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. Why do the Viking ships not go ashore and attack the Abbey?

2. What does Merewyn receive from Rumon in Chapter 7?

3. Who insists that Ethelred go to the coronation?

4. Why is Rumon lost?

5. What does the King tell Merewyn?

Short Essay Questions

1. Describe Caw when he is first introduced in Chapter 1.

2. How does Queen Alfrida look when she arrives in the Great Hall to meet Merewyn and Rumon?

3. Describe Rumon's appearance when he first meets Merewyn.

4. What does King Edgar look like when Rumon and Merewyn first encounter him?

5. Describe Brother Finian.

6. What did the monastery behind the small church that is dedicated to St. Petroc look like when Rumon saw it for the first time?

7. How does Edward describe his love, Elgifu?

8. Describe Merewyn when she first encounters Rumon.

9. On the feast of the Assumption, how does Merewyn describe the Abbey's gardens as she sat in them beside Elfled on the well curb?

10. Why did Alfrida consent to marry Rumon when he asked her again the day after Christmas?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

"Avalon" has many journeys in it. Discuss how these journeys of Rumon and Merewyn add to the novel as a whole and parallel the inner journeys that both Rumon and Merewyn experience.

Essay Topic 2

When Rumon finds Merewyn in Iceland as an accepted member of society and happily married, Rumon may have viewed that as an act of betrayal by Merewyn. Later, Rumon admits to Merewyn that he betrayed his own values and beliefs when he killed two Vikings during a raid not to save the church's treasures in an act of heroism but symbolically killing Merewyn's Viking husband and father for them having taken Merewyn away from him. Analyze the nature of these betrayals and demonstrate how they contributed to the meaning of "Avalon" as a whole.

Essay Topic 3

Think about how the characters, setting, and themes in "Avalon" relate to the period in which it was written. (The early to mid 1960s.) How is it a reflection, and how is it a criticism of that time period? How does Seton make her opinions about that world clear to the reader?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,327 words (approx. 5 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample