Endless Steppe
Endless Steppe Discussion Questions
Chapters 1-4:
Chapters 1-4:
- On pg 19, Esther and her family are boarding the truck.
- Discuss the feelings and actions of the family members standing on the sidewalk.
- Discuss the feelings and actions of the family members standing on the sidewalk.
- On the truck, Esther’s mother and others urge her to stop crying. Why do you think this is? Is this a good idea / fair?
- Think about the word choices Esther uses when describing the train: Starting on the bottom of page 21, “Ahead of us the cattle cars were waiting for their human cargo,” and continuing on to page 22 to the end of the first paragraph, “one could see the scars on the floor made by those other beasts as they shuffled uneasily during their journey.” There are additional descriptions throughout chapter 2 (ending on page 34).
- What effect does these word choices have on tone and mood?
- What effect does these word choices have on tone and mood?
- Esther mentions her Grandfather’s garden and plants, the value of gardening, and her knowledge of plants multiple times in chapters 1 to 3. On page 41, she “saw a patch of flowers next to a hut. I remembered what Grandfather Solomon had said about people who loved flowers, and I thought anyone who loved flowers enough to make them grow here must have more than a little good in him.”
- Why does the idea of gardening continue to come up over and over?
- What does this particular passage reveal about Esther? About the whole situation?
- Why does the idea of gardening continue to come up over and over?
- Of all the negative things that happen to Esther in these chapters (no photo albums- pg 17, shipped in cattle car - pg 22, no private toilet - pg 30, shipped to Siberia - pg 41, living the a school house - pg 45, little food even though there is plenty in the storeroom - pg 56), which is the most deplorable? Why?
- Providing evidence from the text, what word(s) describe each of the characters so far?
- Esther
- Father
- Mother
- Grandmother
- Esther