Print
Word
PDF
|
| Name: _________________________ | Period: ___________________ |
This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.
Short Answer Questions
1. The mother's superstitions may have been confirmed when ___________________________.
2. As national chess champion, Waverly is touted as __________________________.
3. The old woman's daughter swallowed this, more than sorrow.
4. Ying-Ying, or Betty, is consumed with ______________.
5. The Mah Jong tiles are arranged into ___________________.
Short Essay Questions
1. Discuss why the woman has never told her daughter about the single feather she kept from the swan.
2. June Woo started the American Joy Luck Club because she sensed the grief in the other Chinese people she met here. How does the club help June Woo deal with her own tragic memories?
3. Why did An-Mei's mother return to her sister's home where she was so unwanted and rejected? Was her mother the person An-Mei had thought she was?
4. Discuss the unusual circumstances under which Lena lives.
5. What triggers Ying-Ying's early memory of her traumatic fall from the family boat?
6. Rose's mother, An-Mei Hsu, has raised quite a large family in America. What might have made her want so many children?
7. Why is Bing's name written in erasable pencil in the Bible's Death section?
8. The woman wishes for a daughter just like herself, but there are some caveats. Discuss the things she does not want for her daughter.
9. Why would Lindo begin to think of her cruel husband as a god?
10. Discuss the "scar" reference. How did it happen and why?
Essay Topics
Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:
Essay Topic 1
Research and write a biography on the author, Amy Tan. In addition to general information about Tan, draw some conclusions as to how and why she knows so much about a time before she was alive. Is her material all from personal experience or is it researched?
Essay Topic 2
Do a thorough re-read of The Joy Luck Club and scan for recurring devices that make the story come alive. They are subtle, but you will notice that Amy Tan meticulously plants them in the right places to give her story consistency and to give her readers a real sense of her culture. One example is how she uses "smells" throughout the story - the smells from the sewer in Kweilin, Lindo learning to smell the toilets to be sure they were clean and being able to detect the amount of salt in a soup by its smell, the cat putting a stink on Suyuan's door, the smelly crab -- these are just a few instances.
Essay Topic 3
The four Chinese women who become friends in America meet in a Chinese Baptist church, which they were attending for practical reasons. What possible connections could Christianity have to their earlier religious beliefs in China? Did they all eventually accept Christianity over their old religion?
|
This section contains 1,086 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) |
|
