An Innocent At Rinkside
By William Faulkner
- 1.Who is the “he” in this article?
- A.
The hockey player
- B.
The coach
- C.
Faulkner
- D.
An audience member who is not named
- 2.What feeling is Faulkner trying to conjure in the first paragraph?
- A.
Fakeness
- B.
Expectancy
- C.
Coldness
- D.
None of the above
- 3.Faulkner refers to the “sweating barehanded behemoths from the troglodyte mass of football.” Based on this description, how might Faulkner feel about football?
- A.
He thinks it is exciting and enjoyable to watch.
- B.
He thinks that is brutish and inelegant.
- C.
He thinks that it is complicated and swift.
- D.
It cannot be discerned from this description.
- 4.Faulkner notes that hockey is both fast and elegant, but also brutal and bloody. He notes that here “actual blood could flow, not from the crude impact of a heavier fist but from the rapid and delicate stroke of weapons.” How does Faulkner feel about violence?
- A.
Violence is never appropriate, even in sports.
- B.
Violence needs to have purpose, not mere brutality.
- C.
Violence is a natural consequence of sports and should be controlled as best as possible.
- D.
All of the above
- 5.Faulkner begins to comment on sports in America. What does he foresee?
- A.
More violence
- B.
Fewer spectators
- C.
More controlled environments
- D.
Fewer injuries
- 6.Faulkner only mentions a few of the players in this article, which was written for Sports Illustrated. Why might this be?
- A.
Hockey was not familiar to many of Faulkner’s readers; therefore, the players were not familiar either.
- B.
The purpose of the article was not about hockey itself, but sports in general.
- C.
Faulkner was working to convey impressions of the game rather than exact statistics and players involved with the game.
- D.
All of the above.
- 7.Faulkner repeats “because the innocent did not quite believe that either” several times through the course of the article. Why does he do this?
- A.
An innocent is a person who is new to something, and he wishes to remind those who might be offended by his points that he is commenting as someone with no experience.
- B.
Faulkner wishes to convey to the audience that he has no malice at all towards sports in America, and by repeating this line he is suggesting that everything he says is factual and true.
- C.
Being a writer prone to lumbering and unwieldy descriptions and sentences, he wished to add another level of interpretation to the article for his literary critics.
- D.
None of the above
- 8.What tone does Faulkner convey?
- A.
Innocent fascination
- B.
Hopeful observation
- C.
Experienced boredom
- D.
Nonchalant detachment
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