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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 does John Young tell the Reverend Kreditor when they meet?
(a) He wants to help people.
(b) He says that good weather is coming.
(c) He describes his work at the hospital.
(d) He says that the weather is good in Munich.

2. What does the narrator describe as an "atrocity-producing" situation?
(a) The city.
(b) The possibility of nuclear war.
(c) The hospital.
(d) JFK's hero's welcome in Dallas.

3. When does the narrator feel that he and Tod Friendly have things in common?
(a) When Tod Friendly is looking at women.
(b) When Tod Friendly is taking money from prostitutes.
(c) When Tod Friendly is dreaming about a person in a lab coat.
(d) When Tod Friendly is talking to Irene.

4. What is Irene saying the first time the narrator hears her voice?
(a) She is telling Tod Friendly she loves him.
(b) She is telling Tod Friendly that she knows his true identity.
(c) She is telling Tod Friendly that she knows about his affairs with other women.
(d) She is telling Tod Friendly goodbye.

5. How does the narrator feel about eating?
(a) He is disgusted.
(b) He is afraid of his food.
(c) It fills him with pain.
(d) He is always hungry.

Short Answer Questions

1. Where does Hamilton de Souza keep his gold when he travels to Salerno, Italy?

2. Where would John Young perform abortions on women?

3. How does the narrator learn to make sense of what people say?

4. When does the narrator begin to feel that the world is going to start making sense very soon?

5. What does the narrator think Tod Friendly does in church?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does the narrator understand language?

2. What is the narrator's relationship with Irene?

3. What happens when the Reverend Kreditor talks to John Young about stormy weather?

4. Describe the narrator's mindset at the beginning of the novel.

5. Does Tod Friendly/John Young seem to be a good person?

6. Can the reader sympathize with the narrator's sense of horror at John Young's work?

7. Describe some cases in which characters are wistful about the past.

8. What is the key to substance for the narrator?

9. How does the narrator feel about John Young's work?

10. What habits does Tod Friendly pick up over the course of the first chapter?

(see the answer keys)

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