Student Question
What is the setting of Milkweed?
Quick answer:
The setting of Milkweed is Poland during World War II. Poland was invaded and occupied by the Germans during the war, and the Nazis brought great suffering and misery to the native population, especially Jews. Misha witnesses Nazi savagery firsthand when he ends up being trapped in the Warsaw ghetto.
The setting of Milkweed by Jerry Spinelli really couldn’t be better for giving us an insight into what life was like in occupied Europe during the Second World War. Poland was invaded by the Germans and became a testing ground for their racial theories. The Nazis, in keeping with their racist ideology, treated the native Poles as subhumans and saw them as racially inferior. But they treated Polish Jews even worse, rounding them up into ghettos before deporting them to their deaths in the concentration and extermination camps.
The largest and most notorious of these ghettos was the Warsaw Ghetto, where Janina, Misha, and the other boys in his gang find themselves trapped. Conditions in the ghetto are horrendous, as indeed they’re supposed to be. People are crowded into a confined space like animals and are systematically deprived of enough food to eat. Janina’s Uncle Shepsel aptly describes living conditions...
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in the ghetto as like being in a closet.
In common with many young adult novels that deal with the horrors of war, Milkweed is told from the point of view of a child. This makes it easier for younger readers to identify with the suffering endured by those caught up in the middle of conflict and genocide. Through Misha’s eyes, we’re able to gain insight into the experiences of millions of people in war-torn Poland during this dark and tragic era of world and European history.
What is the setting of the book Milkweed?
Milkweed is set in Warsaw, Poland, and a nearby farm during the Second World War and in the United States afterward. As a homeless vagabond, the boy who does not initially know his name, later becoming Misha, covers considerable territory in the city. When Uri befriends him, they find shelter from the bombs in a stable and then an old barbershop. After he joins with Janina's family, he goes to live with them in the Jewish ghetto after they are forced to relocate there.
When the ghetto is sealed off, Misha sneaks out and reenters, bringing food. He avoids deportation to the concentration camps and lives for a while on a farm in the countryside.
After the war, he secures passage and immigrates to America.