View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Where does the "line of words" go at the end of Chapter 1?

2. What did Dillard's study carrel in the Hollins College library overlook?

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

4. Who claimed to have written for twenty hours a day?

5. Which religious sect did Dillard read about in the Virginia library?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the most appealing schedule that Dillard says she knows?

2. Why does Dillard say that she made a pen drawing of the scenes outside her library window?

3. In Chapter 1, what does Dillard say she thinks of as the usual reasons for an author getting stuck in a book?

4. Why does Dillard feel that an appealing workplace for a writer should be avoided?

5. What, outside Dillard's library window, proved to cause the most distraction to her work?

6. When the cab driver in New York sang songs with Dillard, why did he sing one dull song twice?

7. How does Dillard describe the line of words as being one's own heart?

8. Why does Dillard believe a writer often wants to refrain from throwing away the beginnings of the work she has created?

9. How is the line of Dillard's words likened to a hammer in Chapter 1?

10. When Dillard glanced in the daylight at one of the stacks of books she regularly touched to feel her way at night, what surprised her?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Describe Dillard's reasoning behind why it makes more sense to write one long book rather than many stories or essays. Use the comparison of book chapters to short stories in your explanation.

Essay Topic 2

What is meant by Thoreau's statement to "know your own bone"? How is this advice helpful to a writer?

Essay Topic 3

What advice did Dillard give to a reader asking if she would teach him to write? Describe the two different ways in which Dillard explains her advice.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,033 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample