55 pages 1 hour read

Ralph Ellison

King of the Bingo Game

Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1944

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Exam Questions

Multiple Choice and Long Answer questions create ideal opportunities for whole-text review, unit exam, or summative assessments.

Multiple Choice

1. Why does the narrator feel embarrassed during his interaction with the man with the microphone?

A) Because he is worried everyone will discover his secret plan

B) Because he is ashamed that he doesn’t speak the northern dialect

C) Because he is concerned he is making a fool of himself

D) Because he is frightened by the possibility of public speaking

2. After spinning the wheel on stage, the narrator observes that “[a]s the wheel increase[s] its speed it seem[s] to draw him more and more into its power, as though it h[olds] his fate; and with it c[omes] a deep need to submit, to whirl, to lose himself in its swirl of color. He c[an]not stop it now. So let it be” (Paragraph 19). Which of the following literary terms is used in this quote?

A) Palindrome

B) Parable

C) Paradox

D) Personification

3. Which of the following words best describes what the bingo wheel symbolizes?

A) Fear

B) Hatred

C) Fate

D) Harmony

4. Which of the following moments in the story best represents an example of Ellison’s use of the theme Invisible Man and African Americans Coming of Age Through Existential Crisis?

A) When the protagonist questions his name