Chapter 18 question (Sarah)

When the German officer finds out that szpilman is a Jew he still decides to help him hide from the SS and give him food. Why do you think he chose to help him? If you were the officer would you choose to help szpilman even though it could put your own life in danger?

Chapter 17 question

How would you feel if you were the last one left in a destroyed ghetto. You managed to come so far and all of a sudden a German soldier is hovering over you asking why your searching for food. Szpilman just stood there not knowing what to do, it was too late to run, he had no other option. What would you do if you were stuck in that position?

Chapter 16 question (Steph)

in the beginning of the chapter, szpilman wakes up in the house. He describes the circumstances he is in and whats going on the filthiness and the dead bodies. If you were placed in such circumstances, how would it make you feel? Or in other words, how would you cope with all of it?

Chapter 15 question (Sarah)

If you were szpilman and were still locked inside the same room and all you could do while the Germans were going through the city shooting innocent people is see what is happening through the window and hear gun fire outside how would you feel? Would you want someone to let you out so you could help fight back when the rebellion began or would you want to stay locked in the room?

Chapter 14 question (Steph)

In chapter 14, Szpilman finds a new hiding place during these hard times would you continue to try and get out by finding another hiding place, or would you wait until the war was over, risking death and possibly never escaping.

Chapter 13 question

Szpilman is in hiding in a room that he can not leave. He is actually locked in from the outside. He is brought food every week by a family who cares for him. But every day szpilman wonders If they will come into his building and find him. Szpilman decided that he will nor let the Germans take him alive so he has planned out ways of comiting suicide. He made a nuce and hung it from the celing and put a chair under it. What would be going though your head if you had to wake up and see the same four walls for weeks on end, as well as think that at any time you may need to kill yourself, what thoughts would be going though your head? Also in the movie one difference I noticed is that in the movie he puts a chair up to the window so that if the Germans came he would run and jump, he never prepared a nuce for himself.

Chapter 11 Question (Steph)

This chapter really starts talking about when the Germans took them to a ghetto and put them to work. As we read about the conditions he was in and how he was in pain, there were mothers and fathers being separated from their kids. In Szpilmans point of view, what thoughts would be running through your head? Would you be able to cope with everything and stay calm, or would you lash out and risk death?

Chapter 9 and 10 Question (Sarah)

On page 101, Szpilman and his family, along with many other families are all waiting to be sent to a labor camp or at least thats what the Germans told them. Some of the people thought that they were just being sent to their death and that the Germans were lying about a labor camp. Would you believe the Germans or would you think that they were just going to kill you at the place you were being sent to? Also, some of the people were talking about joining together to fight back against the Germans. Would you choose to fight back or just go along with what they told you to do in fear of being killed?

Chapter 8 Question

If you were Szpilman and you watched all the other people in the ghetto slowly have to pack up and be deported, what would you think. would you be scared? and when in the book it says "our turn came a selection had been carried out at the collecting center, and only Henryk and Halina were passed as still fit to work. Father, Regina, and I were told to go back to the barracks. Once we were there the building was surrounded, and heard the whistle in the yard. It was no use struggling any more. I had done what i could to save my loved ones and myself. It had obviously been impossible from the start. Perhaps at least Halina and Henryk would fare better than the rest of us." (97) If you were Szpilman would you think you think your a "failure" for not protecting your family? if so why or why not?

Chapter 6 & 7 Question (Steph)

Throughout the two chapters, we see that Szpilman is trying to forget about the war by distracting himself, when he suddenly finds himself in the hospital wit appendicitis. With all of these events going on at one time how would you manage to cope with all of it? And furthermore, how would being in the hospital make it worse during this time? better?

Chapter 5 Question (Sarah)

When things started to get worse for the Jews, some people cried but others thought that somehow everything would turn out okay. What thoughts would be going through your head if you were a Jew and noticed that the Germans were doing worse things?

Chapter 4 Question

If you had the chance to leave and go to Russia would you, like that man who tried but didn't succeed. Also what would you do/think if there was speculation that your family may be sent to a ghetto.

Chapter 3 Question (Steph)

On page 38, the mayor of Warsaw is described, "He was disheveled and unshaven, and his face wore an expression of deathly weariness. He hadn't slept for days. He was the heart and soul of the defense, the real hero o the city." Put yourself in his situation, would you be as helpful as him, or run away to defend your yourself? How would you react; the same? Differently?

Chapter 2 Question (Sarah)

When Wladyslaw Szpilman and the others in his town first heard about the Germans attacking, they went on with their everyday lives normally. When he was also told that the Germans were advancing on Warsaw, he decided to stay at his house and not leave to try and find a safer place. If you were in this position would you have reacted the same way as Szpilman and the others in his town? In what ways would you have reacted differently?

Chapter 1 Question

If you and your family were stuck in a "ghetto" do you think you would be as positive as Wladyslaw Szpilman and find a job to keep busy.. ect? Also what kind of affect on you physically and mentally do you living in the ghetto would create?

Chapter 1 Synopsis

Wladyslaw Szpilman had a hard life during the war, his family sold everything they had even their piano. Szpilman managed to get a job at the Cafe Nowoczena which was very close to the warsaw ghetto. In the evenings people would smuggle things over the wall of the ghetto, such as bread and other things needed for survival. Children often were the ones to go out and smuggle food for their family, and szpilman talks about how he tried to save a boy that was stuck underneath the wall trying to crawl through, he pulled the boy but he could hear the german on the other side beating the boy; the boy went limp as the german broke his spine. Szpilman was often very lucky because where he worked often had many rich people in it, which means he often got to eat good food and make good money. Four months later he moved on to another cafe, he played the piano once again but this time with another man. Winter soon came after and winter in the ghetto was terrible, there was disease and lice everywhere and an epidemic broke out within the ghetto. Five thousand people died every month and the germans arrested the doctor because they didnt care. Szpilman didnt have himself vaccinated because he didnt have the money for him or his family, and he had to see all the people laying in the streets on his way home from work who had died of thyphus and starvation. The children in the ghetto had terrible lives the emerged from basements, alleys, and doorways where they slept where they never knew what the next day would bring them. Szpilmans life begins to change and he has to live with many things that we would never imagine, life in the ghetto gets harder and as they say at the end of chapter one "It turned his heart to stone".