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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What happens as Friedrich is eating?

2. What does Resch pick up?

3. What does Friedrich find when he comes back to his apartment?

4. What does the sergeant say about the Allies?

5. What does the narrator tell his mother about his activities?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is ironic about the prayer that Scholoime is reciting at his death?

2. What is foreshadowed in the first part of this chapter?

3. What is the narrator's ethical dilemma concerning this situation?

4. Why do you think Friedrich would want to go see a movie that espouses hatred toward Jews?

5. Describe the Jewish death ritual.

6. Tell the story of Solomon.

7. Who visits the Schneiders and what happens?

8. What is ironic about the way Resch treats his garden polycarp in contrast to how he treats Friedrich?

9. How are these chants a perversion of Jewish historical events?

10. What does Friedrich's appearance suggest?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

In the chapter, "Conversations on the Stairs," we see the first example of the courage of the narrator's father, though he is, like most humans a mixture of seemingly conflicting emotions and behaviors. Choose one of the following questions and write a well-developed, cohesive essay using examples from the text and your research or personal experience:

1. Take one major character and show how the character is a mixture of both admirable and less-than-admirable traits. Why do you think this is so? Is anyone ever always one way or another?

2. Most of us have had the experience of doing something that was "not like us." We are fearful when we are usually brave, or vice versa. Mean when usually kind; pessimistic when usually optimistic, etc....Relate one or two incidents in your life when you did something that was not like you. Explain why you did it; whether you regret your choices, and if you would make the same choice again.

3. Choose several well-known politicians, celebrities or other persons who have done things that seemed out of character for that person, or did something completely opposite of what s/he indicated s/he intended. State the situations and analyze each situation, answering the same questions in number 2 above.

Essay Topic 2

In the chapter titled "The Cleaning Lady," Frau Penk apologetically responds that she had planned on coming to tell Frau Schneider that she can no longer work for her. Answer the following questions and write a well-developed, cohesive essay using examples from the text and your research or personal experience:

1. Why can Frau Penk no longer work for the Schneiders? Is this fair?

2. Do you think Frau Penk should ignore the law and do what she thinks is right? Why or why not?

3. Are there any alternatives to Frau Penk just quitting?

4. Frau Penk says her husband used to be a communist and therefore they have to be very careful. What do you think she means by this?

5. What would you do in Frau Penk's place?

Essay Topic 3

The chapter "Reasons" is very important in understanding much of what happens later in the book and also in understanding why so many Jewish people did not flee Nazi Germany when they had the chance. Answer the following questions and write a well-developed, cohesive essay using examples from the text and your research or personal experience:

1. What are the reasons Herr Schnider gives for not leaving Germany? Are they valid?

2. Do you think, given the things that have already happened to the Schneiders, that Herr Schneider is being rationale in thinking that because it's the 20th century, things like genocide do not occur anymore?

3. Are modern governments (those in the 20th and 21st centuries) any less prone to wholesale genocide than any other era? Give specific examples and details to support your stance.

4. Is it fair for Herr Schneider to expect his teenage son to be as philosophical about persecution as Herr Schneider?

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