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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. Why does Lina, Ma's co-worker, come to the narrator's house?

2. How does Old Man tell the brothers to cure their "skeet bites" (35)?

3. What does Ma say to Paps on the way home from the lake?

4. What does the pregnant woman tell the brothers about babies outside the drugstore?

5. After reading Chapter 1, WE WANTED MORE, what point of view is the novel being told from?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why does Ma not want the narrator to get older like his other brothers?

2. As the brothers hid in the bathtub, Paps and Ma pretend to not know and do not immediately come to find them. What deep fears does the narrator share about this lack of attention?

3. How does Paps coerce Ma into not being so irate about about the new truck?

4. What previous incident may have led Joel to ask a pregnant woman outside a drugstore if she was tricked into having a baby?

5. Why do the brothers dig up Old Man's garden?

6. Having the knowledge of Ma's grueling work schedule and unstable behavior, why might the narrator say after Ma awakes confused, "It was a Sunday, but no one told Ma that" (5)?

7. How does the narrator differentiate the brothers' behavior in relation to when Ma is awake or asleep?

8. How does the reader know that Ma was a naive teenager when it came to sex as explained in Chapter 6, US PROPER?

9. How does the narrator feel when Paps and Ma discover him after the narrator nearly drowns in the lake?

10. What are some examples at the start of Chapter 12, BIG-DICK TRUCK that demonstrate the financial situation of the narrator's family?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Ma takes the brothers to a church service on the narrator's birthday and shows them a painting of monks. The narrator sees them as "men of hoods with clasped hands and eyes lifted upward" (13). The narrator is especially mesmerized by these men. Later on in the novel, the narrator confesses to Ma that he wants to be a monk. Why might the reader want to become a religious man? How would becoming a monk change the trajectory of his life and assist him in escaping his own demons?

Essay Topic 2

At the start of the novel, Ma asks the brothers to squirt tomato juice on her. Before being splattered, she compares the brothers appearance, covered in red tomato sliminess, with what the brothers looked like when they were born. Ma requests that the brothers, "Do it to me [Ma]?...Make me born" (6). What does this quote symbolize about Ma and her possible wants, needs, fears, state of mind, or stability? Provide specific examples to support your answer, as well as appropriate quotes.

Essay Topic 3

In Chapter 16, WASN'T NO ONE TO STOP THIS, the narrator is irritated by Manny's unceasing mention of God. The narrator is annoyed that Manny acts as if he deeply understands, but the narrator questions Manny's awareness. How does Manny justify his knowledge of God? What are some examples that justify Manny's intuitions about God?

(see the answer keys)

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