The Cage

Chapter 1

Reading Check

1. Her children (Chapter 1)

2. Her daughter (Chapter 1)

Short Answer

1. The first-person narrator toggles back and forth between the night’s terror and the day’s calm, which they experience in Camp Mittelsteine. The first-person narrator’s references to her nightmares of Nazi torture, in the following paragraphs, disrupt this sense of calm; a full night’s sleep “happens so very, very seldom.” (Chapter 1)

Chapters 2-4

Reading Check

1. Passover, or Pesach (Chapter 2)

2. The Grubers (Chapter 3)

Short Answer

1. In this section, we see Riva recognize that her mother would feel deep pain upon losing her, and so Riva harnesses her courage by remembering her mother’s strength as she persevered through the death of her father and son and remembering that she courageously sent her oldest children away to protect them. Like her mother, Riva adopts those around her (the young boy in the crowd, Abram). (Chapters 2-4)

Chapters 5-7

Reading Check

1. The Judenrat (Chapter 5)

2. Making braids from fabric scraps that will later become rugs for Germans (Chapter 7)

Short Answer

1. In September 1942, Nazis enter the ghetto to remove the sick, the old, and children.