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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What is Nabokov's favorite Captain Mayne Reid novel?
(a) Paul Bunyan.
(b) Bonnie and Clyde.
(c) Johnny Appleseed.
(d) The Headless Horseman.

2. At what does Nabokov hint about Sergey?
(a) His wish to emigrate to America.
(b) His interest in a girl.
(c) His possible homosexuality.
(d) His desire to join the military.

3. What does Vladimir study at St. Petersburg University?
(a) Medicine.
(b) Music.
(c) Law.
(d) Art.

4. What is Lenski's idea for the use of Magic-Lantern Projections?
(a) To play in the light from the lanterns.
(b) To create shadow puppets.
(c) To create special effects on the wall.
(d) To illustrate petic works with the use of slides.

5. What is one thing he recalls suddenly becoming aware of while creating a poem?
(a) He's standing in the rain.
(b) He has forgotten part of the poem.
(c) His mother is removing a plate of untouched food from in front of him.
(d) His father is speaking to him.

6. Why does Sergey end up in a concentration camp?
(a) He is Jewish.
(b) Due to his outspoken opposition to the regime.
(c) He is captured by the Nazis as a POW.
(d) He humiliated a high-ranking official.

7. Why does Nabokov feel exiled in Crimea, a Russian territory?
(a) He does not have his family with him.
(b) He misses his butterflies.
(c) He misses Tamara.
(d) The environment is so foreign.

8. What is publication like outside of Russia?
(a) Not as good as in Russia.
(b) A well-paying, satisfying career.
(c) Better than in the United States.
(d) Often insufficiently lucrative to provide a comfortable existence.

9. What is Vladimir elected to, which the Tsar dissolves?
(a) First Russian Senate.
(b) First Russian Parliament.
(c) Russian Congress.
(d) Russian House of Burgesses.

10. What does Nabokov say they had lost that winter in St. Petersburg?
(a) Their "true identities."
(b) Their "lovers' nest."
(c) Their "sylvan security."
(d) Their "secret hideaway."

11. What do both Vladimir's writings on technical matters as well as philosophical have in common?
(a) They are both boring.
(b) They are inspiring.
(c) They have the same steadiness of thought.
(d) They are filled with mistakes.

12. What is the purpose of the Constituent Assembly?
(a) Tries to limit the extent of Soviet control.
(b) To support the Soviets.
(c) To give power to the Soviets.
(d) To encourage Soviet control.

13. Nabokov develops a fondness for what?
(a) Lawn tennis.
(b) Poetry.
(c) Butterflies.
(d) Composing chess problems.

14. The boredom of the audience at these poetry performances is obvious to everyone but whom?
(a) Max.
(b) Dmitri.
(c) Lenski.
(d) Nabokov.

15. Why do they hire the village schoolmaster, though he is not technically one of the family's regular tutors?
(a) To give them writing lessons.
(b) To give them mathematics lessons.
(c) To give them a crash course in the Russian language.
(d) To give them French lessons.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is the subject of this chapter?

2. What is Nabokov called in exile?

3. What makes becoming a Russian novelist an uphill battle for Nabokov at Cambridge?

4. What fills Nabokov with surprise, while roller-skating?

5. When does Nabokov begin to write poetry?

(see the answer keys)

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