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

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Carr dream about sometimes?

2. According to Carr, what likely happened around the same time as Das Kapital was published?

3. In this section, Tzara tells Gwen that her most perfect attribute is her what?

4. What leader does Lenin state that he particularly distrusts in this section?

5. When Cecily finally lashes out at Carr, she says Marx warns the worker against all of the following groups but which?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

At the beginning of the play, Carr provides a long explanation of the events that are to progress. Throughout the monologue he has difficulty getting his facts straight. As related by Carr, many of the seemingly-absurd assertions later crop up in the play. In three parts, write about the way in which Stoppard brings these absurdities to life. Why do they initially seem impossible? How do they manifest themselves in the action later?

Part 1) Carr's description of Joyce vacillating between gregarious gentleman and horrid miser.

Part 2) Placing a bet on the success of Lenin.

Part 3) Lenin the Scandinavian.

Essay Topic 2

Tristan Tzara is the contrarian of Travesties. He seems to lash out at all set values, just as Dada as a movement lashed out at accepted artistic norms. Focusing on his defamation of beauty, reason, and causality, write an essay about the character of Tzara. Why does he lash out at both Joyce and Carr? How does he connect the violence of the First World War to the art that came before Dada? Why, in the end, is he able to woo Gwendolen?

Essay Topic 3

Stoppard's plays often involve large personalities with different world-views clashing regarding some major topic. In Travesties, the topic is revolution and art. Write an essay on three characters and how they represent different views of these subjects:

Part 1) Henry Carr represents the past, a Victorian ideal. How does he relate to the other characters int he play? How does his obsession with clothing and order represent a style that is going out of fashion?

Part 2) James Joyce is perhaps the most of-the-moment in 1917. To what extend has he reconciled his love for the classical with the acknowledgment that the world is shifting? How is Ulysses a physical representation of this?

Part 3) Tristan Tzara wants to throw away everything that has come before, reject the old forms. How is he the most abrasive of characters on the stage? In what ways are all other characters put off by him?

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