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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 does Ralph Ellison's father hope that Ralph will grow up to be?

2. What type of jug does Ellison say Howe imagines Negro people to be in?

3. According to Ellison what does the term "the grays" mean?

4. What does Ellison praise about "Primer for White Folks?"

5. What does Ellison believe is the true "Negro experience?"

Short Essay Questions

1. Ellison originally wanted to be a musician. What changed for him?

2. What does Ellison admire most about "The Primer for White Folks?"

3. What were some of the catastrophic events which occurred in Wright's life?

4. What writers are at issue in the exchange between Irving Howe and Ralph Ellison?

5. When Ellison accepts the American National Book Award for "The Invisible Man" what does he say that the award is recognizing?

6. What is different about Oklahoma and the relationship of different races when compared to the South or even to Texas?

7. Though "Black Boy" presents a brutal and violent world, what else does it manage to convey about the young Wright?

8. What does Ellison find so remarkable about Crane?

9. Why does Ellison choose to write about Faulkner?

10. Why does Ellison consider Stephen Crane to be such a great artist?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Race relations in America have long been a central focus of our culture. In the introduction Ellison prepares the reader to enter this discussion with him. What kind of invitation does he present? What is the emotional tone and feeling of the introduction? What does Ellison reveal about his own perspective on race? Why is it one of the themes of this book of his writing?

Essay Topic 2

In "Living with Music" Ellison literally finds himself overwhelmed by the group of people who live around him. His struggle to find his own peace within a larger and very noisy society is a metaphor for the way he sees the individual constantly struggling against the group in life. How does he find peace? What method does he use to carve out his space and literally "be heard?"

Essay Topic 3

The final essay in the book was never published. It is a book review of the Swedish economist Gunnar Myrdal who was brought in by the Carnegie Foundation to study the "Negro problem." What is Ellison's primary reaction to the book? What is positive in Myrdal's assessment? What does Ellison object to? Why do you think the review was never published?

(see the answer keys)

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