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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. What job did Gwendolyn hold at the time of her death?

2. Where did Trethewey's grandmother tell her she still felt pain sometimes after Gwendolyn was dead?

3. What surprise did Gwendolyn have for Trethewey in 1973?

4. What was Trethewey's mother's full name?

5. What was the name of Trethewey's grandfather, Gwendolyn's father, who Trethewey never met?

Short Essay Questions

1. Why did Trethewey's parents travel to Ohio to elope in 1965?

2. What did Trethewey remember most clearly about leaving Mississippi for Atlanta in 1972?

3. What was Trethewey's last image of her mother while her mother was living?

4. What monument was very close to the apartment where Trethewey's mother was killed?

5. Why did Trethewey's father want to take her and her mother to Mexico in the 1960s?

6. What did Trethewey want more than anything after moving to Atlanta?

7. When and where did Trethewey first encounter racism from other children?

8. What name did Trethewey's father bestow on her in his fiction writing and why is it significant?

9. Why did Trethewey's father encourage her to become a writer?

10. What did Trethewey remember fearing about her drives around Atlanta with Joel?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

How did Trethewey react the first time she heard Joel beating her mother? Who did she confide in, and what happened afterwards? Write an essay explaining your answers.

Essay Topic 2

What did Trethewey think about her mother's decision to visit a psychic weeks before her death? Why did Trethewey herself decide to visit a medium as an adult? Write an essay explaining your answers.

Essay Topic 3

How did the various people, from the police to the owners of Gwendolyn's apartment, treat Trethewey in the immediate aftermath of her mother's death in 1985? Write an essay explaining your answers.

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 629 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample