Problem: Mark Twain has been called the inventor of the American novel. And he surely deserves additional praise: the man who popularized the clever literary attack on racism. I say clever because anti-slavery fiction had been the important part of the literature in the years before the Civil War. H. B. Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin is only the most famous example. These early stories dealt directly with slavery. With minor exceptions, Twain planted his attacks on slavery and prejudice into tales that were on the surface about something else entirely. He drew his readers into the argument by drawing them into the story. Again and again, in the postwar years, Twain seemed forced to deal with the challenge of race. Consider the most controversial, at least today, of Twain's novels, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Only a few books have been kicked off the shelves as often as Huckleberry Finn, Twain's most widely read tale. Once upon a time, people hated the book because it struck them as rude. Twain himself wrote that those who banned the book considered the novel "trash and suitable only for the slums ." More recently the book has been attacked because of the character Jim, the escaped slave, and many occurences of the word nigger. (The term Nigger Jim, for which the novel is often severely criticized, never appears in it.) But the attacks were and are silly--and miss the point. The novel is strongly anti-slavery. Jim's search through the slave states for the family from whom he has been forcibly parted is heroic. As J. Chadwick has pointed out, the character of Jim was a first in American fiction--a recognition that the slave had two personalities, "the voice of survival within a white slave culture and the voice of the individual: Jim, the father and the man." There is much more. Twain's mystery novel Pudd'nhead Wilson stood as a challenge to the racial beliefs of even many of the liberals of his day. Written at a time when the accepted wisdom held Negroes to be inferior to whites, especially in intelligence, Twain's tale centered in part around two babies switched at birth. A slave gave birth to her master's baby and, for fear that the child should be sold South, switched him for the master's baby by his wife. The slave's lightskinned child was taken to be white and grew up with both the attitudes and the education of the slave-holding class. The master's wife's baby was taken for black and grew up with the attitudes and intonations of the slave. The point was difficult to miss: nurture , not nature, was the key to social status. The features of the black man that provided the stuff of prejudice--manner of speech, for example-- were, to Twain, indicative of nothing other than the conditioning that slavery forced on its victims. Twain's racial tone was not perfect. One is left uneasy, for example, by the lengthy passage in his autobiography about how much he loved what were called "nigger shows" in his youth--mostly with white men performing in black-face--and his delight in getting his mother to laugh at them. Yet there is no reason to think Twain saw the shows as representing reality. His frequent attacks on slavery and prejudice suggest his keen awareness that _ did not. Was Twain a racist? Asking the question in the 21st century is as wise as asking the same of Lincoln. If we read the words and attitudes of the past through the "wisdom" of the considered moral judgments of the present, we will find nothing but error. Lincoln, who believed the black man the inferior of the white, fought and won a war to free him. And Twain, raised in a slave state, briefly a soldier, and inventor of Jim, may have done more to anger the nation over racial injustice and awaken its collective conscience than any other novelist in the past century.
1. Who is the inventor of the American Novel?
2. What had been an important part of literature before the Civil War?
3. Who wrote Uncle tom's cabin?
4. What did they deal with?
5. Directly or indirectly?
6. What book did he write?
7. Is it his most popular book?
8. Which character has the book been attacked because of?
9. What is he?
10. Do the attacks miss the point?
11. What did J. Chadwick point out?
12. What is twain's mystery novel?
13. What did it center around?
14. Was Twain's racial tone perfect?
15. What did Lincoln believe?
16. Where was Twain raised?
17. Was he a soldier?
Answer: 1. Mark Twain
2. anti-slavery fiction
3. Stowe
4. slavery
5. directly
6. Huckleberry Finn
7. unknown
8. Jim
9. an escaped slave
10. yes
11. jim was a first in American fiction
12. Pudd'nhead Wilson
13. babies switched at birth
14. np
15. blacks were inferior to whites
16. a slave state
17. yes

Problem: (CNN) -- Rafael Nadal is known as the undisputed king of clay with seven French Open titles to his name -- but the Spaniard was given an almighty scare in the quarterfinals of the Monte Carlo Masters Friday.

Nadal, who has won the past eight editions of the tournament, was made to fight all the way by Bulgaria's Grigor Dimitrov before eventually prevailing 6-2 2-6 6-4.

It was the first time the 26-year-old had dropped a set at the tournament since 2009 as he racked up a 45th consecutive match victory in the French principality.

That record had looked in doubt until his opponent began to suffer with cramp in his leg, allowing Nadal to emerge victorious.

But despite working his way back to fitness following a seven month absence with a knee injury, Nadal admits he still lacks match sharpness.

"I didn't play tennis for seven months," he told reporters. "I'm losing little bit intensity of the match for moments.

"That's normal after being a lot of time outside of the competition. I played for a month, then I stopped for another month. I need time to play with top rhythm for the whole match.

"I was playing great at the first set, playing my best level. So that's the most important thing."

Nadal was spotted playing with taping on his back, but he refused to elaborate on the problem when asked.

He added: "I'm happy to be in the semifinals, I played the best with what I had. It's normal have problems on the back, on the shoulder, on the elbow."
1. who is the story about?
2. what else is he called?
3. of what?
4. is he a potter?
5. what is his profession?
6. what is his nationality?
7. his age?
8. was he victorious in many important games?
9. in which competition?
10. did he win more or less than 9 times?
11. how many exactly?
12. was he hurt?
13. what was hurt?
14. did that prevent him from competing?
15. for how long?
16. how many times did he win in a row in Monte Carlo?
17. was he scared there?
18. on what day?
19. in what competition?
20. in which round?
Answer:
1. Rafael Nadal
2. the undisputed king
3. clay
4. No
5. tennis player
6. Spanish
7. 26
8. Yes
9. The French Open
10. less
11. seven
12. Yes
13. his knee
14. Yes
15. seven months
16. 45
17. Yes
18. Friday
19. the Monte Carlo Masters
20. the quarterfinals