Magda

Rosa's daughter, Magda, is a nursing infant hidden in her mother's shawl at the beginning of the story, and a fifteen-month-old child when she is killed. Magda is the center of Rosa's existence: Rosa gives Magda most of her own food and focuses much of her energy on worrying about what might happen to Magda and on keeping the child alive. Magda learns as an infant not to cry when she is hungry; instead, she satisfies her hunger by suck­ing on the shawl. The shawl becomes the center of her existence, her" own baby, her pet, her little sister." She hides under it to keep from being discovered by the Nazis, sucks on it to satisfy her hunger, laughs at it as it blows in the wind. Magda does not cry until Stella takes her shawl away. Her cries then, as she walks out of the...