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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapter 1.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Oftentimes, what part of Dillard's work must be edited out?
(a) The typos and misspellings.
(b) The best-written part.
(c) The dialogue.
(d) The opening paragraph.

2. What do experienced writers urge young men and women to learn, according to Chapter 1?
(a) Word definitions.
(b) Shakesperian plays.
(c) A useful trade.
(d) How to spell.

3. Dillard refers to writing as changing "..from an expression of your notions to an epistemological tool." What does epistemological mean?
(a) A philosophy concerned with the nature and origin of knowledge.
(b) Bacterial DNA that is extrachromosomal.
(c) Greek knowledge.
(d) Surgical incision of the perineum during childbirth.

4. Who said a long poem takes between five and ten years to write?
(a) Emily Dickinson.
(b) John Berryman.
(c) Walt Whitman.
(d) Maya Angelou.

5. When Dillard relays a story about a cabdriver singing a boring song, why did the driver sing it twice?
(a) He wanted to bore the author.
(b) It had taken him a long time to get it right.
(c) He was stalling for time.
(d) It was a throw-away song.

Short Answer Questions

1. Who is the main character in a story told by Ernest Thompson Seton?

2. What happened in Bridgeport, Connecticut one morning in April, 1987?

3. Saint-Pol-Roux used to hang what sign on his door while he slept?

4. What question does Dillard say a writer must ask when considering random scenes that come to mind?

5. What does Dillard's "line of words" do with random pictures in the writer's mind?

(see the answer key)

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