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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 answers the phone when Oedipa tries to call Driblette from her motel room in Chapter 6?

2. Bortz suggests to Oedipa that Tristero might have caused ______ simply in order to issue the Proclamation of the 9th Frimaire, An III, ending the sanctioned postal monopoly.

3. Mucho's boss, Funch, says Mucho is losing his identity and becoming more ________.

4. While walking down a stretch of railroad track, Oedipa remembers that Inverarity had once told her the secret to success was what?

5. Genghis Cohen claims that the stamp, which depicts a Pony Express rider galloping out of a western fort into a black feather, is what?

Short Essay Questions

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

2. In addition to visiting John Nefastis, why does Oedipa need to go to Berkeley?

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

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

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

6. What causes Oedipa to realize that every source of information on the Tristero can somehow be traced to Inverarity?

7. By gathering clues from diverse obscure sources, what is the account of how the Tristero organization began that Oedipa pieces together?

8. Why are WASTE mail boxes located under freeways?

9. What does the historical marker that Oedipa remembers seeing at Fangoso Lagoons commemorate?

10. Bortz hands Oedipa an ancient book about the Italian travels of Dr. Diocletian Blobb. What does this story have to do with the Trystero?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss how Chapter 4 of The Crying of Lot 49 shows Oedipa involved in a process of meaning creation. Give at least four specific examples from events in the chapter.

Essay Topic 2

Oedipa's search for truth leads her to visit, along with Metzger, the Paranoids and their girlfriends, Inverarity's housing development, and Fangoso Lagoons.

1) Explain the significance of this setting to the thematic aspects of the novel.

2) Describe how the characters themselves and their actions in this scene embody certain themes of the novel.

Essay Topic 3

The presence of numerous male characters in the narrative who are unable to truly love Oedipa alludes to Freud's theory of the Oedipal complex.

1) Explain Freud's theory and how it relates to The Crying of Lot 49.

3) Show specifically what each of these male characters represents to Oedipa and how they abandon her: Metzger, Driblette and Mucho.

(see the answer keys)

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