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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. Oedipa returns to Echo Courts to find the Paranoids in shock because _________ ran off with one of their girlfriends.
(a) Miles.
(b) Metzger.
(c) Mucho.
(d) Humbert Humbert.

2. What does Oedipa see on an airmail stamp with a jet flying by the Capital dome that is on the letter the old drunk asks her to mail?
(a) A suspicious black figure on top of the dome.
(b) A WASTE symbol on the plane.
(c) A suspicious black figure flying the plane.
(d) A dead badger on top of the dome.

3. Mr. Thoth pulls a gold signet ring with the ________ symbol out of his knitting bag, which he says his grandfather cut from the finger of an Indian he had killed.
(a) WASTE.
(b) Nefastis.
(c) Trystero.
(d) Yoyodyne.

4. Mucho's boss, Funch, says Mucho is losing his identity and becoming more ________.
(a) Sad
(b) Generic
(c) Funny
(d) Erratic

5. Genghis Cohen shows Oedipa an old German stamp with Thurn and Taxis printed on it which has a special symbol in each corner. He suggests that the extra mark on the symbol is a ______.
(a) Moat.
(b) Mute.
(c) Foul.
(d) Flute.

Short Answer Questions

1. Where does Stanley Koteks tell Oedipa to go instead of Berkeley after he becomes distrustful of her?

2. In her investigations in Chapter 4, Oedipa goes to what kind of meeting at Yoyodyne?

3. Oedipa, accompanied by Bortz and the graduate students, attends the funeral and tries to reach out to some remaining trace of life in the grave in a similar fashion to what?

4. The Paranoids sing a song recounting how men like __________ seduce younger women?

5. In Chapter 5, it is explained that the equations for the entropy of heat-engines coincidentally resemble the equations for what?

Short Essay Questions

1. Oedipa compares her search for The Tristero to what process?

2. What is the story behind the founding of Inamorati Anonymous?

3. Describe the Nefastis Machine as it was explained by Stanley Koteks.

4. When Oedipa visits Vesperhaven House, what does Mr. Thoth tell her about his dream?

5. What is the story behind the religious splinter group known as the Scurvhamites that Professor Bortz tells Oedipa about?

6. What is significant about the fact that the founder of Tristero, Hernando Joaquin de Tristero y Calavera, called himself The Disinherited?

7. Why does Nefastis contend that only a sensitive person can work his machine?

8. Why does Oedipa think it is possible that her search for Tristero may be a hoax created by Pierce Inverarity?

9. The overall crisis Oedipa faces by the end of the novel could be summed up how?

10. The men Oedipa meets on her journey end up abandoning her. What were some of their fates and what did they represent?

(see the answer keys)

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