View a FREE sample

This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How does the author see the violence in the natural world?
(a) as inevitable
(b) as something that needs changed
(c) as a mistake God made
(d) as a symbolic sacrifice

2. When Dillard discovers so much violence and horror in the natural world, how does she feel?
(a) disillusioned as to the goodness of creation and the creator
(b) relieved that insects are killed in such large numbers
(c) depressed that the world was created so
(d) confused because it seems contradictory to logic

3. In Chapter 13, the author is beginning to find a balance in her thinking about nature. What is that balance?
(a) a balance between believing nature to be good or evil
(b) a balance between believing nature to be either terrible or wonderful
(c) a balance between believing nature to be for animals or humans
(d) a balance between believing nature to be better than cities or not

4. What is the muskrat young called?
(a) a kit
(b) a kitten
(c) a puppy
(d) a baby

5. When Dillard comes upon a rooting acorn, she imagines what?
(a) a giant oak, two hundred years from then
(b) an squirrel grabbing the acorn and ending its fragile life
(c) reaching down to root and its shoot springing towards the heavens
(d) the acorn burying itself to come to life in the spring

6. The balance enables her to think about the beauty without doing what?
(a) making all of nature bad
(b) wanting to move to a large city and never be in nature again
(c) making all of nature good
(d) constantly remember the aspects of nature which she finds ugly

7. Ultimately, at the end of the book, what is Dillard's overwhelming feeling?
(a) joy
(b) depression
(c) puzzlement
(d) anger

8. In Chapter 13, Dillard quotes Van Gogh. What did she quote?
(a) the important thing is to breathe
(b) life is not art
(c) life is not pretty
(d) it's important to see

9. What does the author think about as she watches the flood waters?
(a) the waters are very powerful
(b) surf's up
(c) what the animals do in a flood
(d) the well won't run dry for a while

10. What has Dillard decided is the meaning of death?
(a) a way to join the creator
(b) one merely joins the earth at death
(c) a journey to a far land
(d) it must happen or the earth could not sustain everything

11. What lures birds of all species out of their summer hiding places?
(a) a wet rain
(b) seeds sprinkled on the ground
(c) a cold snap
(d) a cloudy day

12. Fecundity could be defined as:
(a) always hungry
(b) wasteful of resources
(c) a type of fat
(d) prolific in offspring

13. Silvery eels swim to the sea after eight years of maturing in obscure creeks and rivers. What happens to them at the sea?
(a) they lay eggs and then go into deep water for the rest of their lives
(b) they have offspring and bring them back in two years
(c) they lay their eggs and then die
(d) they mate with other eels then return to the fresh water

14. Ultimately, what does Dillard say about predators or parasites?
(a) predators get parasites from their food
(b) parasites are suicidal
(c) a predator can be infested with a parasite
(d) it's eat or starve no matter who you are

15. When ancient Hebrews sacrificed an animal to their god, how did they use the horns?
(a) to cage the animal
(b) to strenthen the altar for a larger animal
(c) they didn't use them
(d) poured blood into the horns

Short Answer Questions

1. In Chapter 10, what does Dillard see as making life easier?

2. What does the author think the existence of parasites makes the world?

3. Dillard says that if plants had emotions, she would applaud this:

4. In this book the author is not only striving to understand the natural world, but to understand this acceptance:

5. What does the author believe about the difference between abundant plant life and abundant insect life?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 723 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample