Essay Questions

What did it mean that the city had a curfew?

During the Second World War, most countries involved in a war had a curfew, that it an hour until which civilians were allowed to roam the streets. After that hour, the civilians were supposed to return home and stay there until the curfew was over. Being in the street during curfew was dangerous since a person risked being shot and killed by the soldiers trying to protect the city. Because of this, Lev and his friend became scared when they realized that they will be caught outside after curfew and decided to run.

Why were the boys in the 4th chapter painting over the street numbers and over the street named inside the city?

In the fourth chapter, Lev and the soldier stumble upon a group of kids painting over the street named and number in Leningrad. The practice was a common one in the big cities affected by war and the reason why the numbers and names were painted over was because the city officials tried to make it as harder as possible for the enemy to find their way into the city. In the situation in which the city would fall to the enemy, the soldiers wanted the enemy to be as confused as possible navigating through the streets of the city.

What is the historical background in the novel?

The action in the novel takes part sometimes at the end of the Siege of Leningrad, in 1944. The siege lasted from 1941 and it affected greatly the city and its citizens. Soon after the siege started, the city ran out of food so the government issued ration cards for each individual. The food given to the people was unfortunately not enough so many had to resolve to other ways to get food. For example, some began to eat the so called library candy, made out of books and cellulose and other people claimed that the dirt they were selling was actually food. Other people, like the giant presented in the novel, resorted to cannibalism in order to survive. All this facts are present in the novel as well as the countless deaths that were common during the war and the way the people in the city became unaffected by death.