This test also appears in my paperback book titled 30+ Brain-Exercising Creative Coach Businesses to Open: How to Use Writing, Music, Drama & Art Therapy Techniques for Healing, Anne Hart, M.A. ASJA Press, Jan. 2007. (Reprinted with author's permission--I'm the author).

CREATIVE WRITING EMPLOYMENT PERSONALITY PREFERENCE ASSESSMENT
If you’re an expressive arts therapist—creative writing, bibliotherapy, dance, drama, art, music, movement…you are “tech support” specializing in behavior, critical thinking, emotional response, actions, and reactions in relation to various personality preferences, attitudes, traits, and aptitudes. If you’re a writing coach or a coach-consultant in any of the arts, your clients call you when they have problems with their product or manuscript. You can work face-to-face or online or through interactive multimedia correspondence.

You spend your day talking to professionals that ask you to solve problems or resolve conflicts in a tangible object—a script, music score, or design. As a therapist, your “tech support” role emphasizes behavior. Sometimes the behavior and the product are one.

If you talk to people having a bad day, will you have a bad day, too? Here’s one sample of my creative writing preference and aptitude classifier assessments to take yourself and to offer to your clients. Design your own to fit your particular requirements as a coach, consultant, or therapist.

Take the “Howling Wolf’s Scribe” Creative Writing Preference Classifier
©2007 by Anne Hart

Are you best-suited to be a digital interactive or ethnographic story writer, a nonfiction writer, or a mystery writer using historic themes? Do you think like a fiction writer? Take the writing style preference classifier and find out how you approach your favorite writing style using Zabeyko’s facts and acts.

Which genre is for you--interactive, traditional, creative nonfiction, fiction, decisive or investigative? Would you rather write for readers that need to interact with their own story endings or plot branches? Which style best fits you? What’s your writing profile?

Take this ancient echoes writing genre interest classifier and see the various ways in which way you can be more creative. Do you prefer to write investigative, logical nonfiction or imaginative fiction—or a mixture of both? There are 35 questions—seven questions for each of the five pairs. There are 10 choices.

The Choices:

Grounded Verve
Rational Enthusiastic
Decisive Investigative
Loner Outgoing
Traditional Change-Driven

Writer's Creativity Style Preference Classifier

Use the clues to inspire your own creativity in writing historic or mystery fiction. You are a mystery writer working on an interactive audio book of stories with clues for the Web about a scribe and music composer prodigy, Zabeyko, who lives and works in Wolkowysk (Howling Wolf), White Russia (now Belarus) near Bialystok of 1812, in the ancient Grodno province the time Napoleon visited. Zabeyko’s father, Kutkowski, has unending adventures trying to track down the person who gifted the multi-lingual musical prodigy child, Zabeyko, with a golden scholarship to study musical performance far away in Venice.

Zabeyko, son of a Tatar prince, is the young, adopted son of the famous Baltic wolf tamer, Polotskay Kutkowski. Surrounding the area is a forest known historically for its howling wolves. In Kutkowski’s gentle hands, the wolves sing opera as they stand on the rooftops of light-reflecting gingerbread-type houses in the midst of snowy winters and, tall, fresh-scented pine trees.

It’s December, and the holidays are being celebrated among Wolkowysk’s diverse and expanding population. The nation has just fallen back again under Russian rule.
When music prodigy, Zabeyko mysteriously disappears from his music tutor, Azarello, in Vienna when he was supposed to be studying music with that tutor in Venice, you as the mystery writer and scribe are in a race against time to save Zabeyko’s teenaged fiancée, Jadwiga, from being forced into an unwilling marriage with Zabeyko’s first childhood music tutor and male nanny, Jagello of the Zamkover forest. Jagello told Zabyeko’s father that his son, probably murdered by river bandits, is buried in Vienna on lands owned by the music tutor from Venice who has fled to family in Vienna.

You are hired as the scribe and investigator, much like an early investigative journalist who must follow clues and solve the mystery for his step father, Polotskay Kutkowski. But there is another famous wolf tamer in town. Your ‘avatar’name is Efrosinia.

It is Jagello, who owns a competing traveling circus. Both Kutkowski and Jagello are wealthy land owners who compete in their circus acts, and both own equally prosperous traveling circuses.

Jagello is determined to become the greatest wolf tamer of them all in his traveling circus by marrying the wealthy Jadwiga. How will you write this interactive story, according to your writing style preferences?

Clues

The leading character is Napoleon’s greatest enemy of the howling wolf forest, a wise, older woman, Efrosinia, the scribe and healer who knows exactly which plants will heal and nurse the villagers back to health. Efrosinia, the scribe and healer is rightly named after Efrosinia Polatskaya, a patron saint (who took a new name, Pradslava) of the land now called Belarus. You are now Efrosinia.

As a leading character, Efrosinia is a woman of 1812 fortunate enough to have inherited wealth from an ancestral line of architects. She grew up as a friend to the Kutkowski extended family. This character, Efrosinia, is your alter ego and takes on your own personality as she solves problems or crimes using her healing touch.

1. To write your story, would you prefer to
a. go to the Belarus archives in order to have translated two letters sent by Zabeyko’s teenage fiancée, Jadwiga to the 1812 ruler of Wolkowysk asking to send her a new fiancé (down-to-earth) or
b. dig deeper and find out the connections between the two documents, reading fear between the lines and noting the reluctance Zabeyko’s fiancée expresses in being forced to marry her servant, the tutor, Jagello? (verve)
a. □
b. □
2. Would you be more interested in researching history and writing about
a. the closeness or distance of the relationships that surfaced between the Belarus farmers, Baltic Lithuanians, Russians, and the Poles (enthusiastic) or
b. analyze the business deals and diplomatic events between these equal powers to see who was winning the race to becoming the superpower of the century? (rational)
a. □
b. □

3. Are you more interested in the fact that
a. Zabeyko’s teenage fiancée, Jadwiga wrote all her letters in Swedish, not in the Belarus (White Russian) dialect (down-to-earth) or
b. Zabeyko’s father, Polotskay Kutkowski, was so hated after his death because he worshipped the spirits inhabiting pine trees, that his face was scratched off all his monuments and wall friezes in his traveling circus? (verve)
a. □
b. □

4. Would you rather write about
a. Zabeyko being adopted, sent as a gift from a Tatar trader during his step father's festival celebrating the birth of his 12th son (enthusiastic) or
b. the mystery of why Zabeyko turned up “buried in Budapest” (never reaching Venice) near his music teacher’s land with both the Tatar horse amulet, a tamga, on his neck and a cobra twisted into music notes on his headstone? (rational)?
a. □
b. □

5. You are Jadwiga. Would you rather
a. exercise your right as a fiancée to claim Zabeyko's unmarried Tatar brother, Prince Atil (enthusiastic) or
b. marry Zabeyko's male nanny, Jagello because it's only right and fair to restore a Tatar prince in hiding from his throne even while he dwells in Wolkowysk, as he works with equally brilliant Jadwiga? (rational)
a. □
b. □
6. Zabeyko's fiancée wrote to her father-in-law to send her another of his sons for marriage to her. As a writer of her life story, would you rather
a. create a laundry list of princes either Tatar, Russian, Polish, Lithuanian, or of Wolkowysk, that she must interview and screen in a dating game (down-to-earth) or
b. create a story where she rides 1,000 miles across the forests and steppes to run away from Zabeyko’s tutor, Jagello after he forces her to marry him. Finding herself childless, she then studies design disguised as a 14-year old boy. But growing wiser and older, she travels in disguise along the Silk Road to study architecture where she meets her true soul mate and business partner. (verve)
a. □
b. □
7. Are you more interested in ending your story with
a. Jagello marrying Zabeyko's fiancée, Jadwiga, then quickly getting rid of Jadwiga as Jagello marries Zabeyko’s adoptive grand mother, Pradislava, for her land and property as his second wife, so that you have closure and an ending for your story (decisive) or
b. would you rather let your story remain open for serialization, since Zabeyko's fiancée is never heard from again and disappears just like Zabeyko did after Jagello marries her and then marries his adoptive grandmother, Pradislava. The fate of Zabeyko’s fiancée after marrying Zabeyko’s tutor, Jagello is not recorded in history. (investigative)
a. □
b. □
8. If you were a Tatar prince living in a foreign land, would you prefer to
a. decide immediately to obey the diverse European nobles of Wolkowysk and leave Tataristan to marry Jadwiga of the howling wolf forests because duty required it, knowing you'll probably be killed when you arrive by the same person who killed Zabeyko, (decisive) or
b. stall for time as long as possible, waiting for validated information to arrive regarding the diplomatic climate between Tatars and Russians? (investigative).
a. □
b. □
9. You are Zabeyko, a Tatar prince adopted in infancy by a wealthy Belarus owner of many traveling circus acts. You have been given as a gift from the Tatar king to the Baltic Tribes because his wife had six daughters and no sons. If you were Zabeyko, would you
a. speak in the Tatar tongue in front of your Slavic tutor, thereby possibly inflaming the nationalism in him (investigative) or
b. plan and organize methodically to have a whole line of people close to you from your own Tataristan rather than from the Slavic lands in which you were raised?
(decisive)
a. □
b. □
10. Would you rather write about
a. terms of the treaty between Tatars and the Slavs based on the facts provided by records (down-to-earth) or
b. the theories set in motion when Jagello marries Jadwiga and soon after, she disappears, just like her financee, Zabeyko, and Jabello then marries Zabeyko’s mother? (verve)
a. □
b. □
11. Do you like writing about
a. enigmas or puzzles set in motion by symbols on intimate funerary equipment in a mystery novel (rational) or
b. why no other Tatar royalty emblem after Zabeyko’s life span ever again appeared on a medallion with a horse tamga inscribed in scrimshaw ivory with a vulture? (enthusiastic)
a. □
b. □
12. A tag line shows the mood/emotion in the voice--how a character speaks or acts. Are you more interested in
a. compiling, counting, and indexing citations or quotes from how-to books for writers (down-to-earth) or
b. compiling tag lines that explain in fiction dialogue the specific behaviors or gestures such as, “Yes, he replied timorously.”? (verve)
a. □
b. □
13. Would you rather write
a. dialog (enthusiastic) or
b. description? (rational)
a. □
b. □
14. To publicize your writing, would you rather
a. give spectacular presentations or shows without preparation or prior notice (investigative) or
b. have to prepare a long time in advance to speak or perform? (decisive)
a. □
b. □
15. If you were Jadwiga, would you prefer to
a. receive warnings well in advance and without surprises that Jagello is planning to get rid of you and marry your would-be mother-in-law (adoptive grandmother of Zabeyko) so you could conveniently disappear (decisive) or
b. adapt to last-moment changes by never getting down to your last man or your last coin? (investigative)
a. □
b. □
16. As a scribe, artist, and poet in Wolkowysk when Napoleon visited, would you
a. feel constrained by Zabeyko's time schedules and deadlines (investigative) or
b. set realistic timetables and juggle priorities? (decisive)
a. □
b. □
17. As Zabeyko's widow, do you feel bound to
a. go with social custom, do the activities itemized on the social calendar, and
marry your dead husband's unmarried brother because it's organized according to a plan (decisive) or
b. go with the flow of the relationship, deal with issues as they arise, make no commitments or assumptions about what's the right thing to do because time changes plans? (investigative)
a. □
b. □
18. You're the Tatar prince reading Jadwiga’s,
desperate letter. Is your reply to Jadwiga more likely to be
a. one brief, concise, and to the point letter (rational) or
b. one sociable, friendly, empathetic and time-consuming letter? (enthusiastic)
a. □
b. □
19. You're the Tatar prince and music prodigy, Zabeyko, adopted and re-named by Belarus step-parents. You’re contemplating who wants more to replace you with a local noble. You make a list of
a. the pros and cons of each person close to you (rational) or
b. varied comments from friends and relatives on what they say behind your back regarding how your influence them and what they want from you. (enthusiastic)
a. □
b. □
20. You're the scribe trying to solve Zabeyko's murder in Vienna when he was supposed to be studying music in Venice. Would you rather investigate
a. the tried and true facts about Jagello (down-to-earth) or
b. want to see what's in the overall picture before you fill in the clues? (verve)
a. □
b. □
21. You’re a scribe painting Zabeyko's tomb shortly after his demise and you
a. seldom make errors of detail when looking for clues such as taking notice of Jagello’s wedding present to the young, healthy Jadwiga--her freshly inscribed coffin. (down-to-earth) or
b. prefer more innovative work like writing secret love poems to Jadwiga disguised as prayers and watching for Zabeyko's ghost to escape through the eight-inch square hole you cut in his headstone. (verve)
a. □
b. □
22. As a scribe in 1812 Wolkowysk, you become
a. tired when you work alone all day in a dimly torchlit room (outgoing) or
b. tired when Zabeyko interrupts your concentration on your work to demand that you greet and entertain his guests all evening at banquets. (loner).
a. □
b. □
23. When Jadwiga asks you as a scribe to write love poems for her that she can send to Zabeyko, you
a. create the ideas for your poems by long discussions with her (outgoing) or
b. prefer to be alone when you reach deep down inside your spirit to listen to what your soul entities tell you as the only resource for writing metaphors. (loner)
a. □
b. □
24. You travel to Venice and Vienna investigating the death of Zabeyko and prefer to
a. question many different foreigners and locals at boisterous celebrations in different languages (outgoing) or
b. disregard outside events and look inside the family history/genealogy inscriptions for the culprit. (loner)
a. □
b. □
25. Zabeyko, at age nine asks you to develop ideas for him about how to act when writing music. You prefer to develop ideas through
a. reflection, meditation, and prayer (loner) or
b. discussions and interviews among Zabeyko’s playmates on what makes Zabeyko laugh. (outgoing)
a. □
b. □
26. As a scribe you are
a. rarely cautious about the family position of those with whom you socialize as long as they are kind, righteous people who do good deeds (outgoing) or
b. seeking one person with power to raise you from scribe to noble, if only the richest noble in Wolkowysk would ask your advice. (loner)
a. □
b. □
27. You are a designer and builder of palaces. A rich noble asks you to carve a name for yourself on his palace door that's a special representation of its builder. Would you
a. inscribe the word that means ‘remote’ (loner) or
b. choose a special name for yourself that means, “He who shares time easily with many foreigners?” (outgoing)
a. □
b. □
28. As an early 19th century scribe, do you work better when you
a. spend your day off daydreaming where no one can see you (loner) or
b. spend your free time training teams of apprentice scribes? (outgoing)
a. □
b. □
29. If you discovered a new land, would you build your cities upon
a. your wise elders’ principles as they always have worked well before (traditional) or
b. unfamiliar cargo that traders brought from afar? (change-driven)
a.□
b.□
30. Do you depict your ruler’s victories on a stone column exactly as
a. surviving witnesses from both sides recounted the events (change-driven) or
b. only the ruler wants people to see? (traditional)
a.□
b.□
31. If you’re self-motivated, would you avoid learning from your overseer because
a. your overseer doesn’t keep up with the times (change-driven) or
b. your overseer doesn’t let you follow in your father’s footsteps? (traditional)
a.□
b.□
32. Would you prefer to
a. train scribes because your father taught you how to do it well (traditional) or
b. move quickly from one project to another forever? (change-driven)
a.□
b.□
33. Do you feel like an outsider when
a. you think more about the future than about current chores (change-driven) or
b. invaders replace your forefathers’ familiar foods with unfamiliar cuisine? (traditional)
a.□
b.□
34. Do you quickly
a. solve problems for those inside when you’re coming from outside (change-driven) or
b. refuse to spend your treasures to develop new ideas that might fail? (traditional)
a.□
b.□
35. Would you rather listen to and learn from philosophers that
a. predict a future in which old habits are replaced with new ones (change-driven) or
b. are only interested in experiencing one day at a time? (traditional)
a.□
b.□
Self-Scoring the Test
Add up the number of answers for each of the following ten writing style traits for the 36 questions. There are seven questions for each group. The ten categories are made up of five opposite pairs.
Down-to-earth Verve
Rational Enthusiastic
Decisive Investigative
Loner Outgoing
Traditional Change-Driven
Then put the numbers for each answer next to the categories. See the same self-scored test and results below.
1. Total Down-to-earth 6. Total Verve
2. Total Rational 7. Total Enthusiastic
3. Total Decisive 8. Total Investigative
4. Total Loner 9. Total Outgoing
5. Total Traditional 10. Total Change-Driven
To get your score, you’re only adding up the number of answers for each of the 10 categories (five pairs) above. See the sample self-scored test below. Note that there are seven questions for each of the five pairs (or 10 designations). There are 35 questions. Seven questions times five categories equal 35 questions. Keep the number of questions you design for each category equal.

***

Here is a Sample Self-Scored Assessment with Answers
Take the “Howling Wolf’s Scribe” Creative Writing Preference Classifier
©2007 by Anne Hart

Are you best-suited to be a digital interactive or ethnographic story writer, a nonfiction writer, or a mystery writer using historic themes? Do you think like a fiction writer? Take the writing style preference classifier and find out how you approach your favorite writing style using Zabeyko’s facts and acts.

Which genre is for you--interactive, traditional, creative nonfiction, fiction, decisive or investigative? Would you rather write for readers that need to interact with their own story endings or plot branches? Which style best fits you? What’s your writing profile?

Take this ancient echoes writing genre interest classifier and see the various ways in which way you can be more creative. Do you prefer to write investigative, logical nonfiction or imaginative fiction—or a mixture of both? There are 35 questions—seven questions for each of the five pairs. There are 10 choices.

The 10 Choices:
The Choices:
Grounded Verve
Rational Enthusiastic
Decisive Investigative
Loner Outgoing
Traditional Change-Driven

Sample Scores

Total Down-to-earth 0 Total Verve 5
Total Rational 0 Total Enthusiastic 7
Total Decisive 0 Total Investigative 7
Total Loner 4 Total Outgoing 3
Total Traditional 2 Total Change-Driven 5

In the already self-scored sample assessment that follows, the four highest numbers of answers are enthusiastic, investigative, imaginative loner. Choose the highest numbers first as having the most importance (or weight) in your writing style preference. Therefore, your own creative writing style and the way you plot your character’s actions, interests, and goals (for fiction writing and specifically mystery writing) is an enthusiastic investigative vivacious (verve-with-imagination) loner. Your five personality letters would be: E I V L C. (Scramble the letters to make a word to remember, the name Clive, in this case.)

Note that there is a tie between C and V. Both have a score of ‘5’. However, since ‘V’ (verve) which signifies vivacious imagination with gusto competes with ‘C’ being change-driven, the ‘verve’ in the vivacious personality wracked with creative imagination would wither in a traditional corporation that emphasizes routinely running a tight ship. Traditional firms seek to imitate successful corporations of the past that worked well and still work. They don’t need to be fixed often unless they make noise.

Instead, the dominantly change-driven creative individual would flourish better with a forward-looking, trend-setting creative corporation and build security from flexibility of job skill. When in doubt, turn to action verbs to communicate your ‘drive.’ If you’re misplaced, you won’t connect as well with co-workers and may be dubbed “a loose canon.”

You know you’re in the right job when your personality connects with the group to share meaning. Communication is the best indicator of your personality matching a corporation’s character traits. It’s all about connecting more easily.
Your main character or alter-ego could probably be an enthusiastic investigative imaginative loner. But you’d not only have lots of imagination and creativity—but also verve, that vivacious gusto. You’d have fervor, dash, and élan.

The easily excitable, investigative, creative/imaginative loner described as having verve, is more likely to represent what you feel inside your core personality, your self-insight, as you explore your own values and interests.

It’s what you feel like, what your values represent on this test at this moment in time. That’s how a lot of personality tests work. This one is customized for fiction writers. Another test could be tailored for career area interests or for analyzing what stresses you. Think of your personality as your virtues.

Qualities on this customized test that are inherent in the test taker who projects his or her values and personality traits onto the characters would represent more of a sentimental, charismatic, imaginative, investigative individual who likes to work alone most of the time.

The person could at times be more change-driven than traditional. The real test is whether the test taker is consistent about these traits or values on many different assessments of interests, personality, or values.

What’s being tested here is imaginative fiction writing style. Writing has a personality, genre, or character of its own. The writing style and values are revealed in the way the characters drive the plot.

These sample test scores measure the preference, interest, and trait of the writer. The tone and mood are measured in this test. It’s a way of sharing meaning, of communicating by driving the characters and the plot in a selected direction.
This assessment ‘score’ reveals a fiction writer who is enthusiastically investigative in tone, mood, and texture. These ‘traits’ or values apply to the writer as well as to the primary characters in the story.

The traits driving a writer’s creativity also drive the main characters. Writer and characters work in a partnership of alter egos to move the plot forward. A creativity test lets you select and express the action, attitudes, and values of the story in a world that you shape according to clues, critical thinking, and personal likes. Below you’ll see the definitions of the 10 key word choices in this assessment followed by the sample assessment that already is self-scored.

***
Definitions of the 10 Key Words

Change-Driven Visionary and forward-looking.
Decisive Choices based upon feedback and avoiding blind spots
Enthusiastic Charismatic and passionate
Grounded Reality-based and driven by hindsight and pitfalls
Investigative Vigilant
Loner Inner-directed
Outgoing Energized by spoken communication and touch
Traditional Imitating and following successful giants whose plans work
Rational Logical and critical thinker
Verve Imagination based on the big picture, and not small details.

Here’s the Sample Self-Scored Assessment

1. To write your story, would you prefer to
a. go to the Belarus archives in order to have translated two letters sent by Zabeyko’s teenage fiancée, Jadwiga to the 1812 ruler of Wolkowysk asking to send her a new fiancé (down-to-earth) or
b. dig deeper and find out the connections between the two documents, reading fear between the lines and noting the reluctance Zabeyko’s fiancée expresses in being forced to marry her servant, the tutor, Jagello? (verve)
a. □
b. ■
2. Would you be more interested in researching history and writing about
a. the closeness or distance of the relationships that surfaced between the Belarus farmers, Baltic Lithuanians, Russians, and the Poles (enthusiastic) or
b. analyze the business deals and diplomatic events between these equal powers to see who was winning the race to becoming the superpower of the century? (rational)
a. ■
b. □
3. Are you more interested in the fact that
a. Zabeyko’s teenage fiancée, Jadwiga wrote all her letters in Swedish, not in the Belarus (White Russian) dialect (down-to-earth) or
b. Zabeyko’s father, Polotskay Kutkowski, was so hated after his death because he worshipped the spirits inhabiting pine trees, that his face was scratched off all his monuments and wall friezes in his traveling circus? (verve)
a. □
b. ■
4. Would you rather write about
a. Zabeyko being adopted, sent as a gift from a Tatar trader during his step father's festival celebrating the birth of his 12th son (enthusiastic) or
b. the mystery of why Zabeyko turned up “buried in Budapest” (never reaching Venice) near his music teacher’s land with both the Tatar horse amulet, a tamga, on his neck and a cobra twisted into music notes on his headstone? (rational)?
a. ■
b. □
5. You are Jadwiga. Would you rather
a. exercise your right as a fiancée to claim Zabeyko's unmarried Tatar brother, Prince Atil (enthusiastic) or
b. marry Zabeyko's male nanny, Jagello because it's only right and fair to restore a Tatar prince in hiding from his throne even while he dwells in Wolkowysk, the foreign land that has invited him for his brilliance in architecture as he works along with equally brilliant and beautiful Jadwiga? (rational)
a. ■
b. □
6. Zabeyko's fiancée wrote to her father-in-law to send her another of his sons for marriage to her. As a writer of her life story, would you rather
a. create a laundry list of princes either Tatar, Russian, Polish, Lithuanian, or of Wolkowysk, that she must interview and screen in a dating game (down-to-earth) or
b. create a story where she rides 1,000 miles across the forests and steppes to run away from Zabeyko’s tutor, Jagello after he forces her to marry him. Finding herself childless, she then studies design disguised as a 14-year old boy. But growing wiser and older, she travels in disguise along the Silk Road to study architecture where she meets her true soul mate and business partner. (verve)
a. □
b. ■
7. Are you more interested in ending your story with
a. Jagello marrying Zabeyko's fiancée, Jadwiga, then quickly getting rid of Jadwiga as Jagello marries Zabeyko’s adoptive grand mother, Pradislava, for her land and property.as his second wife, so that you have closure and an ending for your story (decisive) or
b. would you rather let your story remain open for serialization, since Zabeyko's fiancée is never heard from again and disappears just like Zabeyko did after Jagello marries her and then marries his adoptive grandmother, Pradislava. The fate of Zabeyko’s fiancée after marrying Zabeyko’s tutor, Jagello is not recorded in history. (investigative)
a. □
b. ■
8. If you were a Tatar prince living in a foreign land, would you prefer to
a. decide immediately to obey the diverse European nobles of Wolkowysk and leave Tataristan to marry Jadwiga of the howling wolf forests because duty required it, knowing you'll probably be killed when you arrive by the same person who killed Zabeyko, (decisive) or
b. stall for time as long as possible, waiting for validated information to arrive regarding the diplomatic climate between Tatars and Russians? (investigative).
a. □
b. ■
9. You are Zabeyko, a Tatar prince adopted in infancy by a wealthy Belarus owner of many traveling circus acts. You have been given as a gift from the Tatar king to the Baltic Tribes because his wife had six daughters and no sons. If you were Zabeyko, would you
a. speak in the Tatar tongue in front of your Slavic tutor, thereby possibly inflaming the nationalism in him (investigative) or
b. plan and organize methodically to have a whole line of people close to you from your own Tataristan rather than from the Slavic lands in which you were raised?
(decisive)
a. ■
b. □
10. Would you rather write about
a. terms of the treaty between Tatars and the Slavs based on the facts provided by records (down-to-earth) or
b. the theories set in motion when Jagello marries Jadwiga and soon after, she disappears, just like her financee, Zabeyko, and Jabello then marries Zabeyko’s mother? (verve)
a. □
b. ■
11. Do you like writing about
a. enigmas or puzzles set in motion by symbols on intimate funerary equipment in a mystery novel (rational) or
b. why no other Tatar royalty emblem after Zabeyko’s life span ever again appeared on a medallion with a horse tamga inscribed in scrimshaw ivory with a vulture? (enthusiastic)
a. □
b. ■
12. A tag line shows the mood/emotion in the voice--how a character speaks or acts. Are you more interested in
a. compiling, counting, and indexing citations or quotes from how-to books for writers (down-to-earth) or
b. compiling tag lines that explain in fiction dialogue the specific behaviors or gestures such as, “Yes, he replied timorously.”? (verve)
a. □
b. ■
13. Would you rather write
a. dialog (enthusiastic) or
b. description? (rational)
a. ■
b. □
14. To publicize your writing, would you rather
a. give spectacular presentations or shows without preparation or prior notice (investigative) or
b. have to prepare a long time in advance to speak or perform? (decisive)
a. ■
b. □
15. If you were Jadwiga, would you prefer to
a. receive warnings well in advance and without surprises that Jagello is planning to get rid of you and marry your would-be mother-in-law (adoptive grandmother of Zabeyko) so you could conveniently disappear (decisive) or
b. adapt to last-moment changes by never getting down to your last man or your last coin? (investigative)
a. □
b. ■
16. As a scribe, artist, and poet in Wolkowysk when Napoleon visited, would you
a. feel constrained by Zabeyko's time schedules and deadlines (investigative) or
b. set realistic timetables and juggle priorities? (decisive)
a. ■
b. □
17. As Zabeyko's widow, do you feel bound to
a. go with social custom, do the activities itemized on the social calendar, and marry your dead husband's unmarried
brother because it's organized according to a plan (decisive) or
b. go with the flow of the relationship, deal with issues as they arise, make no commitments or assumptions about what's the right thing to do because time changes plans? (investigative)
a. □
b. ■
18. You're the Tatar prince reading Jadwiga’s,
desperate letter. Is your reply to Jadwiga more likely to be
a. one brief, concise, and to the point letter (rational) or
b. one sociable, friendly, empathetic and time-consuming letter? (enthusiastic)
a. □
b. ■
19. You're the Tatar prince and music prodigy, Zabeyko, adopted and re-named by Belarus step-parents. You’re contemplating who wants more to replace you with a local noble. You make a list of
a. the pros and cons of each person close to you (rational) or
b. varied comments from friends and relatives on what they say behind your back regarding how your influence them and what they want from you. (enthusiastic)
a. □
b. ■
20. You're the scribe trying to solve Zabeyko's murder in Vienna when he was supposed to be studying music in Venice. Would you rather investigate
a. the tried and true facts about Jagello (down-to-earth) or
b. want to see what's in the overall picture before you fill in the clues? (verve)
a. □
b. ■
21. You’re a scribe painting Zabeyko's tomb shortly after his demise and you
a. seldom make errors of detail when looking for clues such as taking notice of Jagello’s wedding present to the young, healthy Jadwiga--her freshly inscribed coffin. (down-to-earth) or
b. prefer more innovative work like writing secret love poems to Jadwiga disguised as prayers and watching for Zabeyko's ghost to escape through the eight-inch square hole you cut in his headstone. (verve)
a. □
b. ■
22. As a scribe in 1812 Wolkowysk, you become
a. tired when you work alone all day in a dimly torchlit room (outgoing) or
b. tired when Zabeyko interrupts your concentration on your work to demand that you greet and entertain his guests all evening at banquets. (loner).
a. □
b. ■
23. When Jadwiga asks you as a scribe to write love poems for her that she can send to Zabeyko, you
a. create the ideas for your poems by long discussions with her (outgoing) or
b. prefer to be alone when you reach deep down inside your spirit to listen to what your soul entities tell you as the only resource for writing metaphors. (loner)
a. □
b. ■
24. You travel to Venice and Vienna investigating the death of Zabeyko and prefer to
a. question many different foreigners and locals at boisterous celebrations in different languages (outgoing) or
b. disregard outside events and look inside the family history/genealogy inscriptions for the culprit. (loner)
a. □
b. ■
25. Zabeyko, at age nine asks you to develop ideas for him about how to act when writing music. You prefer to develop ideas through
a. reflection, meditation, and prayer (loner) or
b. discussions and interviews among Zabeyko’s playmates on what makes Zabeyko laugh. (outgoing)
a. □
b. ■
26. As a scribe you are
a. rarely cautious about the family position of those with whom you socialize as long as they are kind, righteous people who do good deeds (outgoing) or
b. seeking one person with power to raise you from scribe to noble, if only the richest noble in Wolkowysk would ask your advice. (loner)
a. ■
b. □
27. You are a designer and builder of palaces. A rich noble asks you to carve a name for yourself on his palace door that's a special representation of its builder. Would you
a. inscribe the word that means ‘remote’ (loner) or
b. choose a special name for yourself that means, “He who shares time easily with many foreigners?” (outgoing)
a. □
b. ■

28. As an early 19th century scribe, do you work better when you
a. spend your day off daydreaming where no one can see you (loner) or
b. spend your free time training teams of apprentice scribes? (outgoing)
a. ■
b. □
29. If you discovered a new land, would you build your cities upon
a. your wise elders’ principles as they always have worked well before (traditional) or
b. unfamiliar cargo that traders brought from afar? (change-driven)
a. □
b. ■
30. Do you depict your ruler’s victories on a stone column exactly as
a. surviving witnesses from both sides recounted the events (change-driven) or
b. only the ruler wants people to see? (traditional)
a.□
b.■
31. If you’re self-motivated, would you avoid learning from your overseer because
a. your overseer doesn’t keep up with the times (change-driven) or
b. your overseer doesn’t let you follow in your father’s footsteps? (traditional)
a. ■
b. □
32. Would you prefer to
a. train scribes because your father taught you how to do it well (traditional) or
b. move quickly from one project to another forever? (change-driven)
a. □
b. ■
33. Do you feel like an outsider when
a. you think more about the future than about current chores (change-driven) or
b. invaders replace your forefathers’ familiar foods with unfamiliar cuisine? (traditional)
a. ■
b. □
34. Do you quickly
a. solve problems for those inside when you’re coming from outside (change-driven) or
b. refuse to spend your treasures to develop new ideas that might fail? (traditional)
a. ■
b. □
35. Would you rather listen to and learn from philosophers that
a. predict a future in which old habits are replaced with new ones (change-driven) or
b. are only interested in experiencing one day at a time? (traditional)
a. □
b. ■
© by: Anne Hart 2007
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