A Day's Wait Quiz

"A Day's Wait" is mostly about

• courage in the face of death.
• the fear people have about becoming ill.
• misunderstandings between parent and child.
• the feelings of a parent whose child is seriously ill.

What can you infer about the boy even before the arrival of the doctor?

• He is usually strong and healthy.
• He frequently demands a lot of attention.
• He tends to be stubborn and disobedient.
• He does not generally complain or whine much.

What change comes about as a result of the doctor's visit?

• The father becomes more worried.
• The boy becomes very tense.
• The boy's fever finally begins to go down.
• The boy is able to fall asleep.

The story's major conflict is

• the boy's external struggle against illness.
• the boy's external conflict with his father.
• the boy's internal struggle against fear of death.
• the father's internal conflict over how to treat his son.

Which moment represents the climax in the plot?

• The father comes home from his hunt.
• The boy asks what his temperature is.
• The father explains the different types of thermometers.
• The boy asks when he is going to die.

Why does the boy prefer to stay awake even though he feels so sick?

• He does not want his father to leave his bedside.
• He does not want to waste the last day of his life by sleeping.
• He feels that it is more manly to endure pain than to hide from it by sleeping.
• He is too terrified to fall asleep.

The father's quail hunt contributes primarily to the reader's understanding of the story's

• title.
• theme.
• setting.
• plot.

What does the boy's insistence that no one enter his room say about him?

• He does not want his family to see him at his worst.
• He prefers to die alone, rather than risk infecting his family.
• He is too stubborn to let anyone but his father give him medicine.
• Comfort seems useless, since he is already resigned to his death.

Which of the following sentences is a clue to the major conflict in the story?

• When the doctor came he took the boy's temperature."
• "'... you don't have to stay if it's going to bother you.'"
• "... it was difficult to stand o walk on the glassy surface ..."
• "'I'll wake you up for the medicine.'"

The boy could be considered heroic because he

• suffers in silence and bothers no one.
• manages to overcome the universal fear of death.
• would willingly sacrifice his life for the welfare of others.
• is more concerned for his family than for himself.