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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 state of being does Martha accuse George of having?

2. How does George silence Martha as she talks about his failure to take over the department?

3. What is Martha doing for Honey at the beginning of Act 2?

4. How does George refer to his arguments with Martha while alone with Nick?

5. When Martha suggests that George should have listened to her in the bathroom, what does he suggest he would have done instead?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe university politics as explained by George.

2. What is George's argument regarding human chromosomes and biologists?

3. How does Martha describe Nick and Honey?

4. Who is George and Martha's son?

5. Describe Martha when she returns to the main room and how the guests react.

6. Describe the state Honey is in during this scene.

7. What happened to George's school friend who killed his mother?

8. What do George and Martha do with their tears?

9. What is Martha's relationship with her father?

10. What confession does Honey make?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Choose one of the following to write an essay:

1.) To what extent are Nick and Honey surrogates for the audience? What can characters who are not acclimated to the setting of the play have in common with the viewer and what can they do that the viewer cannot? Cite examples from the text to justify your thesis.

2.) How did George and Martha come to the point at which they are when the play begins? Begin with a description of their living arrangement, and use individual events in their marriage as a frame for the essay.

3.) How do we grow to understand George and Martha as sympathetic characters by the end of the play when almost all they say is a lie? Write an essay in the defense of unreliable protagonists, citing specifics from the text as evidence.

Essay Topic 2

Three times in the play, Honey is reduced to tears or gets sick. Write a paragraph about each of these breakdowns - one in each act - and how, together, they signify the yielding of social grace and denial to the reality of a desperate, helpless life.

Essay Topic 3

Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf is a play about rapidly shifting alliances. Compare and contrast the last scene of Act 2 - where Nick and Martha team up against George - and the middle of Act 3 - where George and Martha bombard Nick. What has changed between these two scenes and what is each of the three characters trying to accomplish at each point in time?

(see the answer keys)

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