View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What creatures' 'being' does Bataille compare in "The Labyrinth"?

2. What was Nietzsche's life dominated by, in Bataille's account?

3. What value does money articulate for workers?

4. How is the question of 'what exists compared to what appears' resolved, in "Sacrifices"?

5. What did fascism use Nietzsche's writing to oppose?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is Bataille's theme in "The Labyrinth"?

2. What does Bataille see as the value of Christianity of in "The Notion of Expenditure"?

3. How does Bataille describe the individual in "The College of Sociology"?

4. When does Bataille date the origin of the Popular Front to?

5. Describe Bataille's notion of potlatch.

6. What will cause the death and resurrection of God, in Bataille's account in "Propositions"?

7. How does Bataille portray Engels' interpretation of Hegel's philosophy in "The Critique of the Foundations of the Hegelian Dialectic"?

8. How did Nietzsche respond to the decay of his culture, according to Bataille's essay "Nietzschean Chronicle"?

9. What flaw does Bataille identify in dialectic philosophy in "The Critique of the Foundations of the Hegelian Dialectic"?

10. What pattern for self-discovery does Bataille offer in "The Sacred"?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Analyze Bataille's writing style to comment on his literary personality and temperament.

Essay Topic 2

Describe Bataille's opposition to dialectics. Is he consistent with his own anti-dialectic stance in his writing? Identify the places where Bataille's writing is most successful in opposing dialectics.

Essay Topic 3

Bataille aligned himself with Catholicism before he broke with it as a young man--but what religion can we interpolate from Bataille's writing? Analyze his writings and describe the religion or lack of religion in Bataille's writing.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 676 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample