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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 is Tom Crick's response to this revelation?

2. What is the lesson about history that Tom Crick draws from the study of eel mating behavior?

3. Why does Tom Crick decide to study the history of the Fens?

4. Why does his most outspoken student reject Tom Crick's attempt to teach the class history?

5. What disaster befalls Sarah Atkinson when she is 37 years old?

Short Essay Questions

1. At the end of chapter 49, Tom Crick compares progress to the process of reclaiming land lost to flooding. What does he mean?

2. In chapter 19, Tom Crick describes the beginning of the decline of his grandfather, Ernest Atkinson. Discuss what caused that decline.

3. In chapter 38, Tom describes the death of his mother from the flu. What is most remarkable about it to him?

4. In chapter 33, Tom Crick takes Price to a bar to have a drink. What is the question Price asks Tom that shakes Tom the most?

5. In chapter 11, Tom Crick describes the inquest into Freddie Parr's death. What does the judge determine is the official cause of death, and how does he arrive at his conclusion?

6. Chapter 26 is a long dissertation by Tom Crick about the mating habits of the eel. Recall three theories about how eels procreate that naturalists have advanced over the millennia.

7. In chapter 50, Harry Crick spends a lot of time thinking about the significance of the bed he is lying in. What is his conclusion?

8. Chapter 39 is about Mary's reaction to her pregnancy and to Tom's joy about it. What does Tom find her doing and what is the reason she gives?

9. In chapter 10, Tom Crick explains that he thinks the most important question is the question "why?" How does he use Louis XVI's fate to illustrate that point?

10. Chapter 16 is titled "Longitude 0°." What is this a reference to?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Carefully consider the character of Sarah Atkinson from Graham Swift's novel Waterland. Using specific examples from the novel, trace how she captures the imagination of her two sons, of the people of the town of Gildsey, and of her descendants. Finally, analyze what Sarah's life might symbolize in Tom Crick's narrative about the Fens and its people.

Essay Topic 2

Graham Swift's novel Waterland features several important symbols that recur over and over again--the phlegm-like soil, the chest in the attic and the hidden key, pikes and eels, Coronation Ale, the empty bottle Tom finds in the river, the ruined windmill, and so on. Choose two of those symbols, trace in detail how they are used throughout the novel to point to something beyond themselves, and discuss how and why they are important to understanding some of the deeper truths the novel is trying to convey.

Essay Topic 3

A central tenet of Graham Swift's novel Waterland is that history has something circular about it. Using specifics from the novel, examine one example from the story that supports that idea. Explain the impact that circular nature of history has on how the novel unfolds. Analyze whether the narrator, Tom Crick, is projecting his own theory onto the story in this regard and why he might want to do so. Support your opinion with specific references from the book that show what sort of person Tom is and what his agenda might be.

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