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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 Tarby yell when he sees Lewis in Chapter Five?

2. What happens in Chapter Five when Lewis begins chanting?

3. What did Uncle Jonathan get his university degree in as he tells Lewis in Chapter Two?

4. What does Lewis see in Chapter Five as he tries to fall asleep?

5. What does Uncle Jonathan use to create a reflection of the moon in Chapter Three?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is strange to Lewis about playing poker in Chapter One?

2. What does Lewis notice that is weird in the mansion in Chapter Two?

3. What is Lewis’ new challenge in Chapter Three? Why is he bullied?

4. What is the first illusion scene that Uncle Jonathan pulls up in Chapter Four? What happens in it?

5. What does Lewis hear when he is up reading a book at night in Chapter One? What does he see when he goes to investigate?

6. What is Uncle Jonathan doing when he walks at night as said in Chapter Two? Why is he doing this?

7. What does Tarby say about Uncle Jonathan’s magic in Chapter Four? What does Lewis say to change Tarby’s mind?

8. What does Uncle Jonathan do in Chapter Three to make the moon disappear?

9. What does Lewis do to resurrect the dead in Chapter Five? What does he have to do to complete the spell and how does he do this?

10. Who previously owned Barnvault’s Folly as said in Chapter Two? What were the old owners like?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

While the novel is a mystery about the clock in the walls, as it says in the title, the main events of the novel are written on the book cover. How does this change what it means to read a mystery? Why is it changed in this way? Write three pages with at least four textual examples.

Essay Topic 2

In the beginning of the novel, Uncle Jonathan says that magic works by using “solid everyday objects” (41). What does the novel show as the connection between the ordinary, or the everyday, and the magical, or the extraordinary? Write four pages with at least four textual examples.

Essay Topic 3

Light and dark dichotomies are typically used in the Gothic to illustrate good versus evil. How does the novel use this typical color palette to heightened literary effect? Find two examples from the text to support your response. Then look at how the novel uses other colors. What other colors and forms of light does the novel incorporate? How does it create a new palette of the Gothic and why does it do this? Make sure to consider that Barnavelt's Folly has had two recent owners. Use at least four examples in four pages for your overall answer.

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