Essay Questions

What is unusual about this novel in its use chapter epigraphs?

An epigraph is a short quote usually by an external source. Many books begin with an epigraph. A few commence each chapter with an epigraph. An even smaller percentage of those use epigraphs that actually connect with each other. In most cases, an epigraph is used to provide a certain ambiguous foreshadowing of what the book—or the chapter—is going to be about. It may be a direct commentary on a theme or perhaps an indirect indication to the reader about how to approach the content. None of the chapters in Zorrie are titled except for their number—Chapter One, Chapter Two, etc.—but each is preceded by an epigraph that is not referenced to an outside source. Instead, they are just short phrases that seem to offer little in the way of contextual clues about what is to come. It turns out, however, that they are not just individual random phrases, but individual lines that, when placed together, form a poem that is coherent if not exactly easily interpreted::

“out of this shadow, into this sun

running together, the day falls copiously

no shining roof or glittering window

this Palace seems light as a cloud set for a moment in the sky

Our hands touch, our bodies burst into fire

and soft green passages and blurry lemon highlights”

Who is Opal and why has been institutionalized?

Opal is the wife of Noah Summers. Her only interaction with Zorrie occurs when Zorrie visits her inside the Logansport State Hospital where she has been institutionalized. Noah and Opal had only been married for a few months when tragedy both struck and was averted. Opal had decided for reasons unclear to set fire to the house. Had she done so and then fled, she would likely not have been institutionalized but incarcerated. The difference between hospitalization and imprisonment as punishment lies not in what she did, but what she didn’t do. And what Opal did not do after setting fire to the house was leave it. In fact, she refused to flee from the threat of the flames surrounding her and it was only as a result of Noah physically picking her up and removing her that she did not become a victim of her own arson. The refusal to leave a house she had set on fire also dictated that her future would take place at the state mental hospital rather than inside the state penitentiary.

What legendary historical figure plays a part in the conclusion of Zorrie’s story?

The book concludes with Zorrie making a trip to Amsterdam. Her husband, Harold, had died after his plan was shot down over Holland in World War II. The urge to travel there is more immediately stimulated by an article in National Geographic about the famous tulips industry of the country. She will leave on Halloween on a plane also occupied by a kid wearing a cape and plastic fangs and she will make a new friend named Ellie Storms on the way home. While in Amsterdam, Zorrie visit the house that Anne Frank and her family called home. Zorrie is so moved by the experience that she takes the tour a second time on her last day in the city. While there she also reads Anne’s famous diary. The short tragic life Anne Frank who would die without mercy at the hands of fascist monsters deeply moves Zorrie as she considers how much “living” the young girl was able to stuff into such a short time in comparison to her own.