Essay Questions

Why is Ruby afraid of the dark?

Ruby is afraid of the dark because of several experiences she has had and connects with the darkness. She remembers the time she lost Jude in the dark, and the soberness prompts the malicious feelings she associates with it. She also realizes that the darkness is the absence of light, which maces her weary. Ruby relates the light to happiness and safety, and when there is darkness, those feelings are long lost.

Why doesn’t Clancy want Ruby to take the cure?

Ruby wanted to take the cure because she wished to become a normal person again, and be treated like a human. What she didn’t realize was that she always would be viewed as different, no matter what she would do. The fact is that the disease wasn’t any of the children’s fault and they should not be treated as if it was. Clancy manages to make Ruby understand that the problem does not lay with the children, but with the government and their ideology and actions.

What did Zue try to explain in her interview?

Ruby tried to explain how it was to be a child trying to survive in the horrible world they were living in. She said that she, alike all the other child survivors, had to work and do bad thing to make sure that they woke up, healthy and unhurt the next day. The bad circumstances lead to bad behavior, because that was what they had to do to survive. She put the adults in the position of the kids, trying to show them that they also might have done the same thing, had they been in their shoes.