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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. How does Ossip respond to Maga's simple question in Chapter 25?

2. What word terrifies Horacio in Chapter 93?

3. What does Horacio do when Maga starts crying in Chapter 12?

4. How many audience members - including Horacio - are left in the auditorium at the end of the recital in Chapter 23?

5. Over time, what does La Maga fantasize Horacio will do during sex?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Wong's torture photos affect Horatio's mood for the worse?

2. What is Maga doing when Horacio arrives in Chapter 28?

3. Why does La Maga feel responsible for Pola's death in Chapter 27?

4. Why does Ossip apologize to Maga in Chapter 24?

5. What is Rocamadour's place in La Maga and Horacio's relationship?

6. What criticism does Maga make of Horacio at the end of Chapter 3?

7. Why are Maga and Horacio so affected by the fish in Chapter 8?

8. How are La Maga and Horacio different?

9. In Chapter 26, what reason does Ossip offer for Horacio's leaving?

10. Why is La Maga irate in Chapter 93?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The motif of madness permeates the second book of HOPSCOTCH to the point that by the end even the reader is unsure what is real and what is not. Write an essay on the topic of madness, focusing on the character of Horacio. What begins his spiral away from sanity? How does encroaching madness manifest itself at first, and how does it accelerate when he begins to work at the mental hospital? In the end, how is Horacio unable to process reality?

Essay Topic 2

An emotional change occurs in Horacio between the death of Rocamadour and Horacio's arrival in Buenos Aires. He tells Ossip he wants anonymity and develops a plan for his relationship with the Travelers. Write an essay about this shift from sensation to observation in Horacio. What does he want from Manu and Talita, and how does he go about getting it? Whom does he have to use in the process? Discuss how this attempt at dispassion eventually pushes him into a sort of madness. What is Cortazar saying about the need to express emotion, no matter how painful?

Essay Topic 3

The novel of HOPSCOTCH consists of three books: two main narrative books and one compilation of chapters sometimes called "expendable." Write an essay about these expendable chapters, what they contain, and how reading them is essential to understanding the full narrative of the novel. Focus on three components of the story that only appear in the third book. What does having this information do to inform what is told in the first two books? Which characters does it illuminate? Why do you think this only exists in expendable chapters?

Part 1) The affair with Pola.

Part 2) Morelliana

Part 3) The hospital meeting with Morelli

(see the answer keys)

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