle does Toru have in Chapter 27?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Communication is a tricky and prevalent theme in the novel. Toru Okada is bombarded with new acquaintances in nearly every chapter of the novel, and they come top him in many different ways. Write an essay, outlining the different ways in which people make contact with the protagonist of the novel. How are the telephone, mail, dreams, and an early internet chat program all utilized? How does this menagerie of different forms of communication lead to ambiguity regarding how is communicating with whom?

Essay Topic 2

Perhaps the most central theme of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is the interconnectedness of humanity and the impossibility of escaping said interconnectedness. Write an essay about several characters' attempts to distance themselves from humanity and how they are pulled back:

Part 1) Why does Kumiko try to alienate herself from her family? How does she go about doing this, and how is she pulled back into the Wataya sphere? To what extent is Kumiko destroyed emotionally and existentially by her return to her family?

Part 2) Why does May Kasahara choose to leave Tokyo, and where does she go? Is this flight indicative of a desire to be separated from the society at large? Who is the only person with whom she maintains communication? How does she rediscover her interconnectedness with society?

Part 3) How is Toru Okada the definition of social alienation at the beginning of the novel? Who does he have in his life, and what does he do with his days? Write out the steps by which he leaves his house and accepts other into his life.

Essay Topic 3

A major theme of Murakami's novel is personal reinvention, and this reinvention is often made most explicit in characters who choose to rename themselves and others. Write an essay about characters in the novel who choose to change names, focusing on three instances. What events transpire that precipitate this change? What is the nature of the change? Is the change permanent? Conclude each paragraph by stating the essential thematic purpose for this change in name.

Part 1) Toru Okada, when speaking with May Kasahara.

Part 2) Malta and Creta Kano.

Part 3) Toru Okada's cat.

(see the answer keys)

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