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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. Why can't Henry remember some of his actions?

2. What does Hertford ask Tom in Chapter 14?

3. What troubles Henry VIII while he sleeps?

4. What does Tom think about his life?

5. How does Hertford react to St. John thinking that Tom is an impostor?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does Mrs. Canty test Edward to see if he is Tom? What is the result of the test?

2. What is Tom prepared for in Chapter 16? How does he do with the event?

3. What does the prince's presentation to the people look like?

4. What is Tom's house like? Who lives there with him?

5. What does Tom do that Edward wouldn't do while eating? How does everyone react?

6. What does Hertford tell the king in response to the king's problem in question # 16? What does Hertford do? What is the result of Hertford's action? What does the king decide to do?

7. What does Miles find when he returns to the room where he left the prince? What does a servant tell him?

8. Why does John tell the family they must leave the house? How does Edward finally escape from them?

9. What does Edward command Miles to do before the prince will go to sleep? What does Miles do first when morning comes?

10. Who lives in the Canty's house besides the family?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

The prince finds that he is in the company of a gang of thieves and beggars, but Twain interjects a note of social concern by having Ruffler discuss farmers who have been forced off their property by landowners eager to enter the more profitable sheep business. One of the men named Yokel describes the oppressive political and economic conditions that forced him into a life of crime.

1. Do you think oppression or economic conditions are justification for resorting to crime? Why or why not? Use examples from The Prince and the Pauper to support your ideas.

2. If a farmer farms another person's land with the agreement that some of his or her harvest will go to the landowner, do you think the landowner has any obligation to maintain that arrangement if the owner decides he/she would rather raise sheep? Why or why not?

3. In the above situation, the farmers are farming land, raising families, and paying for the use of the land. Also, one might suppose they have made improvements on the land. However, the land is owned by another person. Although the life or rights of the farmer means the land stays in farming, the rights of the landowner are trampled if he/she doesn't have the right to do as he/she pleases. Describe how you might solve the situation if you were a judge and this case came to your court.

Essay Topic 2

Tom's initial worries about being mistaken for the prince are beginning to abate, which is understandable because excuses are given for every mistake he makes.

1. Given the treatment Tom, as a person believed to the prince and insane was given, what type of personality defects do you think could show up in a person who was treated like this, as if he or she were so important that no one would dare contradict him or her. Use examples from your own life to illustrate your answer.

2. Acting as if the prince were fine, even when drinking out of a hand washing bowl, seems to be more insane than Tom's behavior. Do you think this is true? Why or why not?

3. How do you think denial about people we know well in any situation affects our relationships in the world?

Essay Topic 3

Tom's two guardians, now alone, reflect that the king is ill and the prince is mad. St. John hints that he doubts the boy really is the prince, but Hertford declares this treasonous, and St. John quickly retracts. When St. John leaves, Hertford begins to wonder if the boy could be an impostor, but then he reflects that the child denies being the prince, which no impostor would do. He decides that it must mean that the prince has gone mad.

1. What are the implications for a political system that a thought that is true could be labeled treasonous? Use examples from The Prince and the Pauper and other sources to support your ideas.

2. How does an idea that is true being treasonous in a 1500 era monarchy relate to a modern country, for example, China, whose citizens are not allowed to speak truth that conflicts with official positions? Use examples from The Prince and the Pauper to support your ideas.

3. When Hertford decides Tom is mad, not an impostor, he does so with what might be termed circular reasoning. What do you think is meant by the term circular reasoning? Discuss why Hertford's thinking might qualify as such.

(see the answer keys)

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