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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 things disappeared around Storm?

2. What does Gary do in his moment of sheer stupidity?

3. What joke did Storm play on the dog that pulled next to him?

4. What is the command for the team to go right?

5. What scared Paulsen about the song the dogs sang?

Short Essay Questions

1. How does it feel, on day three, for Gary running the dogs?

2. How cold had it been that week?

3. What does Gary hear that breaks him of the spell that took him not to finish the Run?

4. What will Gary always blame himself for?

5. What did the 'person' who arrived to help Paulsen look like?

6. Why did Cookie stop before the arch?

7. Why is Gary unworried about the rumors he hears on the mandatory twenty-four hour layover?

8. Why is there chaos in the first night?

9. What tradition did Storm start, and what did it come to mean?

10. When did Storm pointedly drop the stick?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss Paulsen's experience on the Iditarod trail. Compare them to his experiences on his trail at home. What changes in the over all tone of the Run section? Discuss at least three different ways the second section contrasts to the first.

Essay Topic 2

Paulsen discusses how one of his lead dogs was more often than not a fighter and how he initially thought this was a quality of all sled dogs. Although he admits he was wrong, for that situation, he offers no explanation as to how he found out it was a wrong insight. Provide an explanation as to what happened to convince him that this was an undesirable characteristic.

Essay Topic 3

Discuss Paulsen's lack of desire in explaining why he was calling out "Willy?" in the middle of the night. What did he not wish to divulge and why? What did he risk as a result, and how would this influence other people's perspective of him? Is this important? Why or why not?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,083 words (approx. 4 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample