MOCK EXAM 4
SIMULA UN ENTORNO TRANQUILO DURANTE CUATRO HORAS Y MEDIA
COMO SI ESTUVIERAS EN EL EXAMEN. DURANTE ESE TIEMPO:
1. ELIGE UN TEMA Y REDÁCTALO SIN MIRAR APUNTES, SIMULANDO
EXAMEN REAL.
2. ELIGE TRES PREGUNTAS DE LAS SEIS DEL TEXTO.
GOOD LUCK!
PRACTICAL EXAM:
I remember too much; I am like the air on a calm day as it holds itself still, letting
nothing escape. As the world holds its breath, I keep memory in. So when I told him about the
rabbits I was not telling him something that I had half-forgotten and merely remembered
because of his insistent presence. The details of what I told him were with me all the years in the
same way as my hands or my arms were with me. On that day, the day he wanted details
of, the day he wanted me to go over and over for him, in the middle of everything that was
confused, in the middle of all the terror and shrieking and the crying out, a man came close
to me who had a cage with a huge angry bird trapped in it, the bird all sharp beak and
indignant gaze; the wings could not stretch to their full width and this confinement seemed
to make the bird frustrated and angry. It should have been flying, hunting, swooping on its
prey. The man also carried a bag, which I gradually learned was almost half full of live
rabbits, little bundles of fierce and terrorized energy. And during those hours on that hill,
during the hours that went more slowly than any other hours, he plucked the rabbits one
by one from the sack and edged them into the barely opened cage. The bird went for some
part of their soft underbelly first, opening the rabbit up until its guts spilled out, and then of
course its eyes. It is easy to talk about this now because it was a mild distraction from what
was really going on, and it is easy to talk about it too because it made no sense. The bird
did not seem to be hungry, although perhaps it suffered from a deep hunger that even
the live flesh of writhing rabbits could not satisfy. The cage became half full of half-dead,
wholly uneaten rabbits exuding strange squealing sounds. Twitching with old bursts of life.
And the man's face was all bright with energy, there was a glow from him, as he looked at
the cage and then at the scene around him, almost smiling with dark delight, the sack not yet
empty.
By that time we had spoken of other things, including the men who played with dice close
to where the crosses were; they played far his clothes and other possessions, or for no
special reason. One of these men I feared as much as the strangler who arrived later. This
first man was the one among all those who carne and went during the day who was most
alert to me, most menacing, the one who seemed most likely to want to know where I
would go when it was over, the one most likely to be sent to bring me back. This man who
followed me with his eyes seemed to work for the group of men with horses, who
sometimes appeared to be a ching from the side. If anyone knows what happened that day
and why, then it is this man ho played with dice. It might be easier if I said that he comes in
dreams but he does not, nor does he haunt me as other things, or other faces, haunt me. He
was there, that is all I have to say about him, and he watched me and he knew me, and if
now, after all these years, he were to arrive at this door with his eyes narrowed against the
light and his sandy-coloured hair gone grey and his hands still too big far his body, and his air
, MOCK EXAM 4
of knowledge and self-possession and calm, controlling cruelty, and with the strangler
grinning viciously behind him, I would not be surprised. But I would not last long in their
company.
Just as my two friends who visit are looking far my voice, my witness, this man who
played dice, and the strangler, or others like them, must be looking for my silence. I will know
them if they come and it should hardly matter now, since the days left are few, but I
remain, in my waking time, desperately afraid of them. Compared to them, the man with the
rabbits and the hawk was oddly harmless; he was cruel, but uselessly so. His urges were
easy to satisfy. Nobody paid any attention to him except me, and I did because I, perhaps
alone of those who were there, paid attention to every single thing that moved in case I
might be able to find someone among those men with whom I could plead. And also so that
I could know what they might want from us when it was over, and more than anything else
so that I could distract myself, even for a single second, from the fierce catastrophe of what
was happening.
They have no interest in my fear and the fear all those around me felt, the sense that there
were men waiting who had been told to round us up too when we sought to move away, that
there seemed no possibility that we would not be held.
SOURCE: The Testament of Mary by Colm Tóibín.
1. Translate from "by that time" until "long in their company".
2. Comment on the style of the text.
3. Define the following expressions from the text and create a complex
sentence using the words in a different context:
1. Width:
2. Swooping:
3. Strangler:
4. Squealing:
S. Round us up:
4. Find words in the text for the following synonyms:
1. Beaming:
2. Screaming:
3. Looming:
4. Pertinacious:
SIMULA UN ENTORNO TRANQUILO DURANTE CUATRO HORAS Y MEDIA
COMO SI ESTUVIERAS EN EL EXAMEN. DURANTE ESE TIEMPO:
1. ELIGE UN TEMA Y REDÁCTALO SIN MIRAR APUNTES, SIMULANDO
EXAMEN REAL.
2. ELIGE TRES PREGUNTAS DE LAS SEIS DEL TEXTO.
GOOD LUCK!
PRACTICAL EXAM:
I remember too much; I am like the air on a calm day as it holds itself still, letting
nothing escape. As the world holds its breath, I keep memory in. So when I told him about the
rabbits I was not telling him something that I had half-forgotten and merely remembered
because of his insistent presence. The details of what I told him were with me all the years in the
same way as my hands or my arms were with me. On that day, the day he wanted details
of, the day he wanted me to go over and over for him, in the middle of everything that was
confused, in the middle of all the terror and shrieking and the crying out, a man came close
to me who had a cage with a huge angry bird trapped in it, the bird all sharp beak and
indignant gaze; the wings could not stretch to their full width and this confinement seemed
to make the bird frustrated and angry. It should have been flying, hunting, swooping on its
prey. The man also carried a bag, which I gradually learned was almost half full of live
rabbits, little bundles of fierce and terrorized energy. And during those hours on that hill,
during the hours that went more slowly than any other hours, he plucked the rabbits one
by one from the sack and edged them into the barely opened cage. The bird went for some
part of their soft underbelly first, opening the rabbit up until its guts spilled out, and then of
course its eyes. It is easy to talk about this now because it was a mild distraction from what
was really going on, and it is easy to talk about it too because it made no sense. The bird
did not seem to be hungry, although perhaps it suffered from a deep hunger that even
the live flesh of writhing rabbits could not satisfy. The cage became half full of half-dead,
wholly uneaten rabbits exuding strange squealing sounds. Twitching with old bursts of life.
And the man's face was all bright with energy, there was a glow from him, as he looked at
the cage and then at the scene around him, almost smiling with dark delight, the sack not yet
empty.
By that time we had spoken of other things, including the men who played with dice close
to where the crosses were; they played far his clothes and other possessions, or for no
special reason. One of these men I feared as much as the strangler who arrived later. This
first man was the one among all those who carne and went during the day who was most
alert to me, most menacing, the one who seemed most likely to want to know where I
would go when it was over, the one most likely to be sent to bring me back. This man who
followed me with his eyes seemed to work for the group of men with horses, who
sometimes appeared to be a ching from the side. If anyone knows what happened that day
and why, then it is this man ho played with dice. It might be easier if I said that he comes in
dreams but he does not, nor does he haunt me as other things, or other faces, haunt me. He
was there, that is all I have to say about him, and he watched me and he knew me, and if
now, after all these years, he were to arrive at this door with his eyes narrowed against the
light and his sandy-coloured hair gone grey and his hands still too big far his body, and his air
, MOCK EXAM 4
of knowledge and self-possession and calm, controlling cruelty, and with the strangler
grinning viciously behind him, I would not be surprised. But I would not last long in their
company.
Just as my two friends who visit are looking far my voice, my witness, this man who
played dice, and the strangler, or others like them, must be looking for my silence. I will know
them if they come and it should hardly matter now, since the days left are few, but I
remain, in my waking time, desperately afraid of them. Compared to them, the man with the
rabbits and the hawk was oddly harmless; he was cruel, but uselessly so. His urges were
easy to satisfy. Nobody paid any attention to him except me, and I did because I, perhaps
alone of those who were there, paid attention to every single thing that moved in case I
might be able to find someone among those men with whom I could plead. And also so that
I could know what they might want from us when it was over, and more than anything else
so that I could distract myself, even for a single second, from the fierce catastrophe of what
was happening.
They have no interest in my fear and the fear all those around me felt, the sense that there
were men waiting who had been told to round us up too when we sought to move away, that
there seemed no possibility that we would not be held.
SOURCE: The Testament of Mary by Colm Tóibín.
1. Translate from "by that time" until "long in their company".
2. Comment on the style of the text.
3. Define the following expressions from the text and create a complex
sentence using the words in a different context:
1. Width:
2. Swooping:
3. Strangler:
4. Squealing:
S. Round us up:
4. Find words in the text for the following synonyms:
1. Beaming:
2. Screaming:
3. Looming:
4. Pertinacious:
