The Things They Carried, Speaking of Courage quiz

Questions and answers

1. 1

   Question 1. What skill did the war teach Bowker that he imagines showing off to Sally?

   • Correct answer: Telling the time within ten minutes or so without ever using a clock
   • Naming any bird out on the lake by the sound it makes at a distance
   • Predicting a prairie rainstorm hours before the clouds come into view
   • Driving the whole loop road after dark without turning his headlights on

   He fantasizes about stopping at her house, announcing the exact time, and getting a casual shrug out of it. Even his one party trick comes from the war he cannot discuss.

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2. 2

   Question 2. What are the four workmen along the unused railway spur doing?

   • Repairing a stretch of track that washed out during the spring floods
   • Correct answer: Setting up a platform and steel launchers for the evening fireworks
   • Loading equipment for the county fair onto a flatbed parked nearby
   • Painting the band shell before the high school band takes the stage

   Bowker whispers his question about the Silver Star toward them and none of the men so much as looks up. Later they blow color into the sky over the lake.

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3. 3

   Question 3. What does Bowker imagine doing someday in front of the Kiwanis club?

   • Accepting the Silver Star at a banquet held in front of the whole town
   • Reading out the names of the men from his unit who did not come home
   • Correct answer: Giving a lecture on everything the war taught him about filth and stink
   • Showing slides of the country he served in to a room of local farmers

   He pictures putting on a suit and tie and delivering an expert address on his real specialty, even offering to pass out samples. The joke is bitter because nobody would sit through it.

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4. 4

   Question 4. In the imagined conversation, how does Bowker answer when his father suggests Kiowa may already have been dead?

   • He accepts the idea gratefully and drops the subject for good
   • He says he never got close enough to the body to be able to tell
   • He admits he has wondered about it every single day since then
   • Correct answer: He refuses the comfort and insists he could feel Kiowa was alive

   His father offers him an escape route and Bowker will not take it, saying that some things you can feel. He needs the failure to stay a failure.

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5. 5

   Question 5. What had the nearby village been using the field for?

   • As a burial ground for the dead of the surrounding hamlets
   • As a rice paddy that they deliberately flooded for planting
   • As a dump for scrap equipment left behind by earlier units
   • Correct answer: As a toilet, since the ville had no indoor plumbing at all

   Somebody in the unit finally works it out in the dark. When the shells crater the ground they open up centuries of waste, and the smell comes bubbling out.

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6. 6

   Question 6. What is pinned to the carhop's shirt when she reaches Bowker's window?

   • A name tag with the drive-in's initials stitched across the top
   • A small enamel flag put on for the Fourth of July celebrations
   • Correct answer: A badge that says EAT MAMA BURGERS, held up at his eye level
   • A paper ticket with the numbers of the orders she still owes

   She stands up straight so the badge is all he can see, then tells him to punch the intercom button himself. The town answers him in advertising instead of conversation.

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7. 7

   Question 7. What does Bowker plan to do the next morning?

   • Correct answer: Look into job possibilities, shoot baskets at the Y, wash the Chevy
   • Drive out to Des Moines and see the friends who moved away to work
   • Visit Sally Gustafson and finally tell her about the Silver Star
   • Take his father out on the lake in a rented boat for the afternoon

   The plans are modest and interchangeable, which is exactly the problem. Nothing on the list requires him to say a word to anyone.

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8. 8

   Question 8. Why does it matter that Bowker's failure happens in a sewage field rather than in an ordinary firefight?

   • It proves the enemy had abandoned the position before the shelling
   • Correct answer: It strips the death of anything heroic and leaves no valor to claim
   • It shows the officers had picked the most defensible ground nearby
   • It explains why the villagers wanted the Americans to move upstream

   A medal system built on uncommon valor has no category for a man beaten by a smell. The setting makes Bowker's story both unwinnable and untellable.

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9. 9

   Question 9. Which of these events actually occur in "Speaking of Courage"?

   • Bowker circles the lake twelve times before the fireworks finally begin.

     Happened

   • Bowker pulls over to talk with Sally Gustafson while she mows her lawn.

     Didn't happen

   • Lieutenant Jimmy Cross fires his pistol to drive the village women off.

     Happened

   • Bowker recognizes several old classmates in the crowd at the drive-in.

     Didn't happen

   • Bowker shuts off the air-conditioning and drives with his elbow on the sill.

     Happened

   • Bowker's father rides along in the Chevy and hears the whole story out.

     Didn't happen

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10. 10

    Question 10. What does "fickle" mean as used in: "relying on fickle prairie rains for replenishment"?

    • Correct answer: Changing without warning and impossible to depend on
    • Arriving in unusually heavy and destructive amounts
    • Following a strict and predictable seasonal schedule
    • Falling only in the coldest months of the calendar year

    The lake has no streams or springs feeding it, so it depends entirely on rain that may or may not come. Fickle means changeable and unreliable.

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11. 11

    Question 11. What does "quaint" mean as used in: "A hot summer day and it was all very quaint and remote."?

    • Threatening in a way that is difficult to name
    • Correct answer: Charmingly old-fashioned and viewed from a distance
    • Overcrowded and noisy with holiday celebrations
    • Familiar and comforting to someone returning home

    Bowker is looking at his own hometown the way a tourist would, as picturesque scenery rather than as a place he still belongs to.

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12. 12

    Question 12. What does "phosphorescent" mean as used in: "the wristwatch gave off a green phosphorescent shine"?

    • Reflecting the light thrown out by the flares overhead
    • Correct answer: Giving off a soft, lingering glow without any heat
    • Ticking loudly enough to be heard over the gunfire
    • Coated in a metal that resists rust and salt water

    The watch dial glows on its own as it slips under, which is what makes Kiowa's disappearance visible to Bowker in the dark.

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