View a FREE sample

This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. How did Orwell say he was received by the people he spoke with about their housing?

2. How did Orwell describe the meals at the Brooker's house?

3. What was the major difference between a mile above ground and a mile in the pit bottom?

4. What physical attributes did the fillers share?

5. What is one superstition miner sometimes hold to?

Short Essay Questions

1. When people moved into the Corporation housing, what were some of the restrictions by which they had to abide?

2. Who were the Brookers? How did Orwell describe them? What did they look like? Behave like?

3. How did Orwell describe his room at the Brookers?

4. What were some of the common conditions in the houses Orwell studied for his book?

5. What were the caravan dwellings Orwell speaks about in his book? How many were there in Wigan? What were the living conditions in these caravan dwelling?

6. What is nystagmus? How is it contracted? How is it cured? What happened to a miner in Orwell's time who contracted nystagmus?

7. There were three shift in the mines Orwell discussed. What happened in each of the three shifts?

8. What were the coal mines like for Orwell? How did he see the men who mined the coal?

9. Who were some of the boarders at the Brooker's rooming house? How were thought of by the Brookers?

10. Why were the fillers an important part of the coal mining business? What were their jobs?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In his descriptions of unemployment in the middle and working classes, Orwell explained that the men and their families in each class had a vastly different reaction to the condition. Orwell contended that the working class man was better equipped to lose his job and become unemployed than the middle class man. What were some of the reasons Orwell cited for this? Can you find proof in studying the middle and working classes to support Orwell's contention that one class was better equipped than another to be out of work?

Essay Topic 2

Orwell and many other writers have described the horrible work conditions in coal mines all over the world. Describe the conditions in the coal mines in northern England in the 1930's. What challenges and risks did miners face working in the mines? What was Orwell's reactions to being in the mines with the workers? Why?

Essay Topic 3

Orwell spent a good deal of his life promoting Socialism and struggling with the issue of class differences and prejudices. He contended that to abolish class distinction, a person must be willing to abolish part of himself. What did he mean by this?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,507 words (approx. 6 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample