English Exam Practice: Reading Comprehension Worksheet

 

Read the story carefully and answer the following questions.

Analyzing O! Pioneers

Willa Cather’s 1910 novel, O! Pioneers, follows a Swedish family of farmers in Nebraska. In this passage, John Bergson is dying and worries about what will become of his wife and young children. Alexandra is the oldest Bergson child.

Alexandra, her father often said to himself, was like her grandfather; which was his way of saying that she was intelligent. John Bergson’s father had been a shipbuilder, a man of considerable force and of some fortune. Late in life he married a second time, a

Stockholm woman of questionable character, much younger than he, who goaded him into every sort of extravagance. On the shipbuilder’s part, this marriage was an infatuation, the despairing folly of a powerful man who cannot bear to grow old. In a few years his unprincipled wife warped the probity of a lifetime. He speculated, lost his own fortune and funds entrusted to him by poor seafaring men, and died disgraced, leaving his children nothing. But when all was said, he had come up from the sea himself, had built up a proud little business with no capital but his own skill and foresight, and had proved himself a man. In his daughter, John Bergson recognized the strength of will, and the simple direct way of thinking things out, that had characterized his father in his better days. He would much rather, of course, have seen this likeness in one of his sons, but it was not a question of choice. As he lay there day after day he had to accept the situation as it was, and to be thankful that there was one among his children to whom he could entrust the future of his family and the possibilities of his hard-won land.

Questions:

1. What is the main concern of John Bergson in the passage?

a) His failing health

b) The prosperity of his shipbuilding business

c) The welfare of his wife and children

d) The questionable character of his father's second wife

 

2. Why does John Bergson compare Alexandra to her grandfather?

a) Due to her questionable character

b) Because of her intelligence

c) Her forceful personality

d) Her extravagant lifestyle

 

3. What impact did John Bergson's second wife have on the family's fortune?

a) She increased their wealth

b) She maintained their fortune

c) She warped the probity of a lifetime

d) She saved them from financial ruin

 

4. Why did John Bergson's father's marriage to a Stockholm woman become a source of despair for him?

a) She was younger than him

b) She goaded him into extravagance

c) She was of questionable character

d) She was from Stockholm

 

5. What was the shipbuilder's infatuation in the passage?

a) Building ships

b) His second marriage

c) Growing old

d) Losing his fortune

 

6. What did John Bergson's father leave for his children after his death?

a) A vast fortune

b) Nothing

c) A successful shipbuilding business

d) A tarnished reputation

 

7. In what way did John Bergson accept the situation as it was?

a) With anger and resentment

b) With thankfulness and resignation

c) By blaming his daughter

d) By disowning his sons

 

8. What did John Bergson entrust to Alexandra?

a) His shipbuilding business

b) His failing health

c) The future of his family and land

d) His unprincipled wife

 

9. What does the passage suggest about Alexandra's characteristics?

a) She is extravagant

b) She is forceful and intelligent

c) She is of questionable character

d) She is despairing

 

10. Why would John Bergson have preferred to see the likeness in one of his sons?

a) His sons were more intelligent

b) His sons were more forceful

c) It was a matter of choice

d) He did not want a daughter to take charge