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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What passage was Dillard working on in the cabin on Puget Sound while a northeaster was blowing?
(a) A passage about a wild child.
(b) A marble statue of a Greek funerary.
(c) Christ's baptism in the bay in front of the house.
(d) Rows of breaker waves resembling lines of writing.

2. Whose drawings and paintings did Dillard believe show his bewilderment and persistence?
(a) Rousseau.
(b) Giacometti.
(c) Gaugan.
(d) Picasso.

3. How long does the twilight linger on the island on Haro Strait in June and July?
(a) Until nearly midnight.
(b) Until nine at night.
(c) Until dawn.
(d) Until seven p.m.

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

5. What damage did the Smith-Corona typewriter do in Chapter 4?
(a) The curtains were set on fire.
(b) The table the typewriter was on collapsed.
(c) The rug got damaged.
(d) The writer's shirt was burned.

Short Answer Questions

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

2. What did Dillard learn about herself while talking with the sheriff in Chapter 3?

3. How did Dillard come to understand the proper way to split wood?

4. Who or what will teach someone to write, according to Dillard in Chapter 3?

5. Who once said about writing, 'Know your own bone'?

Short Essay Questions

1. What did Dillard learn from the local ferryman?

2. Why was a moth trying to gain altitude and ultimately drowning, in Chapter 3?

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

4. How does Dillard say that she believes a writer must control his or her own energies in order to work?

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

6. How does Dillard compare a writer to a Seminole alligator wrestler?

7. What did the children who visited Dillard in Chapter 3 surprise her with?

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

9. Who was Paul Glenn?

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

(see the answer keys)

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