View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What made the teakettle in the faculty lounge look so interesting in Chapter 3?
(a) It had a clothespin jutting from its mouth.
(b) It was in the shape of a cow.
(c) It had a picture of an Aztec on it.
(d) It was only large enough for 8 ounces of liquid.

2. What does Dillard say that she remembers seeing on the island at Haro Strait that made her weep on the shore in fear?
(a) A fire on Stuart Island.
(b) A man out in a rowboat at night.
(c) The sea in a winter storm.
(d) The island beach dropping to the ocean floor suddenly.

3. What does Dillard say that she thinks an artist supposes a live image to possess?
(a) Something he should pretend to know.
(b) Some technique stolen from him.
(c) A confused set of lines.
(d) A secret to be discovered.

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

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

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Dillard say that she believes a writer should aim for when writing?

2. What is the finished work's relationship to the vision of it, as viewed by Dillard?

3. Who once said that '..his firewood warmed him twice because he labored to cut his own'?

4. Why did Dillard write that 'People should not feed moralistic animals'?

5. Where did Willa Cather write her prairie novels?

Short Essay Questions

1. Who was Paul Glenn?

2. Why does Dillard say it makes more sense to write one big book than to write many stories or essays?

3. Why does Dillard advise writers not to hoard a good idea for a later place in a book being written or for another book?

4. How does a work in progress turn on its author, according to Dillard?

5. In Chapter 5, how does Dillard compare a writer to a tennis player?

6. Why does Dillard say that the life of the mind of a writer is hard to be called "living"?

7. How does Dillard say that she learned the correct way to split wood on the chopping block?

8. Why does Dillard say that she needed more materials than a pencil and paper in order to write something like a second draft for a thirty-page chapter?

9. In Chapter 4, Dillard's typewriter erupted. What was the damage done?

10. What is ludicrous about the tea kettle in the faculty lounge of the university that Dillard wrote in?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,119 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample