SparkNotes: Black Boy: Quiz

1. In his childhood and early youth, how does Richard react to the submission of other black Americans to white authority?

(A) With contemptuous astonishment

(B) With understanding

(C) With approval

(D) With amusement

2. What is Granny's religious affiliation?

(A) Southern Baptist

(B) Methodist

(C) Seventh-Day Adventist

(D) Unitarian

3. Which statement accurately describes Richard's relationship with Granny?

(A) It is affectionate

(B) It is practically nonexistent, since they rarely interact

(C) They do not have a relationship, as she died before his birth

(D) It is filled with conflict and hostility

4. Which of the following best describes Richard's education?

(A) It is entirely self-acquired

(B) It consists of some formal schooling and lots of self-directed reading

(C) He has only an elementary-school education

(D) He has a high-school education

5. How does Richard react to his mother's first stroke?

(A) He begins to feel that the world is a hostile place

(B) He becomes extremely religious because the church offers him comfort and security

(C) He develops close ties with the black community and his family because they offer emotional and financial support

(D) He becomes depressed and suicidal

6. Which of the following best describes Richard's childhood?

(A) It is characterized by grinding poverty

(B) It is characterized by isolation and loneliness

(C) It is characterized by frequent, sudden moves

(D) All of the above

7. What is Richard's adult attitude toward his father?

(A) Hateful

(B) Pitying

(C) Fearful

(D) Loving

8. Who is Richard's favorite aunt?

(A) Addie

(B) Cleo

(C) Maggie

(D) Jody

9. Which of the following best describes Richard's relationship with his mother?

(A) Frequently conflicted, but she is the most loving, supportive member of his family

(B) Rife with conflict and hostility

(C) Entirely loving and supportive

(D) Cold and uneasy

10. Who is Richard's only source of encouragement when he publishes his first story in the local newspaper?

(A) His mother

(B) The newspaper editor

(C) His school principal

(D) Aunt Maggie

11. What happens when Richard enters the working world?

(A) He is harassed and abused by his white coworkers

(B) He is fired for not acting properly

(C) He comes to better understand why many black Americans submit to white authority

(D) All of the above

12. Why does Richard succumb to stealing?

(A) To earn money to leave the South

(B) He thinks stealing is cool

(C) To gain his coworkers' approval

(D) All of the above

13. Why is Richard unable to check books out of the Memphis public library?

(A) The librarian is racist and denies his application for a library card

(B) None of Richard's coworkers will loan him a library card

(C) The public library does not allow black people borrowing privileges

(D) Richard gets lost every time he goes looking for the library

14. How does Richard feel when he first arrives in Chicago?

(A) Frightened and bewildered

(B) Homesick for the South

(C) Overjoyed

(D) Calm and collected

15. What does Richard think of the Hoffmans?

(A) He hates them because they are Jewish

(B) He assumes they are like Southern white people

(C) He thinks they make him work too hard

(D) He finds them stupid and overbearing

16. What political organization does Richard join in Chicago?

(A) The Garveyites

(B) The Democratic Party

(C) The Communist Party

(D) The Fascist Party

17. For what job does Richard have to gain weight?

(A) His job as a street sweeper

(B) His job as broncobuster at a Wyoming ranch

(C) His job at the sawmill

(D) His job in the post office

18. Who is Comrade Young?

(A) A high-ranking official in the Communist Party

(B) A hostile spy in the Communist Party

(C) An escapee from a Detroit mental institution

(D) A promising artist whom the Communist Party puts on trial

19. How do the black Communists react to Richard's desire to write?

(A) With condescension

(B) With distrust

(C) With fear

(D) All of the above

20. Which of the following best describes Richard's attraction to the Communist Party?

(A) He likes its philosophical outlook but has trouble with its paranoia and intransigence

(B) He believes the Party is fundamentally racist

(C) He is brainwashed into accepting its dogma

(D) He treats it as an amusing joke

21. Which statement accurately describes Richard's experience with the actors at the Federal Negro Theater?

(A) He develops close ties with them that become the first lasting relationships of his life

(B) He is frustrated by their resistance to controversial productions that examine the reality of racism in America

(C) He leaves the job because they harshly criticize his writing

(D) None of the above

22. How does Richard's mother react to the cartoon she sees in one of Richard's Communist magazines?

(A) It makes her concerned that Richard has been brainwashed

(B) It makes her want to join the Party

(C) She finds it grotesque and horrible

(D) It strikes her as peculiarly childish

23. How are Richard's experiences with the Communist Party similar to his experiences with Granny?

(A) Both Granny and the Party disapprove of his desire to write

(B) Both Granny and the Party disapprove of his love of reading

(C) Both Granny and the Party try to force him to accept rigid dogma

(D) All of the above

24. How does Richard describe Ross's trial?

(A) Glorious

(B) Horrific

(C) Both horrific and glorious

(D) Tedious and uneventful

25. How does Richard react to his final rejection by the Communist Party?

(A) He seeks out John Rockefeller and becomes a devout capitalist

(B) He despairs that, without an intellectually nurturing community, he has no hope for a writing career

(C) He thinks that the charges leveled against him are accurate

(D) His determination to write and to do things his own way despite the challenges grows stronger than ever