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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.
Short Answer Questions
1. What is the finished work's relationship to the vision of it, as viewed by Dillard?
2. What is the topic of an essay written by Dillard that she said she considers too obscure and too intellectual?
3. Why did Dillard momentarily feel she must quit writing in Chapter 3?
4. What was the result of Dillard's first attempts at splitting wood in Chapter 3?
5. What question did Dillard ask Glenn that he answered with the story of Ferrar?
Short Essay Questions
1. The next-to-last sentence of Chapter 5 reads, 'Shall we go rowing again, we who believe we may indeed row off the edge and fall?' What does this refer to?
2. Who was Paul Glenn?
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. Why was a moth trying to gain altitude and ultimately drowning, in Chapter 3?
5. How does Dillard say that she believes a writer must control his or her own energies in order to work?
6. How does Dillard say that she learned the correct way to split wood on the chopping block?
7. Why did the island on Haro Strait haunt Dillard?
8. In Chapter 5, how does Dillard compare a writer to a tennis player?
9. Why does Dillard compare a writer writing a first draft to a Zulu warrior and an Aztec maiden?
10. When Dillard mentions that Thoreau's firewood warmed him twice because he labored to cut his own wood, why does she say that her wood froze her twice?
Essay Topics
Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:
Essay Topic 1
What was Dillard, as a reader, looking for and hoping to find when reading? What emotions and insights did Dillard hope to find? What does Dillard believe many people do that inspires her to write "..instead we watch television and miss the show"?
Essay Topic 2
Dillard expresses the torturous, both in mind and body, experiences she has throughout the book. Her goal is to impart some wisdom and insight to the reader, especially those who want to write.
What wisdom has reading this book imparted to you? How will this wisdom be used?
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.
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This section contains 1,089 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) |
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