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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What project is Nassrin working on?
(a) Reading all the works of Islamic leaders.
(b) A thesis on the works of the Ayatollah Khomeini.
(c) Translating Islamic texts into English.
(d) Translating English texts into Persian.

2. What subject do both Mike Gold and F. Scott Fitzgerald write about?
(a) The value in being poor.
(b) The morality of the wealthy.
(c) Loss, specifically the loss of innocence.
(d) Dreams, specifically the American Dream.

3. According to Nafisi, how can one stop "dancing with the jailer"?
(a) Find a way to preserve one's uniqueness and individuality despite opposition and persecution.
(b) Remember that life is cyclical, and this time will end soon.
(c) Give in to the desires of the regime and follow the nation's laws.
(d) Become a part of the ruling party and end oppression.

4. What teaching technique does Nafisi use in conjunction with the study of "The Great Gatsby"?
(a) The class puts the novel on trial, choosing people to play the roles of lawyers, judge, and jury.
(b) She teaches the novel using the Socratic method, which the students have never seen before.
(c) She chooses students to lead the class discussion.
(d) Nafisi asks the students to construct character sketches of the novel's main characters and compare the sketches to their own lives.

5. What does the study group find disturbing about the texts written by the Ayatollah Khomeini?
(a) Manna knew they had been translated.
(b) The texts contain blasphemy, which is against the laws of morality.
(c) Nassrin had read them and was talking about their contents publicly.
(d) The texts are taken seriously by rulers of the country, even though they are absurd.

Short Answer Questions

1. Why do the students begin to keep vigils at the University of Tehran?

2. In Part 4, Chapter 24, why do the girls have to sit in the back room of the restaurant?

3. What happens to Iranian writers and publishers during the mid-nineties?

4. Where is the narrator at the beginning of the first chapter in Part II?

5. In Part 2, Chapter 23, what are Mr. Nyazi and another student arguing about?

Short Essay Questions

1. How are Mr. Ghoni's statements about "Daisy Miller" in Part 3, Chapter 15, similar to Mr. Nyazi's statements in Part 3, Chapters 17 and 18, about "The Great Gatsby"?

2. What does the Islamist Iranian regime have in common with the theme of Fitzgerald's novel "The Great Gatsby"?

3. What is the impact of Iran's war with Iraq?

4. Why does Nafisi focus on Azin's painted fingernails?

5. Why does Nafisi describe herself as becoming irrelevant?

6. Why is Nafisi conflicted about returning to full-time teaching?

7. Why does Nafisi get upset with students in her class at Alzahrah University (Part 3, Chapter 25)?

8. Part 2, Chapter 11 begins with a quote from Mike Gold, "Art is useful as bread." How is this quote related to the rest of the chapter and to previous incidents in Nafisi's text?

9. In Part 3, Chapter 14, why does Nafisi describe her students in such detail?

10. What does Nafisi mean by her statement that she "left Iran, but Iran did not leave me?"

(see the answer keys)

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