the iron house - 2023 ACF Nationals

Question

The narrator of an essay constructs a metaphor about this place to explain why he spends his time copying politically inoffensive ancient inscriptions instead of writing. For 10 points each:

[10h] Identify this indestructible, windowless, metaphorical place described in the preface to a story collection. It is the subject of a dilemma in which you could let its sleeping residents suffocate painlessly or shout to wake them up to an agonizing death.

ANSWER: the iron house [or the iron room; or tiě wū; prompt on house or room or wū]

[10e] This writer compared China’s “spiritual malaise” to an iron house in Call to Arms, which includes this author’s “The True Story of Ah Q.”

ANSWER: Lǔ Xùn (“loo shwin”) [or Lu Hsün; or Lu Sun; or Zhōu Shùrén or Chou Shu-jen]

[10m] Ah Q is arrested despite failing to become a revolutionary and asked to sign his confession with one of these things, but he is mortified by not drawing this thing perfectly.

ANSWER: a circle [or yuánquān; reject “sphere”; prompt on shape]

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Summary


2023 ACF Nationals	04/22/2023	Y	22	19.09	100%	73%	18%

Data


Duke A	Illinois A	0	10	0	10
Brown A	Georgia Tech B	0	10	10	20
Ohio State A	WUSTL B	10	10	10	30
Rutgers A	Minnesota A	0	10	10	20
McGill A	Rutgers B	0	10	10	20
WUSTL A	Purdue A	0	10	10	20
Chicago A	Vanderbilt A	10	10	10	30
Cornell A	Chicago B	0	10	10	20
Northwestern A	Cornell B	0	10	0	10
Florida B	Michigan A	0	10	0	10
UC Berkeley B	Texas A	0	10	10	20
Yale B	Indiana A	0	10	0	10
Yale A	Columbia A	10	10	10	30
Columbia B	Toronto A	0	10	0	10
Chicago C	Georgia Tech A	0	10	10	20
UC Berkeley A	Iowa State A	0	10	10	20
Penn A	Maryland A	0	10	10	20
MIT A	Penn State A	10	10	10	30
Stanford A	NYU A	0	10	10	20
Claremont A	Minnesota B	0	10	10	20
Harvard A	Houston A	0	10	10	20
Virginia A	North Carolina A	0	10	0	10