31 pages • 1 hour read
The Wives of the Dead
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Questions
1. What is the setting for “The Wives of the Dead”?
A) the Canadian colonies
B) Wampanoag Province
C) Bay Province
D) Connecticut Plantation
2. During what period does the story take place?
A) the mid-1600s
B) the American Revolution
C) the War of 1812
D) the mid-1700s
3. Why are the two women mourning?
A) They lost their sister to a plague.
B) They lost their children in a war.
C) They lost their husbands at the same time.
D) Native Americans killed their families.
4. What country has had a recent fight? (short answer)
5. Who visits the bereaved widows during the day?
A) members of the community
B) a vision of Lucifer
C) a vision of Christ
D) a group of children with food baskets
6. How do the two women know each other?
A) They are sisters by birth.
B) They were best friends in grammar school.
C) They were introduced by their common loss.
D) They are sisters-in-law.
7. What reminds Margaret of the recently deceased men?
A) a portrait
B) vacant armchairs
C) an empty blanket-coat
D) a lantern
8. What is Margaret’s temperament like? (short answer)
9. The fading firelight casts eerie shadows across what area?
A) Margaret’s bedroom
B) the parlor
C) the street door
D) the rain-sodden street
10. What interrupts Margaret’s bitter thoughts?
A) a wagon in the street
B) a wolf’s howl
C) a crack of thunder
D) a knock at the door
11. What does Margaret Learn from Goodman Parker?
A) That her husband has died.
B) That her daughter is still alive.
C) That her husband survived a battle skirmish.
D) That her daughter’s killer has been caught.
12. Margaret wants to tell Mary the good news, but what does she decide to do instead? (short answer)
13. What awakens Mary suddenly?
A) a vivid dream
B) a noise in the street
C) a wolf’s howl
D) Margaret crying out in her sleep
14. Who is at the door when Mary answers it?
A) a sailor with news; he was once her suitor
B) a landsman with news about her husband
C) a sailor with news that her niece is still alive
D) a landsman with news that her niece’s killer has been caught
15. As the man walks off through shadow and moonlight, what happens to Mary’s sense of reality?
A) it collapses
B) it grows stronger and weaker
C) it solidifies
D) it turns upside-down
16. Why does Mary decide not to tell Margaret the news?
A) Margaret needs her sleep.
B) It was only a dream.
C) Margaret will awaken to thoughts of death.
D) She is angry with her sister.
17. Mary did not want to imitate whom?
A) Margaret
B) Goodman Parker
C) the wife of Zadig
D) an uncaring widow
18. As Mary looks at Margaret, what does Margaret do?
19. At story’s end, who awakens?
A) one of the two women
B) both of the women
C) Margaret
D) Mary
Answers
1. C
2. D
3. C
4. Canada
5. A
6. D
7. B
8. lively and irritable
9. B
10. D
11. C
12. to let her sleep
13. A
14. A
15. B
16. C
17. C
18. sheds a tear
19. A
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