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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 does Olive Lawrence seem capable of to Nathaniel that none of the other visitors to his house seem capable of?

2. What is The Darter's real name?

3. What story does Arthur McCash tell Nathaniel he must give him?

4. What is Olive Lawrence's effect on Nathaniel's view of women?

5. What does Nathaniel ask the owner of the house he is buying to help him sketch out?

Short Essay Questions

1. How did The Moth react when The Darter and Olive Lawrence would fight?

2. Where does Arthur McCash find Rachel and who is she with when he looks for her in the Bark Theater?

3. How does The Darter seem to feel about Agnes, and how does that in turn affect how Nathaniel feels about her?

4. What does Nathaniel remember about Rose packing her steamer trunk for her trip to Singapore?

5. What does Nathaniel tell Agnes to try to conceal the truth of his family situation?

6. Why does Nathaniel come to know Agnes as Agnes?

7. How does Olive tell Nathaniel she will stay in touch with he and Rachel after she leaves London, and does she make good on her word?

8. What does Olive insist that Rachel and Nathaniel do with her one evening?

9. How does The Moth react when Nathaniel and Rachel turn up unexpectedly at the house in London when they should be at school?

10. Who helps Nathaniel and Rachel during Rachel's first episode with epilepsy, and what does that person do?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Through Nathaniel's first-person narration, Ondaatje writes, "Ours was a family with a habit for nicknames, which meant it was also a family of disguises" (7). Write an essay analyzing the connections between the use of nicknames, secrecy, and concealment in Warlight.

Essay Topic 2

In several instances in the novel, Ondaatje uses foreshadowing for dramatic effect. For example, on page 115, he writes, "You take your adult life with you. It is not to be a reliving, but a rewitnessing. Unless of course you wish, like my sister, to damn and enact revenge on the whole pack of them." Write an essay analyzing one or two other examples in which Ondaatje uses foreshadowing to sustain readers' attention and build suspense.

Essay Topic 3

Nathaniel is stunned when he discovers the true reason that The Darter is so curt and cold with him when he visits him at the novel's end. Write an essay exploring Nathaniel's range of feelings towards the Darter from the time he spends with him on the Thames in the novel's beginning to his last visit to the Darter at the novel's end.

(see the answer keys)

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