Logan Takes a Lit Test

Seven sharp on the clock and Laszlo is staring at her phone. Teachers shouldn’t be allowed to be on their phones during tests. Bring a book, for god’s sake. My desk has a sticker with my name on it and a corner sticking out. Try to smooth it out. It’ll go back. I hate this; hope it isn’t an omen. Okay, now she’s distributing the tests. I can see Lillian has folded her cheat sheet into her pencil sharpener. If she’s lucky, they’ll let her keep it. My desk is clean, just two number two pencils, two pens, a white eraser, blue Gatorade—and the damn sticker. I murmur a thank you as Laszlo deposits the test in front of me. Know better than to turn it. No one else thanks her but I think it’s bad form not to. It’s bound to be a hot day, we’re edging on summer, and she has to wear long sleeves because of her tattoos, which are against school policy. They say one of her tattoos is a photorealistic depiction of Harry Styles. I think Harry Styles should sue her. If it’s true. Lots of rumors about Laszlo’s tattoos, enough to cover thousands of arms. Does she know this classroom’s AC is kaput? Maybe Nav is punishing her, making her stew in long sleeves in the AC-less room. Meh, who cares? Although maybe it’ll make her spiteful and she’ll take it out on students when she corrects the Chemistry test. Breathe. We’ll do the Chemistry one after Geography and before Biology. We have a plan. Hopefully she won’t be here by then. If she is, we’ll wait it out. I can’t do it in front of her. I may now turn over my test and begin. Ready set go! 

Okay, focus, Logan. Rub your hands together in your mind. English. Leaf over it looking for the English test. A few jump-scares in the Math section involving log, that’s a problem for later. Sharp, sharp like the pencil that I did not sharpen because I don’t have a pencil sharpener because I am not a preschooler nor do I need to cheat on tests. When my pencil is no longer sharp, I just get another one. That’s life. What the fuck am I talking about. Did they let Lillian keep her pencil sharpener? Would she lend me hers if I whispered? No, the cheat sheet is there, dummy. What if they caught me with the cheat sheet folded into Lillian’s pencil sharpener and invalidated my whole test? Shut up, you don’t even need a pencil sharpener, you’re fine! Maybe a mind sharpener, though?

I skim. Baritones, Papageno, wolf boy… Okay, we’ve been through this. We got this. Sip o’ Gatorade and…

1. Regarding the artistic movement known as Baritonism, it would be correct to affirm the following: 

1. It was idealized by Ben Boutsikaris and Vincent Molloy as a way of bringing the “High” and the “Low” closer together. Boutsikaris’ Papageno’s Enlightenment and Molloy’s Variations in E. Majors are seminal works in the movement. X

Nope. Classic “famous partakers taken for founders” type question. Next. 

2. Writers such as Franz Betz and August Kindermann are often described as Baritonists. Later examples, like Bob Dylan, were inspired by their style. X

Funny. Classic nonsense question. Ya mean baritone, honey! Also, Bob Dylan diss. Mrs. Wu hates that he won the Nobel Prize. Don’t know who the other guys are but it’s a pretty clear tell. 

3. Baritonism borrowed its name from the vocal range category of baritone, which describes the tone between bass and tenor. Its founders defended an aesthetic middle ground between light and heavy subjects.

Which at times gave readers whiplash, yes. This one, most likely. But next, 

4. The movement abruptly ended after the start of the First World War, when humorous depictions of grim events became rather tasteless to a general audience. X

Try again next time. Nothing ever ends abruptly. All right, what else you got. 

2. Which of the alternatives below could be described as a valid criticism of Baritonism as a whole? 

As a whole? Oh boy. 

1. It often misinterpreted the materials that inspired it. One example of this is Papageno’s Enlightenment, which fundamentally misreads “The Magic Flute.” X

Ha. John Lennon “Imagine” voice: but you’re not the only one… If only Baritonism were the only one… Love that that’s misinterpreting the very concept of misinterpretation though. Ambitious. How very girlboss of ya. 

2. Baritonist works made liberal use of animal allegories, a phenomenon critic John Gouly pejoratively called “The Aesopian Instinct.” 

We have a winner. Let’s just make sure. Critic John Gouly was onto something. King. Don’t know his life, but yeah, go John. That essay was funny as fuck. Some people are born to hate. Bet some idiots will get stuck on pejoratively. Wild. Unless Wu didn’t find it pejorative. Though it was. Well, fuck her if she’s wrong. No, no, that’s why she showed us the essay. 

3. Due to the necessities of the plot, the characters were not exactly fleshed out. The delinquent Paul Choko, for instance, seemingly needs to learn the same lesson at least four times.

That is a valid criticism of Variations of E. Majors, if you don’t subscribe, like I do, to the interpretation that each variation is a parallel universe, so the characters wouldn’t accumulate knowledge. Even then, it’s hella boring. But realistic. Paul Chokos all around. You wish you were Choko. But not Baritonism as the whole. Tough, ’cause it’s an example, but it reads like it was taken right out of an E. Majors review. 

4. The name “Baritonism” automatically excluded women, who were not part of the movement. Suffragette Rose Norbitt, however, founded the women-only “Mezzo-Sopranism” movement, shortened as Mezzosopro. X

Sounds like an anti-depressant. Middling professional. The kind of answer that would seem right if you haven’t been to class. Anitta Andersen, famous Baritonist, begs to differ. You philistines, falling for it. Mezzosopro is the feminist wing of the movement. They’ll remember just hearing the name ’cause it’s so odd. Ha.

3. Consider the following passage:

“Papa. Papa. He said it a million times or so. There were too many of him. Too many children. Too many whimpers and feathers. Birds of a feather flocking together. Papa said. Somebody. Fly, please, fly. Pluck chickens headless, running. Fly, fly, but no. They ate it, Papa got the leg.” 

MOLLOY, Vincent. Papageno’s Enlightenment, 1919. 

After reading this excerpt, one would have grounds to argue that: 

1. From the very start of the novel, Junior is demonstrably interested in becoming a bird, which paves the way for his later metamorphosis into a parrot. X

This one is for the clueless girlies! The ones who saw the parrot on the cover and went: got it! Say no more! Frank is definitely marking this one off. Boys can be girlies, too. 

2. The narrator begins in an indirect third person register, but soon gets overpowered by the childlike stream of consciousness that will dominate the novel. X

Bold claims, bold claims. Nah. He grows up. But would I have grounds to argue that? Sure. But it wouldn’t be correct. He grows up. He becomes enlightened. It’s in the title, so I wouldn’t have grounds. I’d build a floor on hollow ground. What? Also is this a stream of consciousness? A Real One TM. More real than stately plump. Stanley Cup. Gatorade. But it sure is fancier. 

3. Papageno’s knack for repetition is well-established from the very first paragraph of the novel. 

But his name isn’t really Papageno. So no. Right? Like, he is a Papageno. But he’s not Papageno. He’s Junior. Which also establishes his knack for repetition. Which gets established over and over. Very repetitive book. Maybe the Choko answer was right. No. Lemme see. No, it says the plot. Shit, am I tripping? Junior was throughout that whole book and people still think he’s a misunderstood genius, so…

4. This passage foreshadows the protagonist’s eventual conversion to vegetarianism. 

It does. But it sounds fake. We love a right answer that sounds like straight-up bullshit because it’s so short and to the point. Real recognize real. 

4. Consider the chapters from the Egyptian Book of the Dead and Papageno’s Enlightenment:

Oh Tmu! give me that delicious air which is in thine own nostrils.

It is I who hold that great station which is in the heart of Heracleopolis.

I watch over that egg of the Great Cackler, my strength is the strength thereof, my life is the life thereof, and my breath is the breath thereof.

Available at Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org/files/69566/69566-h/69566-h.htm#ch089). “Another Chapter of Breathing.”

I ask that my parrot remind me how to breathe. He complies. I take the cue from him as always. Thank you, he says, I say. Papa telling me when I was a child, inhale, inhale, inhale. The village doctor said not to hope. Asthmatic diagnosis is a death sentence. Too many feathers, too. Too many chickens. But I’m healed. Grown out of it. Grown out of it all. Breathe out, Junior, breathe out. Move out, go live with Uncle Bob. He’s got no feathers. Except for the parrot. I don’t fear the parrot. 

MOLLOY, Vincent. Papageno’s Enlightenment. Another Chapter for Breathing. 

Spoon-feed us, won’t ya? Jeez. Laszlo coughs from her desk. Looking at her phone, probably her locked instagram account that Lillian said she found. What time is it? Ugh, we gotta hurry up, chop chop. Let’s check out the menu:

1. Molloy’s novel often references the Egyptian Book of the Dead because, though Junior does not know it, he has in fact died of asthma and is being guided through the Netherworld by his loyal parrot mascot. Because he has not yet been given back his body, the parrot needs to speak for him. The “egg” is Junior’s vehicle towards reincarnation. X

Mrs. Wu hates that interpretation, so, no. Also it is kind of a bummer. And there’s nothing in the novel that justifies or denies it. It’s just some people’s weird headcanon. Like the Caillou having cancer thing. Iceberg theory can’t kill you ’cause it’s just a theory… Dumb person’s idea of a clever twist. 

2. The nods to the Book of the Dead throughout the novel are solely inspired by the Baritonist movement’s characteristic Orientalism, and has been heavily criticized by modern scholars as “othering.” 

Solely–that’s yer first mistake! I did not sit through “The Magic Flute” for this! It’s about the Flute! Papageno! Papagena! Criticize Mozart if you want, or whoever wrote the booklet… Also, modern scholars? Modern? That could mean anything. Boo. Like they were very much obsessed with ancient Egypt in kinda weird ways… But this ain’t it. Failoption. 

3. The ritual of weighing the dead’s hearts against a feather is famously described in the Book of the Dead as the entrance exam to the Egyptian “paradise.” Only those whose hearts weighed less would be allowed in. Thus, the “Enlightenment” of Papageno takes on a double–and paradoxical–meaning. 

Bingo. I mean, is it a paradox? Yeah, cause they were questioning what the Enlightenment had come to represent, right? Unlearn it. Stream of consciousness. Stop trying to make sense and embrace the ancient rituals. Also he goes through it allegorically with the metal detector scene. No question about that? Good, fuck that. So on the nose.

4. The references to the Book of the Dead are only filtered through Mozart’s “Magic Flute,” as Egyptian hieroglyphs had not yet been deciphered by the time of the novel’s publication. Since Mozart had access to texts that had been lost, it was only with the discovery of the Rosetta Stone that the plot of “The Magic Flute” itself started to make sense.  X but I love it sm

Wrong! The plot of “The Magic Flute” has never once made sense! But also, lol. Imagine being this lost in Annals of History. The anals of history. No but, seriously, can you point to things on a map? Like do you think Mozart is closer to the Ancient Egyptians than to the year 1919? I just want to know where you think you are situated. Your sitch. Like what do u think about. I’m interested. I want a list of whoever answers D. Just… I wanna know. For Science and stuff. 

5. Lavrenty and Molloy’s falling out marked the beginning of the end of the Baritonist movement. What was the theoretical basis of their disagreement?

Fuck if I know. Was this Spring Break week? I’m sure Lavrenty was right ’cause Molloy is one boring motherfucker. 

1. Molloy believed that the thesis of the movement had been proven wrong by the mass casualties of the First World War. He decided that certain heavy themes should be treated as such. Despite Papageno’s late publication date, the novel had been composed in the pre-war years, and Molloy no longer vouched for it. Lavrenty, nonetheless, published it without his consent. ??????????????????????

Based. This could be true. And we haven’t had an A yet, I’m fairly certain. Not sure about the pre-war years. I don’t know. First question tapped into this though, right? Maybe. If so, he should thank Lavrenty. 

2. Lavrenty’s poem “Tut’s World Tour,” inspired by the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb, disquieted the superstitious Molloy, who feared that the rumored curse might reach them. Until the day he died, Molloy maintained that Lavrenty’s death from cancer in 1930 was brought about by his “cheering at desecrated ancients.” 

I don’t know if that’s true, but I kinda wish it was. Ay, Ay, Ay, King Tut, is what I remember from this poem. So it’s a maybe for me. Then again, what a bad friend. If I were cursed over a bad poem and, on top of that, my friend dumped me over it, I’d be pissed. Doesn’t matter if I brought the curse upon myself. Shit friend. Yolanda would never. I bet she’s taking the Math test first just to stop thinking about it. I kinda want her to fail so I don’t have to go to remedial Math class alone, is that bad? Maybe I’m a shit friend, too.

3. Their political disagreement over the Spanish Civil War soured the friendship. X

Okay but that’s not theoretical. Is it? Did I miss this class? I normally love gossip. But why is it on a test? Can’t be this one, it doesn’t affect the literary output. You’re not Hemingway.

4. Lavrenty’s “Baritonist Manifesto” claimed that Papageno’s Enlightenment should be taken at its word, and that “what the author meant” was nonsense. What mattered was what he had written. Molloy thought that displayed a tragic lack of imagination. 

Again, Lavrenty would be correct. I’m not sure if the alternative is correct, but. Death of the Author. Etc. But would it be in a manifesto? Would a manifesto signify the beginning of the end? Ah shit, dunno. Ok, let’s say it’s A because there are fewer red flags in it. This Gossip Girl ass question. Who’s eating Doritos? It’s 7 am for god’s sake! Have some restraint!

For questions 6 and 7, review the following excerpt from Boutsikaris’ Variations in E. Majors: 

Ugh, must I?

“Under the full moon Ethan saw the wolf behind the bales by the stream rolling in. He considered running, but that would tip it off. It’s so doglike in its movements. The wolf now noticed him. His eyes spoke a baleful lament; he seemed to know Ethan better than himself. 

‘Homo homini lupus est,’ he attempted small talk with the wolf. We’re all the same here, he meant. Wolves speak Latin, right, like pigs? They’d brought up Romulus and his twin. They’d founded the great city of Rome. This one didn’t seem to know its rich history, so Ethan tried again: ‘Wolf is but the man of wolf, no?’

Lupine fatalism aside, the boy was doing well. The wolf seemed unthreatened. They went in opposite directions, staring at each other in fascination. The wolf, Ethan knew, would grow into a pup, a domestic and angelic pup. Meanwhile the boy, now such a gentle cub, would turn into a man, and become wolf to man. The wolf was fully aware, despite his faulty Latin, that once the boy was plump, he’d have to kill him. But today was not that day. He heard the boy tell his parents there was a wolf, and he knew he had to hide.”

BOUTSIKARIS, Ben. Variations in E. Majors. 

6. Consider this in relation to the rest of the novel. Which of these statements sounds like the most plausible?

1. Ethan’s first encounter with the wolf signifies the dawn of puberty, the culmination of which is his transformation into a werewolf. It becomes clear, later in the book, that Ethan was staring at his own reflection, which is why he–usually a “prolific stammerer” – was able to communicate with the wolf.

You wouldn’t think so, but yeah. Spot-on take. Take on E. Take me on (take on me). Okay, okay! Jeez. Focus, hurry up, choppety choppety!

2. His use of Latin in “homo homini lupus est,” taken from Thomas Hobbes’ Leviathan, is, on the surface, a communicative necessity, as we are told that Ethan only stammers in his mother tongue. However, it may also be taken as a clue that he and the wolf are one. 

Okay. There’s some kind of point being made here. Maybe A is wrong, because B is onto something here. He’s able to communicate with the wolf because he is speaking Latin, not because he is the wolf. A only brings up the first reason. But also, this is so specific. Hobbes, yes. Leviathan? Maybe Hobbes wrote other books. Also, he does speak English with the wolf later. Sticking with A for now. 

3. The reworking of the “Boy who cried Wolf” tale exemplifies the Baritonist fabulist inclination by changing the original Aesopian version, in which the boy is a frequent liar, to one where he falls victim to an intentional disinformation campaign. 

Disinformation campaign? That an iPhone-face answer. Too current. Also is the boy who cried wolf Greek? I always pictured him in a hamlet, a medieval hamlet with peasants in bonnets. No can do. Boutsikaris was a Greek immigrant. But Ethan falls victim to himself. He turns into the wolf. Unless you want to separate them, but no. It’s Variations in E. Majors. Not E. Majors and his alter-ego who plots against him. Fuck this. Werewolf, not Boy and Wolf. I like the plot-twist that the boy who cried wolf was just a dumb werewolf. I like it less now that this question is confusing the shit outta me. Are there wolves in Greece? Mediterranean climates and wolves? I dunno… They did have lions at one point. But lions are used to the heat. Whatever. Also, did Aesop even write all those fables? Or did he simply write them down?

4. Ethan’s statement that “wolf is but the man of wolf” was a botched translation of the original phrase, though it may also be taken as a hint about the true nature of the scene described. X

Nah… I think he was just playing with words. See, in C you assume intention, and in D you assume complete incompetence. He was trying to convince the wolf they were pals. If man is the wolf of man, then it must be that wolf is the man of wolf, amiright? Look, we match, we’re of little threat to one another, just to fellow members of our species. So let us say goodbye and part ways uneventfully.

7. Regarding the themes and figures of speech deployed throughout the novel, it would be correct to say: 

1. E. Majors is not a literal werewolf, but a metaphorical one. 

I mean. He is quite literally a werewolf. But who’s to say he can’t also be a metaphorical one? Duality of man. 

2. E. Majors’ English stammer is an allegory for the immigrant experience – something the author, Ben Boutsikaris, was very familiar with, being an immigrant himself. 

What’s wrong with you? Can’t find what’s wrong with you. But I don’t trust you. It’s the allegory. The allegory needs to take on more than the stammer. It’s just a metaphor. Hold your horses. I’ve met many metaphors who dreamed of one day becoming allegories… Very few have made it. Even fewer have made it back… 

3. One of the great ironies of Variations in E. Majors is the fact that Paul Choko, after discovering Ethan’s secret, later becomes the proverbial man who cried wolf, as no one believes a pathological liar. 

Isn’t it ironic? Dontcha think? No. No, I mean. It’s like rain on your wedding day. It’s not ironic unless the groom is a weatherman. Or bride. Mrs. Wu gave us that goddam song to teach this and now I don’t even know what is and isn’t anything anymore. Here’s what I remember: there were two actual ironic situations in that song, and one was a free ride when you’re already there. The other one was a guy who’s dying saying “Isn’t this nice?”, which to me is just sarcasm. What’s the difference between irony and sarcasm, then? Sarcasm is Chandler going “could I be any smarter?” Irony is Joey’s character Dr. Drake Ramoray dying because the only doctor who could have saved him was himself. Joey voice: It’s supposed to be this tragic irony or something. I guess the original fable is ironic? And even the werewolf twist could be ironic. More satirical, though. But if irony is two opposites walking together, then Paul Choko playing into a well-established pattern is not irony. It’s just repetition. Okay, let’s see how bright our winner shines:

d) “Man is the wolf of man” is a metaphor, whereas “It’s so doglike in its movements” is a simile. 

She’s lookin’ good. Short and sweet. Doglike. That’s like saying like, isn’t it? 

Okay, we’re almost done here. We can do this. Isn’t it ironique. Dontcha think. 

8. John Philip Sousa, testifying before Congress in 1906 about the new “Infernal Machines” for recording music, famously said: 

“The time is coming when no one will be ready to submit himself to the ennobling discipline of learning music. Everyone will have their ready-made music (…). Something is irretrievably lost when we’re no longer in the presence of bodies making music.”

Taking into account the novels you have read, what would be a pertinent commentary on this statement?

1. Junior’s parrot in Papageno’s Enlightenment represented the very real concerns of the time that people might grow lazy and uncreative with so much being readily available to them. The parrot, who can read Junior’s thoughts and put them into words which Junior then repeats, may be speaking to the anxiety of influence.

Yeah sure why not. But the parrot was liberating. He’s Junior’s whole reason for living. Like my dog is my whole reason for living, and I’m my mom’s whole reason for living, meaning my dog is carrying a lot of responsibility. Poor Mr. Sniff-a-Ton, that’s why his hair is falling out. Then again, he doesn’t have to wake up early and answer questions about John Phillip Sousa and his marching band music.

2. Boutsikaris seems to have held a point of view similar to Sousa’s, since the character Paul Choko had given up his cabaret act a few years prior to the story. He warns E. Majors that playing the piano is not like riding a bike, which means he most likely forgot how to play. 

False! Pathological liar Paul Choko never had a cabaret stage act, he was lying! Like the boy who cried wolf. Booooo. And even then, who’s to say that’s what the author meant. Get over yourself. Who do ya think you are? Alternative A? 

3. When E. Majors kills Choko, he does so in his human form, with tools–signifying his surrender to his fate but, most importantly, to the impersonal nature of the mechanical act. Unlike the unplanned murders he commits with his teeth, here he premeditates the crime with the help of a machine.

That’s a stretch longer than the stretcher he put Choko in. I’m here every morning. 

4. There is no vestige of Sousa’s anxieties in Papageno’s Enlightenment, as Junior often listens to his own parrot sing “The Magic Flute.” 

Yes, that means nothing. I’m sure it did not signify nor represent any latent issues with the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction. 

9. Of the narrative devices used in these novels and other, less important works of the time, it can be said that: 

1. They took their inspiration from Heraclitus’s idea of the subconscious and Freud’s analogy of time as an ever-changing river. 

Dummies. Imagine if Heraclitus had come up with the subconscious. We’d be in The Future. 

2. Stream of consciousness narratives were more interested in describing the interiority of characters versus the mundane happenings of the outside world.

I think this is true, but Mrs. Wu wouldn’t. 

3. The use of punctuation in stream of consciousness narratives turn the whole enterprise into a phony attempt, since thoughts are often disorganized and messy. 

Speak for yourself. You might as well wear a shirt saying “I’m stoopid.” At least then some people may think you’re being sarcastic.

4. Papageno’s Enlightenment uses stream of consciousness from start to finish, while E. Majors only does so when Ethan becomes a werewolf. 

Yep. 7:25, not bad for ol’ Logue, they said I couldn’t do it but look at me, I’ve done the easiest part of it… Oh boy. I’m hungry. Time for the History portion. I’ll have a cashew now. Good job. Yeah, it’s all right, Pavlov and all. Turn the pages, noise, wonder how the rest of them are doing. These things are crunchy, they make noise. Maybe they’ll lose focus and we’ll be graded on a curve and I’ll come out on top. Not of the curve, that would be bad. You know what I mean. Let’s be nice and not make noise. Good karma. Orientalism though? Okay, just bite after bite, slow. Salt, blue Gatorade. Lots of blocks of text. Kill me. Okay, go.