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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. Who replaced the Mediterraneans when they moved out of Brewster Place?

2. Mattie notes that her son is looking just like whom?

3. What does Mattie's father do to her to coerce her to name the baby's father?

4. What does Mattie's father consider her to be?

5. How does Mattie's mother stop Mattie's father's rage?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe how Brewster Place is separated from the city's growth.

2. Cite instances that support the theme of mentoring women in the book.

3. Explain how Mattie is the perfect example of making the best of what you have been given in life.

4. What is Mattie's legacy to generations of women who will come after her?

5. What life lessons is the author imparting through Mattie, Miss Eva and Etta at this point of the story?

6. Explain how Basil is a product of his upbringing even though Mattie thought she was raising him the right way.

7. How does Theresa finally realize that she is part of the women of Brewster Place in spite of the differences people tried to create?

8. Describe Cora Lee's obsession with babies.

9. Who is Butch and why is Mattie so attracted to him?

10. How is it that Kiswana cannot see the blood on the bricks, only rain water?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The author writes that Kiswana puts her dreams on the back of a pigeon flying by her window. Create three other metaphors for Kiswana's flights of fancy and imaginative thoughts.

Essay Topic 2

Etta longs for respectability yet sleeps with a traveling minister on the night she meets him. Did Etta think she was putting her heart in a safe place? What is the irony in this situation? Explain.

Essay Topic 3

How does Mattie unwittingly create in Basil the type of man who will hurt women including herself? Do you think she knows what she did wrong? Do you think she would change anything about raising Basil if she could do it all over again?

(see the answer keys)

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