Name: _________________Period: ________
Short Story Unit
Test Review
“Note to Sixth Grade Self” - by Julie Orringer
1. Story’s Genre: ____________________________________
2. Story’s Protagonist_____________________ Story’s Antagonist________________________
3. In 3-4 sentences, summarize the story:
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
4. Analyze the following excerpt for comprehension, literary elements, and grammar usage. Find the grammar
mistake in the underlined sentence.
At home, seek medical assistance. Do not let anything heal improperly. You will need that body later. As your mother
binds your wrist in an Ace bandage, you will tell her you tripped on a rock. She will look at you askance. Through instinct,
she will begin to understand the magnitude of your problem. When she is finished bandaging you, she will let you go to
your room and be alone with your books. Read the final chapters of A Little Princess. Make an epic picture of a scene
from a girls’ boarding school in London on three sheets of paper. Push your brother around the living room in a lawndry
basket. That night, in the bath, replay in your head the final moment of your dance with Eric Cassio. Ignore the fact that he
would not look at you that day. Relish the sting of bathwater on your cuts. Tell yourself that the moment with Eric was
worth it. Twenty years later, you will still think so.
5. Using the graph below, identify the main elements of the story.
Climax
Rising Action
Falling
Action
Resolution
Exposition
“The Interlopers” - by Saki
1. Story’s Genre: ____________________________________
2. Story’s Protagonist_____________________ Story’s Antagonist________________________
3. In 3-4 sentences, summarize the story:
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
4. Analyze the following excerpt for comprehension, literary elements, and grammar usage. Find the grammar
mistake in the underlined sentence.
In a forest of mixed growth somewhere on the eastern spurs of the Carpathians, a man stood one winter night
watching and listening, as though he waited for some beast of the woods to come within the range of his vision,
and, later, of his rifle. But the game for whose presence he kept so keen an outlook was none that figured in the
sportsman’s calendar as lawful and proper for the chase; Ulrich von Gradwitz patrolled the dark forest in quest of
a human enemy. The forest lands of Gradwitz were of wide extent and well stocked with game, the narrow strip of
precipitous woodland that lay on its outskirt was not remarkable for the game it harbored or the shooting it
afforded, but it was the most jealously guarded of all its owner’s territorial possessions. A famous lawsuit, in the
days of his grandfather, had wrested it from the illegal possession of a neighboring family of petty landowners; the
dispossessed party had never acquiesced in the judgment of the Courts, and a long series of poaching affrays
and similar scandals had embittered the relationships between the families for three generations.
5. Using the graph below, identify the main elements of the story.
Climax
Rising Action
Exposition
Falling
Action
Resolution
“The Bass, the River, and Sheila Mant” - by W.D. Wetherell
1. Story’s Genre: ____________________________________
2. Story’s Protagonist_____________________ Story’s Antagonist________________________
3. In 3-4 sentences, summarize the story:
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
4. Analyze the following excerpt for comprehension, literary elements, and grammar usage. What is the meaning
of the underlined words?.
These were many. The Dartmouth heavyweight crew would scull by her house on their way upriver, and I think all
eight of them must have been in love with her at various times during the summer; the coxswain would curse at
them through his megaphone but without effect—there was always a pause in their pace when they passed
Sheila’s float. I suppose to theses jaded twenty-year-olds she seemed the incarnation of innocence and youth,
while to me she seemed the incarnation of innocence and youth, while to me she appeared unutterably suave, the
epitome of sophistication. I was on the swim team at school, and to win her attention would do endless laps
between my house and the Vermont shore, hoping she would notice the beauty of my flutter kick, the power of my
crawl. Finishing, I would boost myself up onto our dock and glance casually over toward her, but she was never
watching, and the miraculous day she was, I immediately climbed the diving board and did my best tuck and a
half for her, and continued diving until she had left and the sun went down and my longing was like a madness
and I couldn’t stop.
5. Using the graph below, identify the main elements of the story.
Climax
Rising Action
Falling
Action
Exposition
Resolution
“Harrison Bergeron” - by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
1. Story’s Genre: ____________________________________
2. Story’s Protagonist_____________________ Story’s Antagonist________________________
3. In 3-4 sentences, summarize the story:
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
4. Analyze the following excerpt for comprehension, literary elements, and grammar usage. Find the grammar
mistake in the underlined sentence.
“Ladies and gentlemen—“ said the ballerina, reading the bulletin. She must have been extraordinarily beautiful
because the mask she wore was hideous. And it was easy to see that she was the strongest and most graceful of
all the dancers, for her handicap bags were as big as those worn by two-hundred-pound men. And she had to
apologize at once for her voice, which was a very unfair voice for a woman to use. Her voice was a warm,
luminous, timeless melody. “Excuse me—“ she said, and she began again, making her voice absolutely
uncompetitive.
5. Using the graph below, identify the main elements of the story.
Climax
Rising Action
Exposition
Falling
Action
Resolution
“The Seventh Man” - by Haruki Murakami
1. Story’s Genre: ____________________________________
2. Story’s Protagonist_____________________ Story’s Antagonist________________________
3. In 3-4 sentences, summarize the story:
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________________
4. Analyze the following excerpt for comprehension, literary elements, and grammar usage. Turn the underlined
sentences into a compound sentence.
“Hurry, K.! Get out of there! The wave is coming!” This time my voice worked fine. The rumbling had stopped, I
realized, and now, finally, K. heard my shouting and looked up. But it was too late. A wave like a huge snake with
its head held high, poised to strike, was racing towards the shore. I had never seen anything like it in my life. It
had to be as tall as a three-story building. Soundlessly (in my memory, at least, the image is soundless, it rose up
behind K. to block out the sky. K. looked at me for a few seconds, uncomprehending. Then, as if sensing
something, he turned towards the wave. He tried to run, but now there was no time to run. The next instant, the
wave had swallowed him.
5. Using the graph below, identify the main elements of the story.
Climax
Rising Action
Falling
Action
Exposition
Resolution
Short Story Unit Test Review
Directions: For your test, you need to know not only what happened in the story, but you also need to be able to identify
literary elements within the stories. Make notes of important literary elements and examples from the stories we read in
class.