English 10-1 Unit Test: Short Story Name/ID: _________________

Part A: Short Answer (20 marks)

Write the response in the space below the question.

1. Identify five distinguishing characteristics of a short story. (5 marks)

2. Identify six different types of short fiction. (6 marks)

3. Name three famous Canadian short story authors. (3 marks)

4. What are two differences regarding characters in short stories compared to other types of fiction? (2
marks)

5. What is the more precise name for the person telling the story? (1 mark)

6. What is the name of a storytelling technique which involves beginning in the middle of the action? (1
mark)

7. What is another name for an implausible or contrived ending? (1 mark)

8. The character in the story who opposes the protagonist is called the? (1 mark)
Part C: Literary Identification (40 marks)
Read the quotes from the short stories we studied in class and answer the following 5 questions after
every quote. Each excerpt is worth 5 marks.

I. A newsboy went by shouting something about the Waterbury trial. … “Perhaps

this will refresh your memory.” The District Attorney suddenly thrust a heavy
automatic at the quiet figure on the witness stand. “Have you ever seen this before”
_______ ________ took the gun and examined it expertly. “This is my Webley-Vickers
50.80,” he said calmly. An excited buzz ran around the courtroom.

/1 A. What literary work is this excerpt from?

/1 B. Who is the author of the work?

/1 C. What is the author’s nationality?

/1 D. What do the three dots we see just prior to the excerpt indicate?

/1 E. What word describes the protagonist’s tone when he admits it is his weapon?

II. “It was bad enough having an invalid brother, but having one who possibly
was not all there was unbearable, so began to make plans to kill him by smothering
him with a pillow.”

/1 A. What literary work is this excerpt from?

/1 B. Who is the author of this work?

/1 C. What is the author’s nationality?

/1 D. What is the gender of the narrator in this story?

/1 E. Write down the three word euphemism that appears in this excerpt.
III. “Her fancy was running riot along those days ahead of her. Spring days, and
summer days, and all sorts of days that would be her own. She breathed a quick
prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder
that life might be long.”

/1 A. What literary work is this excerpt from?

/1 B. Who is the author of this work?

/1 C. Write the name of the character being discussed.

/1 D. What event is foreshadowed in this excerpt?

/1 E. What type of irony is present in this excerpt? How?

IV. “‘How many did you catch?’ I asked.

‘Fourteen. We had to go pretty deep in the woods to find them. But we’ll get
even. Not one of them comes out of this alive, not one.’”

/1 A. What literary work is this excerpt from?

/1 B. Who is the author of this work?

/1 C. What is the author’s nationality?

/1 D. Identify the two speakers from the conversation above.

/1 E. This text features a special type of conflict wherein the protagonist faces two
equally undesirable alternatives also known as a(n)?
V. “She loved to luxuriate in the presence of this man, and to feel-almost as a
sunbather feels the sun-that warm male glow that came out of him to her when they
were alone together. She loved him for the way he sat loosely in a chair, for the way he
came in a door, or moved slowly across the room with long strides.”

/1 A. What literary work is this excerpt from?

/1 B. Who is the author of this work?

/1 C. Write the simile present in this excerpt.

/1 D. Write the full name of the character that is compared to the sun in this excerpt.

/1 E. Why is it a significant comparison?

VI. “’Personally, I think it's right here on the premises.’"

’Probably right under our very noses. What you think, Jack?’
And in the other room, _____ _____ began to giggle.”

/1 A. The title of this story is significant; what is the symbol present in the title and what
does it often symbolize?

/1 B. What name is missing in the excerpt?

/1 C. Why does the last character mentioned begin to giggle?

/1 D. What type of irony is present in this excerpt?

/1 E. Identify a detail mentioned about food in the text that implies the country that this
story is likely set in.
VII. “She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all
aquiver with the new spring life. The delicious breath of rain was in the air. In the street
below a peddler was crying his wares. The notes of a distant song which someone was
singing reached her faintly, and countless sparrows were twittering in the eaves.”

/1 A. The title of this story is significant; how long does it take for the character to go
through many mixed emotions?

/1 B. What type of character would the protagonist be classified as?

/1 C. Name the figure of speech used in the excerpt when the air is being described.

/1 D. What are the sparrows a symbol for in this text?

/1 E. Why does this descriptive excerpt seem out of place in this text?

VIII. “’We’re going through!’ The Commander’s voice was like thin ice breaking. He
wore his full-dress uniform, with the heavily braided white cap pulled down rakishly
over one cold gray eye. ‘We can’t make it, sir. It’s spoiling for a hurricane, if you ask
me.’ ‘I’m not asking you, Lieutenant Berg,’ said the Commander. ‘Throw on the power
lights! Rev her up to 8,500! We’re going through!’ The pounding of the cylinders
increased: ta-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa-pocketapocketa.”

/1 A. The title of this text is significant; why is the protagonist’s life described in such a
way?

/1 B. What figure of speech does the author use to describe the Commander’s voice?

/1 C. What sound device does the phrase “ta-pocketa-pocketa-pocketa-pocketapocketa” call

to mind?

/1 D. In the textual account, how many daydreams does the title character have?

/1 E. What pulls the character out of his daydreams most of the time?
Part D: Application
Read Roch Carrier’s short story “The Secret Lost in the Water”.

After I started going to school my father scarcely talked any more. I was very intoxicated by the new
game of spelling; my father had little skill for it (it was my mother who wrote our letters) and was
convinced I was no longer interested in hearing him tell of his adventures during the long weeks when
he was far away from the house.

5 One day, however, he said to me:

‘The time’s come to show you something.’

He asked me to follow him. I walked behind him, not talking, as we had got in the habit of doing. He
stopped in the field before a clump of leafy bushes.

‘Those are called alders,’ he said.

10 ‘I know.’

‘You have to learn how to choose,’ my father pointed out.

I didn’t understand. He touched each branch of the bush, one at a time, with religious care.

‘You have to choose one that’s very fine, a perfect one, like this.’

I looked; it seemed exactly like the others.

15 My father opened his pocket knife and cut the branch he’d selected with pious care. He stripped off
the leaves and showed me the branch, which formed a perfect Y.

‘You see,’ he said, ‘the branch has two arms. Now take one in each hand. And squeeze them.’

I did as he asked and took in each hand one fork of the Y, which was thinner than a pencil.

‘Close your eyes,’ my father ordered, ‘ and squeeze a little harder....Don’t open your eyes!
20 Do you feel anything?’

‘The branch is moving!’ I exclaimed, astonished.

Beneath my clenched fingers the alder was wriggling like a small, frightened snake. My father saw
that I was about to drop it.

‘Hang on to it!’

25 ‘The branch is squirming,’ I repeated. ‘And I hear something that sounds like a river!’

‘Open your eyes,’ my father ordered.

I was stunned, as though he’d awakened me while I was dreaming.

‘What does it mean?’ I asked my father.

30 ‘It means that underneath us, right here, there’s a little fresh-water spring. If we dig, we could drink
from it. I’ve just taught you how to find a spring. It’s something my own father taught me. It isn’t
something you learn in school. And it isn’t useless : a man can get along without writing and
arithmetic, but he can never get along without water.’
 Much later, I discovered that my father was famous in the region because of what people called his
35 ‘gift’: before digging a well they always consulted him; they would watch him prospecting the fields
or the hills, eyes closed, hands clenched on the fork of an alder bough. Wherever my father stopped,
they marked the ground; there they would dig; and from there water would gush.

Years passed; I went to other schools, saw other countries, I had children, I wrote some books and my
poor father is lying in the earth where so many times he had found fresh water.

40 One day someone began to make a film about my village and its inhabitants, from whom I’ve
stolen so many of the stories that I tell. With the film crew we went to see a farmer to capture the
image of a sad man: his children didn’t want to receive the inheritance he’d spent his whole life
preparing for them — the finest farm in the area. While the technicians were getting cameras and
microphones ready the farmer put his arm around my shoulders, saying: ‘I knew your father well.’

45 ‘Ah! I know. Everybody in the village knows each other... No one feels like an outsider.’

‘You know what’s under your feet?’

‘Hell?’ I asked, laughing.

‘Under your feet there’s a well. Before I dug I called in specialists from the Department of
Agriculture; they did research, they analyzed shovelfuls of dirt; and they made a report where they
45 said there wasn’t any water on my land. With the family, the animals, the crops, I need water. When I
saw that those specialists hadn’t found any I thought of your father and I asked him to come over. He
didn’t want to; I think he was pretty fed up with me because I ‘d asked those specialists instead of
him. But finally he came; he went and cut off a little branch, then he walked around for a while with
his eyes shut; he stopped, he listened to something we couldn’t hear and then he said to me: ‘Dig right
50 here, there’s enough water to get your whole flock drunk and drown your specialists besides.’ We dug
and found water. Fine water that’s never heard of pollution.’

The film people were ready; they called to me to take my place.

‘I’m gonna show you something,’ said the farmer, keeping me back. ‘You wait right here.’

He disappeared into a shack which he must have used to store things, then came back with a branch
55 which he held out to me.

‘I never throw nothing away; I kept the alder branch your father cut to find my water. I don’t
understand, it hasn’t dried out.’

Moved as I touched the branch, kept out of I don’t know what sense of piety—and which really
60 wasn’t dry —I had the feeling that my father was watching me over my shoulder; I closed my
eyes and, standing above the spring my father had discovered, I waited for the branch to writhe, I
hoped the sound of gushing water would rise to my ears.

The alder stayed motionless in my hands and the water beneath the earth refused to sing. Somewhere
along the roads I’d taken since the village of my childhood I had forgotten my father’s knowledge.

65 ‘Don’t feel sorry,’ said the man, thinking no doubt of his farm and his childhood; ‘nowadays
fathers can’t pass on anything to the next generation.’

And he took the alder branch from my hands.

Short Critical/Analytical Response (30 marks)

Write an effective thesis statement for this story. Explain why you feel it is effective and thoughtful
using at least three quotations from the text as support. Effective responses typically, are thorough,
unified, and detailed. Following the guidelines of the acronym SEE may prove helpful. Assessment
of your response is based on two categories: “Thought and Understanding” and “Supporting
Evidence”

/30
Part D: Multiple Choice (10 marks)
Answer the following 5 questions in response to the story above. For the last 5 questions use the bolded
lines before each question to respond successfully. Circle the letter of the best answer to the question.
Each question is worth one mark.

1. This story’s title is effective mainly because it is

A. euphonic
B. repetitive
C. alliterative
D. informative

2. The words that best capture the narrator’s tone throughout the story are

A. reflective and somber

B. gregarious and plucky
C. abrasive and apologetic
D. jaded and tongue-in-cheek

3. The phrase “wriggling like a small, frightened snake” (line 25) contains a(n):

A. apostrophe
B. metaphor
C. allusion
D. simile

4. The most appropriate English term to classify the story’s ending is:

A. ironic
B. cliffhanger
C. indeterminate
D. deus ex machina

5. In context the meaning of “pious” (line 16) is:

A. religious
B. frivolous
C. impudent
D. misconstrued

“She arose at length and opened the door to her sister's importunities. There was a feverish
triumph in her eyes, and she carried herself unwittingly like the goddess of Victory.”

6. From the lines above, the phrase “the goddess of Victory” contains a(n):

A. cliché
B. allusion
C. hyperbole
D. euphemism
“I could have killed Gregory Fitzhurst at three hundred feet with my left hand.” Pandemonium
broke loose in the courtroom.”

7. From the lines above, the context of the line above the meaning of “pandemonium” is

A. chaos
B. agitation
C. vexation
D. dissipation

“But he didn't die, and when he was three months old, Mama and Daddy decided they might as
well name him. They named him William Armstrong, which was like tying a big tail on a small
kite.”

8. According to the lines above what is the story’s point of view?

A. objective
B. omniscient
C. first person
D. limited omniscient

“Now and again she would glance up at the clock, but without anxiety, merely to please herself
with the thought that each minute gone by made it nearer the time when he would come. There
was a slow smiling air about her, and about everything she did.”

9. What character term describes the character being described above?

A. flat character
B. stock character
C. static character
D. dynamic character

“And he deserves it. Does he? No! What the devil! No one deserves to have someone else make
the sacrifice of becoming a murderer. What do you gain by it? Nothing.”

10. The conflict in the lines above is mainly

A. person vs. self

B. person vs. person
C. person vs. nature
D. person vs. society
Bonus Questions: (max of 5 marks)

1. What famous author is responsible for these lines:

“Fiction is the lie that helps us understand the truth”

2. Identify the famous storyteller featured in the film A Knight’s Tale.

3. Identify a verb in the English language that is spelled the same in both the present and past tense but
pronounced differently.

4. Name 5 Roald Dahl characters.

5. Solve this anagram to discover a name or phrase that is particularly germane to this unit.

CRISIS TABLE = ________________ _______________