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This quiz consists of 5 multiple choice and 5 short answer questions through Section I (1927-1930).

Multiple Choice Questions

1. In whose hands does Bataille describe conspicuous consumption as a tool?
(a) The poor.
(b) The intelligentsia.
(c) The rich.
(d) The middle class.

2. What description fits with the "Acephale" group?
(a) Literature brotherhood.
(b) Community organizers.
(c) Secret society.
(d) Political underground.

3. What principles does Bataille say men associate with the feet in "The Big Toe"?
(a) Labor and evil.
(b) Powerlessness and subservience.
(c) Subversion and power.
(d) Evil and dark.

4. What does Bataille say the eye causes?
(a) Reverence.
(b) Despair.
(c) Anxiety.
(d) Desire.

5. What are the rats doing in "[Dream]"?
(a) Trying to bite.
(b) Eating each other.
(c) Swimming.
(d) Eating garbage.

Short Answer Questions

1. What writer coined the term conspicuous consumption?

2. What does Bataille feel about the rats in "[Dream]"?

3. What does Bataille say surrealism is, in "The 'Old Mole' and the Prefix Sur in the Words Surhomme [Superman] and Surrealist"?

4. When did Bataille and his mother abandon his father?

5. What do flowers witness, in "The Language of Flowers"?

(see the answer key)

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