The Cage

Multiple Choice and Long Answer questions create ideal opportunities for whole-text review, unit exam, or summative assessments.

Multiple Choice

1. In Chapter 1, Riva references the nightmares of Nazi torture that disrupt her sleep. Which of the following best describes how nightmares/dreams function throughout the text?

A) Nightmares/dreams function as cinematic “bookends” to The Cage, appearing at the very beginning and the very end of the book.

B) Nightmares/dreams are both a vehicle for Riva to insert the past into the present and a means of depicting the aftereffects of trauma.

C) Nightmares/dreams typically feature Riva’s favorite animal, the eagle, which symbolizes her yearning for freedom.

D) Nightmares/dreams are rejected by Riva’s mother as having any deeper meaning, which showcases a rift in the relationship between Riva and her mother.

2. In Chapter 6, Riva and her siblings experience a traumatic event that makes Riva ask herself: “How can the sun still shine?” (34). What event is she referring to?

A) Laibele contracting tuberculosis

B) Riva breaking her leg

C) Motele being taken to a labor camp

D) Riva and her siblings’ mother being taken away by Nazis

3. What is the primary reason that Miss Wolkowna, the social worker from the Child Welfare Department, allows Riva to adopt her siblings?

A) Because Riva fools Miss Wolkowna into thinking that Riva is her siblings’ aunt

B) Because Miss Wolkowna sees the love and devotion that the siblings have for one another

C) Because Miss Wolkowna knows that the siblings will be taken away to the labor camps soon anyway

D)  Because the siblings beg Miss Wolkowna to let them stay with Riva

4. In Chapter 12, there are a few subtle hints that Riva finds her neighbor, Shmulek, attractive. Which of the following is one such hint?

A) Riva describes Shmulek as looking “like a movie star.”

B) Riva blushes every time she sees Shmulek.

C) Riva is shy and therefore cannot look Shmulek in the eye.

D)  Riva feels Shmulek’s “agony” and his “hope.”

5. Why does Shmulek’s arrival at Riva’s family home put Riva and her siblings in danger?

A) Shmulek has PTSD from being in the labor camp and, as part of his condition, has occasional violent outbursts.

B) Shmulek arouses the community’s jealousy, and their neighbors want to plan an attack on him.

C) Shmulek is an escapee from a Nazi labor camp, and Nazi soldiers are looking for him.

D) Shmulek is severely sick with smallpox and, as such, risks infecting Riva and the rest of the family.

6. Which of the following best describes why Riva and Yulek do not ever speak of the nature of their relationship, as Riva explains in Chapter 19?

A) Because the Nazis aim to alienate Riva from her family and friends; they will be angered if they see Riva and Yulek’s budding romance

B) Because Yulek has been promised to another girl; he does not want to offend her family

C) Because Riva does not want her brothers to worry about her potentially broken heart, on top of everything else going on

D) Because, for Riva and Yulek, their relationship feels separate from the “real” world; acknowledging the relationship risks bursting the tenuous bubble in which their relationship exists

7. When Riva and her neighbors gather to leave the Lodz ghetto in Chapter 23, Mrs. Boruchowich tells Riva: “You are all my children. I cannot live without my children.” Whom does Mrs. Boruchowich’s comment make Riva think of?

A) Riva’s mother, who made a similar comment before she was taken away by the Nazis

B) Riva’s aunt, who made a similar comment before her children were taken away by Nazis

C) Riva’s neighbor, Rachel, who made a similar comment before her children were taken away by Nazis

D) Riva’s favorite author, Pearl S. Buck, who wrote The Good Earth

8. Upon arriving in Auschwitz, Riva loses her glasses, leaving her feeling “suddenly blind.” This moment plays most closely into which of the following motifs in the book?

A) The cage

B) Nightmares and dreams

C) Food

D) Darkness and light

9. Riva, in the process of searching for her mother, encounters a woman in Auschwitz who tells Riva to stop searching—according to this woman, Riva will never find her mother. Which of the following best describes why the woman advises Riva so?

A) It is easier, in some ways, to live without hope in Auschwitz, rather than suffer the letdown of having one’s hope never to come true.

B) The woman knows for a fact that Riva’s mother is dead.

C) The Nazis do not take kindly to prisoners who are too eager to find family members; the woman is trying to protect Riva from the Nazis’ wrath.

D) The woman has become cruel and malicious toward everyone, after so much suffering in the camp. She just wants to hurt Riva.

10. Upon Riva’s arrival in Camp Mittelsteine, the prisoners are brought into the camp by a menacing German who will be their commandant. What does this woman tell the prisoners?

A) They will all work in the kitchen now.

B) They are all destined for Gross-Rosen.

C) They are all numbers now.

D) They all no longer have family left.

11. A group of prisoners from Riva’s barrack are caught stealing. What did they steal?

A) A gold necklace

B) Candlesticks and matches

C) Potato peels from the kitchen garbage

D) Four books and five pencils

12. A girl in Riva’s barrack at Camp Mittelsteine (Sara) suddenly realizes that it is a major Jewish holiday. What holiday is it?

A) Passover, or Pesach

B) Hanukkah

C) Purim

D) Yom Kippur

13. When she is tucked away in the sickroom, why does Riva consider herself lucky?

A) Because she finally has space to write

B) Because she does not have to work

C) Because she is spared the daily beating from the Nazi guards

D) Because the doctor who monitors her is quickly becoming her best friend

14. At the Christmas performance in the barracks, Riva recites a poem in Yiddish; what is the subject?

A) Her brothers

B) Her friends

C) Her father

D) Her mother

15. What is the poignant phrase that concludes The Cage, and what is the origin of this phrase?

A) “The serpent tricked me and I ate,” which is a phrase from the Torah

B) “A pot belonging to partners is neither hot nor cold,” which is a phrase from the Talmud

C)  “Let justice roll down like waters, righteousness like a mighty stream,” which is a phrase from the Nevi’im

D) “As long as there is life, there is hope,” which is a phrase from Riva’s mother

Long Answer

Compose a response of 2-3 sentences, incorporating text details to support your response.

1. One major theme in The Cage is how Riva uses cycles of nature to accompany the cycle of the Jewish calendar in marking time. Provide at least one example of this, and answer the question: Why does Riva choose to include this kind of detail in the book?

2. In Chapter 47, when Russian soldiers come to the rescue of Riva and the other prisoners, they stare at the women “as if seeing ghosts coming out of a grave.” How does this moment play into the book’s larger motif of dreams/nightmares?