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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Dillard say she believes poets and novelists like?
(a) The thought of themselves as writers.
(b) Poems and novels.
(c) Books about writing.
(d) Writers from the nineteenth century.

2. Thornton Wilder cited an unnamed writer of sonnets as saying only one line drops from where?
(a) A whisper in the ear.
(b) The ceiling.
(c) A hammer.
(d) A chicken.

3. What is the topic of an essay written by Dillard that she said she considers too obscure and too intellectual?
(a) Popcorn.
(b) A mustang.
(c) Lions.
(d) A moth.

4. When Dillard lacked sufficient energy for writing one morning in Chapter 3, what does she say she did to try and get it?
(a) Ran a few miles and ate.
(b) Smoked and drank coffee.
(c) Played the recorder.
(d) Split some wood and smoked.

5. What did Dillard do when she was upstairs in a house and she felt a tremor under her feet in Chapter 4?
(a) Nothing; she was used to earthquakes.
(b) She went downstairs in case the stairway collapsed.
(c) She collected her writing to keep it from being damaged.
(d) She called the emergency phone number.

6. What did Dillard once describe a moth on a ship as doing?
(a) Taking off before she could draw it.
(b) Taking flight like a hummingbird.
(c) Being stepped on by someone.
(d) Losing altitude and drowning.

7. Where was Ferrar heading as he rowed against the current all night?
(a) Toward the San Juan Islands.
(b) To Fishery Point.
(c) Toward home.
(d) To the Haro Straits.

8. When Dillard left her cabin for home in Chapter 5 during a northeaster, how was she feeling, walking down the beach?
(a) Bright and alive.
(b) Blurry-eyed.
(c) Light and dizzy.
(d) Dead-like.

9. How does society regard the writer, in Dillard's experience?
(a) With indifference.
(b) With fear.
(c) WIth adulation.
(d) With curiosity.

10. Who watched Dillard chop wood every morning in Washington?
(a) Small animals.
(b) Holly and Frederick.
(c) Doe and Bob.
(d) Conrad and Brian.

11. What did Dillard learn about herself while talking with the sheriff in Chapter 3?
(a) She would one day die.
(b) She should be running a ferryboat.
(c) She learned things by writing.
(d) She didn't know why she avoided writing.

12. Who wrote, 'He goes because he must, as Galahad went towards the Grail; knowing that for those who can live it, this alone is life'?
(a) Henry Thoreau.
(b) Albert Einstein.
(c) Evelyn Underhill.
(d) Wallace Stevens.

13. Who once said that '..his firewood warmed him twice because he labored to cut his own'?
(a) Joyce.
(b) Thoreau.
(c) Whitman.
(d) James.

14. How do Tibetan lamas keep from floating away, as described in Chapter 5?
(a) They swim with the current.
(b) The meditate towards the destination.
(c) They wear chains.
(d) They walk very slowly.

15. What did Dillard notice most in the Washington cabin she wrote in?
(a) The beauty.
(b) The cold.
(c) The quiet.
(d) The view.

Short Answer Questions

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

2. According to Glenn's story, what was Ferrar after in the water?

3. At the island on Haro Strait, why would a man overboard die within ten minutes?

4. What, according to Dillard, is the first thing a writer does that is similar to what a painter does?

5. What does Dillard say that she thinks happens to something, such as a writing idea, that you do not give up freely and abundantly?

(see the answer keys)

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