How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
Antonina marveled as their wrinkled hands passed out food (mainly oatmeal), sweets, a postcard album, and little games. (5.10)
The war makes people forge unlikely friendships, like this one between Antonina and her elderly landlords. It's a friendship borne out of a need to survive, and everyone provides companionship and whatever resources they can spare for one another. These old ladies feed Antonina. Hey, a fistful of oatmeal always hits the spot.
Quote #5
We could see our two hawks and one eagle circling above the garden. When their cage was split open by bullets, they'd flown free, but they didn't want to leave the only home they knew. (10.15)
These two eagles remind us of Antonina, Jan, and Ryś: they are often kicked out of their home and forced to circle around it, and all they want to do is return home. At least they always remain happy and never become…angry birds. (We had to do it.)
Quote #6
Antonina worried about her friend, sculptor Magdalena Gross, whose life and art had derailed with the bombing of the zoo, which wasn't just her open-air workshop but her compass, in both senses, an imaginative realm for her work and a direction for her life. (18.19)
Art needs a safe home if it's going to thrive, and the war does all it can to bust everybody and everything up. Where is Bob Ross and his happy trees when you need him?