Quiz Colored Television Danzy Senna

Colored Television Quiz: Test Your Knowledge of Danzy Senna's Novel

About This Quiz

This 20-question quiz covers Danzy Senna's Colored Television (2024). Questions are divided into four categories: plot and sequence, character motivation, theme and symbol, and synthesis. Each question includes either multiple-choice or short-answer format. After completing the quiz, check the answer key for explanations. Use this quiz to deepen your understanding of the novel's conflicts, characters, and ideas.

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Questions

Plot and Sequence (Questions 1-8)

1. (Multiple Choice) What event directly causes Jane to pivot from novel writing to pitching a television show?

  • A) Lenny's announcement that he wants to move to Tokyo
  • B) Her agent Honor calls from Germany to deliver editor Josiah's rejection of her novel, calling it "Frankensteinian"
  • C) Brett offers her a job as a writer on his new show
  • D) She receives a MacArthur Fellowship for creative writing

2. (Short Answer) In Chapter 11, Jane and Hampton brainstorm a sitcom based on Jane's family. What is the name of the fictional family in that sitcom?

3. (Multiple Choice) What happens when Jane visits the lawyer Tony to discuss suing Hampton Ford for stealing her novel?

  • A) Tony takes her case pro bono
  • B) Tony explains there is no paper trail and the theft is nearly impossible to prove
  • C) Tony immediately files a cease-and-desist order
  • D) Tony advises her to go public on social media

4. (Multiple Choice) After the family is forced to leave Brett's house, where do Jane and Lenny eventually find housing?

  • A) A cheap Burbank apartment
  • B) The Golden Eagle, a retirement community in Multicultural Mayberry
  • C) Their friend Priya's guest house
  • D) A renovated Craftsman they purchase

5. (Short Answer) In the epigraph, what comic strip character is the source of the quote "We have met the enemy and he is us"?

6. (Multiple Choice) During the all-night pitch session with Hampton, what drug does Jane take that helps her improvise a Labradoodle episode?

  • A) Marijuana
  • B) Percocet
  • C) Cocaine
  • D) LSD

7. (Multiple Choice) What is the name of the TV show that Hampton Ford creates, which closely copies Jane's novel?

  • A) The Bunches
  • B) Swirl
  • C) Hell Date
  • D) Nusu Nusu

8. (Short Answer) What object does Jane give Ruby for her eighth birthday, and why is Ruby disappointed?

Character Motivation (Questions 9-13)

9. (Multiple Choice) Why does Jane lie to Lenny about her TV work with Hampton Ford throughout the middle of the novel?

  • A) She wants to surprise him with a script she wrote about their marriage
  • B) She is ashamed of having abandoned her novel and fears his judgment
  • C) She is planning to leave him for Hampton
  • D) She wants to protect Lenny from the stress of knowing about Hollywood

10. (Short Answer) What does Lenny urge Jane to do after the incident where a white man confronts Finn in the hills, and how does Jane respond?

11. (Multiple Choice) Why does Jane contact Marianne Berkowitz, Brett's television agent, without Brett's knowledge?

  • A) She wants to pitch her own TV idea after her novel is rejected
  • B) She is trying to sabotage Brett's career
  • C) She is seeking advice on how to sell her novel
  • D) She wants to report Hampton for professional misconduct

12. (Multiple Choice) What motivates Lenny's strong push for the family to move to Tokyo?

  • A) He has a lucrative job offer there
  • B) He believes America's racism makes living there unbearable for his family
  • C) His parents live there
  • D) He wants to study Japanese calligraphy

13. (Short Answer) In the flashback to the couple's therapy camping trip to Joshua Tree, why does Jane sleep in the car rather than in the tent with Lenny?

Theme and Symbol (Questions 14-17)

14. (Multiple Choice) The "colored television" that Jane and Lenny watch (lowbrow Black programming like Hell Date) symbolizes which of the following?

  • A) Their shared desire for highbrow entertainment
  • B) A guilty pleasure that reveals their craving for unpolished, authentic Black stories
  • C) Their rejection of all television
  • D) Jane's childhood memories of watching TV with her mother

15. (Multiple Choice) What does the Labradoodle represent in the episode Jane pitches to Hampton?

  • A) The danger of exotic pets
  • B) A way for a Black man to appear less threatening and more domesticated to white society
  • C) A symbol of the perfect suburban family
  • D) The impossibility of owning a designer dog in a mixed-race household

16. (Short Answer) The essay by Professor Mischling (Cavendish) that Jane uses in her novel predicts the extinction of which group, comparing them to mules?

17. (Multiple Choice) What does the mirror dissociation scene in Chapter 6, when Jane cannot see her reflection in the staged house, symbolize?

  • A) Her feeling of being erased or invisible in a space she desires but does not own
  • B) Her literal blindness
  • C) A supernatural haunting
  • D) Her decision to become a television writer

Synthesis Questions (Questions 18-20)

18. (Multiple Choice) Which of the following best describes the novel's stance on the commodification of mixed-race identity in Hollywood?

  • A) It is presented as a positive opportunity for underrepresented voices
  • B) It is shown as exploitative, reducing complex identities to marketable tropes
  • C) The novel takes a neutral, ambivalent stance
  • D) It argues that mixed-race creators must embrace commodification to succeed

19. (Short Answer) In the final chapter, Jane watches Swirl in the retirement home common room and tries to convince the elderly ladies that the show is based on her stolen work. How do they respond, and what does this scene suggest about authorship and recognition?

20. (Multiple Choice) The novel begins with an epigraph from Pogo Possum ("We have met the enemy and he is us") and ends with Jane binge-watching Swirl, unable to separate her life from the televised copy. Together, these elements suggest which overarching theme?

  • A) External forces are always responsible for one's downfall
  • B) The greatest conflicts come from within, including self-deception and complicity in one's own exploitation
  • C) Television is a harmless escape
  • D) The American dream is universally attainable

Answer Key

Plot and Sequence

1. Answer: B) Her agent Honor calls from Germany to deliver editor Josiah's rejection of her novel, calling it "Frankensteinian."
Explanation: The devastating rejection in Chapter 7 pushes Jane to abandon her novel and email Marianne Berkowitz to pitch a TV idea, marking her pivot to television.

2. Answer: The Bunches
Explanation: In Chapter 11 (see retrieved evidence), the fictional sitcom family is called the Bunches. The main character Sally is based on Jane, Kyle on Lenny, and the children are Schuyler and Chester.

3. Answer: B) Tony explains there is no paper trail and the theft is nearly impossible to prove.
Explanation: In Chapter 21, the lawyer Tony tells Jane that without a paper trail—since she wrote her episode ideas by hand and pitched them orally—she cannot prove Hampton had access to her ideas, and he advises against suing.

4. Answer: B) The Golden Eagle, a retirement community in Multicultural Mayberry.
Explanation: In Chapter 20, after house-hunting, Jane breaks down at the Golden Eagle retirement community and manager Renata offers them a vacant unit. They later move in there.

5. Answer: Pogo Possum
Explanation: The epigraph in Chapter 1 is a quote from the comic strip character Pogo Possum, setting up themes of internal conflict and self-confrontation.

6. Answer: B) Percocet
Explanation: In Chapter 13, Hampton offers Percocet ("perkies") to the group. After taking it, Jane improvises the Labradoodle episode that Hampton loves.

7. Answer: B) Swirl
Explanation: In Chapter 21, Brett shows Jane the series bible for Swirl, a show by Hampton Ford that closely copies her novel. In Chapter 22, Jane watches Swirl and recognizes her stolen stories.

8. Answer: Jane buys Ruby an American Girl doll named Addy Walker, a Black former slave. Ruby is disappointed because she will only ever have this one doll and cannot collect more, unlike her friends.
Explanation: In Chapter 5, Ruby cries in her bedroom, revealing that the invited girls are not her real friends and that she feels limited by the single, historical doll.

Character Motivation

9. Answer: B) She is ashamed of having abandoned her novel and fears his judgment.
Explanation: Throughout the middle chapters, Jane repeatedly hides her TV work from Lenny, lying that her meetings with Hampton are research for her novel. She knows Lenny values artistic integrity and would disapprove.

10. Answer: Lenny urges Jane to leave the country (presumably move to Tokyo). Jane pretends to sleep and does not respond.
Explanation: In Chapter 15, after telling Jane about the unsettling confrontation, Lenny pushes for emigration, but Jane feigns sleep to avoid the conversation.

11. Answer: A) She wants to pitch her own TV idea after her novel is rejected.
Explanation: In Chapter 7, after Josiah's rejection, Jane emails Marianne without Brett's knowledge to pitch a TV show, driven by desperation and jealousy over Brett's success.

12. Answer: B) He believes America's racism makes living there unbearable for his family.
Explanation: Lenny repeatedly cites racism—from the Finn confrontation to general systemic bias—as his reason for wanting to move to Tokyo, where he feels his family could be safer.

13. Answer: Jane is uncomfortable with the outdoors; the text suggests she is too uncomfortable to stay in the tent, so she sleeps in the car.
Explanation: Chapter 14 includes a flashback to the disastrous trip where Jane's discomfort (and perhaps racial speculation on body temperature, as mentioned in the outline) leads her to sleep in the car.

Theme and Symbol

14. Answer: B) A guilty pleasure that reveals their craving for unpolished, authentic Black stories.
Explanation: In Chapter 2, the couple watches Hell Date and "colored television" as a dirty pleasure, seeking moments of truth rather than teachable moments.

15. Answer: B) A way for a Black man to appear less threatening and more domesticated to white society.
Explanation: In Chapter 13, Jane pitches that the Labradoodle transforms Kyle from a perceived "perp" into a family man. The dog functions as a "canine version of a fluffy-haired biracial child"—making the Black man seem soft.

16. Answer: The mulatto (or mixed-race people)
Explanation: In Chapter 21, Cavendish's essay predicts the mulatto will become extinct, comparing them to mules, a symbol of barrenness and liminality.

17. Answer: A) Her feeling of being erased or invisible in a space she desires but does not own.
Explanation: In Chapter 6, Jane experiences a moment of dissociation when she cannot see her reflection in a mirror in the staged house, reflecting her alienation from the idealized domestic space she cannot afford.

Synthesis Questions

18. Answer: B) It is shown as exploitative, reducing complex identities to marketable tropes.
Explanation: Throughout the novel, Hampton Ford pushes Jane to emphasize the "biracial" angle, pitches are dismissed unless they hit racial notes, and his show Swirl commodifies Jane's lived experience. The novel critiques the industry's exploitation of mixed-race identity.

19. Answer: The old ladies dismiss her claim of authorship and turn back to the show. This scene suggests that authorship is invisible to consumers, and that recognition depends on power and visibility, not truth.
Explanation: In Chapter 22, when Jane tries to explain that the show stole her story, the elderly women ignore her and continue watching. The scene underscores the theme of erasure and the gap between creation and credit.

20. Answer: B) The greatest conflicts come from within, including self-deception and complicity in one's own exploitation.
Explanation: The epigraph primes readers to see the enemy as internal. By the end, Jane has participated in her own commodification, lied repeatedly, and ends up binge-watching the show that stole from her, unable to separate her life from the copy—suggesting she is complicit in her own erasure.

Want to explore more? Check out our comprehensive guide to Colored Television, discussion of the ending, or frequently asked questions.