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Chapter 3
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in A Night Divided, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Freedom
Family
Secrets, Surveillance, and Suspicion
Individuality vs. Conformity
Hope and Risk
Summary
Analysis
Mama once told Gerta that one of the nice things about being young is the ability to get used to anything so that it seems normal—even things that border on “insanity.” Gerta understands this once the wall goes up: all the kids accept it as though it’s always been there. But Gerta can’t relate to them: even four years later, when she is 12, she always notices the wall. Fritz thinks it’s because she’s headstrong, like Papa.
On a bitterly cold day, Gerta walks to school with her friend Anna, who is quieter and more reserved than headstrong Gerta. Anna tells Gerta there’s a Pioneer meeting today. Gerta loathes these meetings, which teach students that freedom, individuality, and all western ideas are bad. But Gerta hides this from Anna, telling her that she’s going to the meeting—not going, after all, would lead the school administrators to visit Mama. And she’s had too many visits from the Stasi already, concerning Papa. Each time, they promise they will arrest him if he ever decides to return. Ever since a particularly intimidating visit, Mama has done everything she can to ensure that they appear like “a good East German family.” And so, Fritz joined the Free German Youth, and Gerta goes to Pioneer meetings.
Anna functions as a foil to Gerta: though she might value freedom, she isn’t willing to put her life at risk in pursuit of it, and she dutifully follows through with the responsibilities and norms her government imposes on its citizens. The Pioneer meeting Anna mentions refers to the Ernst Thälmann Pioneer Organisation, a youth organization for schoolchildren in East Germany and a subdivision of the Free German Youth. It was modeled on Scouting and functioned to indoctrinate children with social ideology. That all children are forced to attend such groups reinforces the lack of freedom of thought the East German government afforded its citizens.
Themes
As Gerta and Anna walk to school, Gerta muses at the drab gray buildings and streets—deemed Communist Gray by the East Germans. Just then, Anna points to a boy standing across the wall, on the western side. It’s been four years since Anna last saw Dominic, but she’d recognize him anywhere—and the boy across the wall is definitely him. Gerta instinctively waves at Dominic, but a Grenzer, Müller, catches her and asks who she’s waving at. Gerta feigns innocence, and Müller warns her not to “get too curious about the other side,” threatening her with his gun. After Müller lets her go, Anna, crying, begs Gerta never to stop by the wall again. But in her heart, Gerta knows she can’t make this promise to Anna.
