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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Chapters 4, 5 and 6.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. To what does Dillard compare writing a book?
(a) Learning to walk via crawling.
(b) Running a marathon.
(c) Climbing a long ladder.
(d) A reality television show.

2. What did Dillard study in Chapter 5?
(a) Paintboxes.
(b) Literature.
(c) Exhilaration.
(d) The world.

3. What is the title of the Jack London book mentioned in Chapter 2?
(a) The Iron Heel.
(b) The Call of the Wild.
(c) White Fang.
(d) The Sea-Wolf.

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

5. What does Dillard say shocked her as she remembered a formal lunch with a publishing colleague in Chapter 2?
(a) Her lack of entertaining people.
(b) The fanaticism of her twenties.
(c) The sexist terms the man used.
(d) Her plants dying.

Short Answer Questions

1. What did Dillard realize when she spoke to the local sheriff in Chapter 3?

2. What did Emily Dickinson love best in her writing?

3. How does Dillard describe the process of writing a book?

4. What did Dillard do one night in the rare book room of the Virginia library?

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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