Analyzing An Autobiographical Essay Quiz Flashcards
Read the two excerpts.
“Remembering to Never Forget: Dominican Republic’s ‘Parsley Massacre’” by Mark Memmott:
As for Trujillo, he stayed in power until 1961, when he was assassinated. Last year, the BBC spoke with one of the army officers who killed the dictator. “The only way to get rid of him was to kill him,” Gen. Antonio Imbert told the BBC.
“A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez:
On May 30, 1961, nine months after our escape from our homeland, the group of plotters with whom my father had been associated assassinated the dictator. Actually, Dominicans do not refer to the death as an assassination but as an ajusticiamiento, a bringing to justice. Finally, after thirty-one years, Trujillo was brought to justice, found guilty, and executed.
But the execution was an external event, not necessarily an internal exorcism. All their lives my parents, along with a nation of Dominicans, had learned the habits of repression, censorship, terror. Those habits would not disappear with a few bullets and a national liberation proclamation. They would not disappear on a plane ride north that put hundreds of miles distance between the island and our apartment in New York.
The subject of both passages is
The circumstances under which Trujillo died
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
Perhaps because she had innocently revered him, my mother was now doubly revolted by this cold-blooded monster. He became something of an obsession with her—living as she was by then in exile with my father, isolated from her family who were still living on the Island. As my sisters and I were growing up, Trujillo and his excesses figured in many of my mother’s cautionary tales.
What is the central idea in this paragraph?
The author’s mother thought of Trujillo constantly
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
Passage A:
In December 1960, four months after our arrival, Time magazine reported the murder of the three Mirabal sisters, who along with their husbands had started the national underground Dominican Republic. My parents confiscated the magazine. To our many questions about what was going on, my mother always had the ready answer, “En boca cerrada no entran moscas.” No flies fly into a closed mouth. Later, I found out that this very saying had been scratched on the lintel of the entrance of the SIM’s torture center at La Cuarenta.
Passage B:
The novel would be a fictional retelling of the story of three Mirabal sisters, contemporaries of my mother, whose murder had been reported in that confiscated Time magazine. This time, my mother warned, I was not just going to anger family members, but I would be directly responsible for their lives. There were still old cronies of the dictator around who would love an excuse to go after my family, after my father, after her.
This was one of the hardest challenges I had ever had to face as a writer. If my mother were indeed speaking the truth, could I really put my work above the lives of human beings? But if I shut up, wouldn’t I still be fanning the members of the dictatorship with its continuing power of censorship and control over the imagination of many Dominicans?
What central idea do these excerpts work together to develop?
Alvarez grappled with the issue of writing a novel about a dangerous subject
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
My mother, especially, lived in terror of the consequences of living as free citizens. In New York City, before Trujillo was killed, Dominican exiles gathered around the young revolutionary Juan Bosch planning an invasion of the Island. Every time my father attended these meetings, my mother would get hysterical. If the SIM found out about my father’s activities, family members remaining behind were likely to be in danger. Even our own family in New York could suffer consequences. Five years earlier, in 1955, Galindez, an exile anti-Trujillo teaching at Columbia University, had disappeared from a New York subway. The same thing could happen to us.
I don’t know if my father complied or just got too busy trying to make a living in this country. But after a few months of hotheaded attendance, he dropped out of these political activities and his silence deepened.
Which statement best analyzes how the author develops the central idea across the paragraphs?
Alvarez explains that, although her parents reacted differently to the stress they endured, both became silent about the dictatorship
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
Images of the dictator hung in every house next to the crucifix and Ia Virgencita with the declaration beneath: In this house Trujillo is Chief. The pale face of a young military man wearing a plumed bicorne hat and a gold–braided uniform looked down beneficently at my mother as she read her romantic novelas and dreamed of meeting the great love of her life. Sometimes in her daydreams, her great love wore the handsome young dictator’s face. Never having seen him, my mother could not know the portrait was heavily retouched.
What is the central idea of this paragraph?
The images of Trujillo portrayed him falsely
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
Periodically, Trujillo would demand a tribute, and they would acquiesce. A tax, a dummy vote, a portrait on the wall. To my father and other men in the country, the most humiliating of these tributes was the occasional parade in which women were made to march and turn their heads and acknowledge the great man as they passed the review stand.
If you did not march, your cédula would not be stamped, and without a stamped identification card, you could do nothing; in particular, you could not obtain your passport to leave the country under the pretext of wanting to study heart surgery. This was the second escape—this time with his whole family—that my father was planning.
The day came when my mother had to march.
Which statement best explains how the author develops the central idea throughout the passage?
Alvarez shows that refusing to obey Trujillo’s requests could be dangerous
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
On May 30, 1961, nine months after our escape from our homeland, the group of plotters with whom my father had been associated assassinated the dictator. Actually, Dominicans do not refer to the death as an assassination but as an ajusticiamiento, a bringing to justice. Finally, after thirty-one years, Trujillo was brought to justice, found guilty, and executed.
But the execution was an external event, not necessarily an internal exorcism. All their lives my parents, along with a nation of Dominicans, had learned the habits of repression, censorship, terror. Those habits would not disappear with a few bullets and a national liberation proclamation. They would not disappear on a plane ride north that put hundreds of miles distance between the Island and our apartment in New York.
Which statement best explains how the author develops the central idea throughout the passage?
The author explains that, even after Trujillo was killed, her parents continued to fear the dictatorship
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
Periodically, Trujillo would demand a tribute, and they would acquiesce. A tax, a dummy vote, a portrait on the wall. To my father and other men in the country, the most humiliating of these tributes was the occasional parade in which women were made to march and turn their heads and acknowledge the great man as they passed the review stand.
If you did not march, your cédula would not be stamped, and without a stamped identification card, you could do nothing; in particular, you could not obtain your passport to leave the country under the pretext of wanting to study heart surgery. This was the second escape—this time with his whole family—that my father was planning.
The day came when my mother had to march. The parade went on for hours in the hot sun until my mother was sure she was going to faint. Her feet were swollen and hurting. The back of her white dress was damp with sweat. Finally when she thought she could not go one more step, the grandstand came into sight, a clutter of dress uniforms, a vague figure on the podium.
Which statement best analyzes how the author develops the central idea across the paragraphs?
Alvarez traces how Trujillo demanded the tributes, how her family reacted, and how it was finally her mother’s turn to pay tribute
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
When my sisters and I cared too much about our appearance, my mother would tell us how Trujillo’s vanity knew no bounds. How in order to appear taller, his shoes were specially made abroad with built-in heels that added inches to his height. How plumes for his Napoleonic hats were purchased in Paris and shipped in vacuum-packed boxes to the Island. How his uniforms were trimmed with tassels and gold epaulettes and red sashes, pinned with his medals, crisscrossing his chest. How he costumed himself in dress uniforms and ceremonial hats and white gloves—all of this in a tropical country where men wore guayaberas in lieu of suit jackets, short-sleeved shirts worn untucked so the body could be ventilated. My mother could go on and on.
Which quotation provides the best evidence for the central idea of this excerpt?
“Trujillo’s vanity knew no bounds.”
Read the excerpt from “A Genetics of Justice” by Julia Alvarez.
Images of the dictator hung in every house next to the crucifix and Ia Virgencita with the declaration beneath: In this house Trujillo is Chief. The pale face of a young military man wearing a plumed bicorne hat and a gold–braided uniform looked down beneficently at my mother as she read her romantic novelas and dreamed of meeting the great love of her life. Sometimes in her daydreams, her great love wore the handsome young dictator’s face. Never having seen him, my mother could not know the portrait was heavily retouched.
Which quotation provides the best evidence for the central idea of this excerpt?
“Never having seen him, my mother could not know the portrait was heavily retouched.”
