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

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does Joe lack the courage to do?
(a) Commit suicide.
(b) Move his leg.
(c) Talk.
(d) Climb out.

2. How does Joe describe the shape of the crevasse chamber where he has been?
(a) Football-shaped.
(b) Hourglass-shaped.
(c) A figure-8.
(d) Pear-shaped.

3. When sorting through Joe's possessions, what does Simon salvage?
(a) Joe's clothes.
(b) Miri Smidt's diary.
(c) A bag from Chamonix.
(d) Joe's hat from Czechoslovakia.

4. When he finds a way out, what does Joe say he has that he didn't have before?
(a) Feeling in his fingers.
(b) The will to live.
(c) An escape route.
(d) A plan.

5. After he falls into the crevasse, what does Joe see through the hole far above?
(a) Clouds.
(b) Simon's body.
(c) Sunlight.
(d) Stars.

6. To what does Joe compare the figures in the ice?
(a) Answers #1, #2, and #3.
(b) Carvings inside a Hindu Temple.
(c) A Renaissance painting in the Sistine Chapel.
(d) Paintings by Titian of grossly fat nudes.

7. When reaching the "floor" of the crevasse, Joe determines his depth to be...
(a) Below sea level.
(b) About 50 feet.
(c) About 100 feet.
(d) About 150 feet.

8. After reciting a soliloquy as a preoccupying game, Joe realizes what?
(a) That he hates Shakespeare.
(b) That he is desperately thirsty.
(c) That last night's storm is not over.
(d) That he's in a snow cave.

9. After he emerges from the crevasse, what obstacle next lies in his path?
(a) The glacier.
(b) Another crevasse.
(c) The lake.
(d) Bomb Alley.

10. After the moraines, what is Joe's next destination goal?
(a) Base camp.
(b) The lake.
(c) Lima.
(d) Bomb Alley.

11. What becomes Joe's obsession in the moraines?
(a) Footprints.
(b) Water.
(c) Rocks.
(d) The smell of urine.

12. Who does Simon dread talking to upon his return to civilization?
(a) The police and Customs officials.
(b) The police and Joe's parents.
(c) Joe's parents and Joe's wife.
(d) Spinoza and Richard.

13. How does Joe resolve to die?
(a) Slowly and painlessly by hypothermia.
(b) Suddenly, unexpectedly, and in the course of finding a way out.
(c) By jumping into the void.
(d) In his sleep.

14. When Simon reaches base camp, what is the first thing he says to Richard?
(a) 'He fell.'
(b) 'Joe's dead.'
(c) 'You look terrible!'
(d) 'There was nothing I could do.'

15. What is the 4-step pattern of movement that Joe perfects to get through the moraines?
(a) Push-hop-push-hop.
(b) Check-sit-swing-step.
(c) Place-lift-brace-hop.
(d) Hop-fall-retch-curse.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is the first thing Richard gives to Simon?

2. What does Joe land on when he falls into the crevasse?

3. At seven o'clock on the eve of their departure from base camp, Simon and Richard hear a strange cry in the distance. What does Richard suggest it is?

4. In Bomb Alley, Joe sees the footprints of Simon and Richard. What does he think this means?

5. When Joe falls into the crevasse, what is the first thing he does when he realizes he is alive?

(see the answer keys)

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