Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes
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40 free Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes trivia questions with answers — literature quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Eleanor Coerr's short novel has been read in classrooms around the world since the 1970s. It follows a lively girl in postwar Hiroshima who loves to run, falls ill, and sets out to fold a thousand paper cranes in the hope of being granted a wish. Few books for young readers say so much about war, hope and courage in so few pages. This quiz walks through the story chapter by chapter: the family's morning on Peace Day, the school sports day, the secret Sadako keeps, the people she meets on the ward and the presents that lift her spirits. It then steps outside the book to the real Sadako Sasaki, the places where the novel and the historical record differ, and the monuments and traditions her story inspired. It is written for students and teachers reading the book in class, and for anyone who remembers it from their own school days. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so the quiz works as a study aid as well as a game.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In Eleanor Coerr's novel, how many paper cranes does Sadako fold before she grows too weak to go on?
644
644 is where Sadako's count stops in the novel. Her classmates fold the other 356, so that a full thousand cranes can be buried with her.
Q 02According to Sadako Sasaki's family, what really happened to her goal of folding a thousand cranes?
She passed 1,000
She passed 1,000 by the end of August 1955 and went on folding, an exhibit at Hiroshima's peace museum stated. The story that she fell short comes from the novel.
Q 03Which illness is known in Hiroshima as the atom bomb disease in Eleanor Coerr's novel about Sadako?
Leukemia
Leukemia is a cancer of the blood, and it was still striking young people in Hiroshima nine years after the bomb. Mr. Sasaki prays each morning that his family will be spared.
Q 04Which best friend visits Sadako in the hospital and tells her the legend of the thousand cranes?
Chizuko
Chizuko has been close to Sadako since kindergarten. She folds the very first crane herself, even though she doesn't share her friend's faith in lucky charms.
Q 05Which US president gave Hiroshima's peace museum paper cranes he had folded, echoing Sadako's story?
Barack Obama
Barack Obama was the first sitting US president to visit Hiroshima's Peace Memorial, in 2016. The two cranes he made by hand are displayed alongside his message.
Q 06The real Sadako Sasaki ran short of paper in the hospital, so what did she fold many cranes from?
Medicine wrappers
Medicine wrappers and the paper from other patients' get-well gifts kept her supplied. Her best friend also brought sheets from school.
Q 07Who raised the money to build the statue of Sadako that stands in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park?
Schoolchildren
Schoolchildren across Japan, including Sadako's own classmates, ran the fund-raising campaign. The finished monument was unveiled in 1958.
Q 08What color is the paper of the very first crane that Sadako is given in her hospital room?
Gold
Gold paper makes the first crane special, and Sadako keeps it on her bedside table for luck. She even carries it home on her one visit to her family.
Q 09Which relative of Sadako, honored each morning at the family altar, was killed by the atomic bomb?
Her grandmother
Her grandmother, known to the family as Oba chan, looks out from a photograph on the altar shelf. The Sasakis still feel connected to her nine years on.
Q 10Which creature does Sadako carry out of the house in Chapter 1, sure that it brings good luck?
A spider
A spider seen in the morning is a traditional Japanese good omen. Her older brother teases her for believing it, but that night Sadako decides it worked.
Q 11Sadako's parents scold her on the morning of Peace Day for describing the memorial day as what?
A carnival
A carnival is how the excited Sadako sees it, with its music, fireworks and street food. Her parents remind her that it honors those the bomb killed.
Q 12In Eleanor Coerr's novel, what job does Mr. Sasaki do to support Sadako and her three siblings?
A barber
A barber's income barely stretches to a family of six, so the Sasakis struggle for money. It makes the costly gifts Sadako receives in the hospital a real sacrifice.
Q 13What name do the people of Hiroshima give the atomic bomb in Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes?
The Thunderbolt
Q 21Which nurse comforts Sadako when a young friend on the ward dies, urging her to keep folding cranes?
Yasunaga
Nurse Yasunaga finds Sadako afraid that she will be the next to die. Her advice is to carry on with the cranes so that the wish can still be made.
Q 22Which brother of Sadako promises to hang every crane she folds from her hospital room ceiling?
Masahiro
Masahiro, who is fourteen, makes the promise when he brings Sadako her homework on her first full day in the hospital.
Q 23What kind of traditional wooden doll do Sadako's classmates send to cheer her up in the hospital?
Kokeshi
Kokeshi was also the title her classmates gave the collection of Sadako's letters they published after her death, a book Eleanor Coerr drew on for the novel.
The Thunderbolt fell when Sadako was only two, yet she insists she can still remember its blinding light and heat.
Q 14At the Peace Day ceremony in Sadako's story, what is released into the sky after the mayor's speech?
White doves
White doves are set free in their hundreds, and to Sadako they look like the souls of the bomb's victims rising into the open sky.
Q 15After dark on Peace Day, what does Sadako's family set afloat bearing the names of lost relatives?
Paper lanterns
Paper lanterns carry the names of relatives the bomb killed. Drifting down the Ohta River together, the lights remind Sadako of fireflies.
Q 16Which treat is Sadako especially keen on at the Peace Day festivities in Eleanor Coerr's novel?
Cotton candy
Cotton candy is the highlight of the day's street food for Sadako. Less welcome are the burn scars she sees on survivors, which frighten her into looking away.
Q 17For which Field Day event do Sadako's classmates pick her in Chapter 3 of Eleanor Coerr's novel?
A relay race
A relay race is Sadako's big chance, and she trains for it every day. Mr. Sasaki marks the news with a long dinner speech about family honor.
Q 18Chapter 3 of Eleanor Coerr's novel is called Sadako's Secret, so what is she hiding from her family?
Dizzy spells
Dizzy spells begin straight after her Field Day victory and grow worse over the winter. Sadako tells no one, hoping they will simply go away.
Q 19On which special night does Sadako make a secret wish that her strange symptoms will go away?
New Year's Eve
New Year's Eve ends with Sadako's wish, and next morning the family joins the crowds visiting shrines. She even outruns her big brother on the way home.
Q 20Which nine-year-old orphan does Sadako befriend on the ward, a patient sure that he will die soon?
Kenji
Kenji was born after the war, but his mother's exposure to the bomb's radiation left him with the same illness as Sadako. One chapter is named after him.
Q 24Which gift does Sadako's mother sew for her to wear during the family's last hospital visit?
A silk kimono
A silk kimono is a milestone Mrs. Sasaki refuses to let her daughter miss, whatever the cost. Sadako is able to wear it only once.
Q 25Sadako's doctor lets her go home in July for which holiday that welcomes the spirits of the dead?
O Bon
O Bon brings a stream of relatives and friends to the Sasaki home over several days. The visit leaves Sadako pale and worn out.
Q 26Sadako is treated in a Hiroshima hospital named after which international aid organization?
The Red Cross
The Red Cross Hospital in Hiroshima admitted the real Sadako Sasaki in February 1955, and she died there that October at the age of twelve.
Q 27What is the name of Sadako's younger sister, who helps her wash the dishes on Peace Day morning?
Mitsue
Mitsue is nine, and the two girls rush through the kitchen chores so that the family can set off for the celebrations sooner.
Q 28Where is Sadako running when she collapses one February day and can no longer hide that she is ill?
The schoolyard
The schoolyard fall ends months of secrecy. Sadako is taken to the hospital, where she overhears her parents and a doctor discussing her diagnosis.
Q 29Eleanor Coerr, who wrote Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes, was born and raised in which country?
Canada
Canada was her first home: she grew up in Saskatoon, where a high-school best friend born to Japanese immigrants sparked her interest in Japan.
Q 30In real life, who told Sadako Sasaki the legend of the thousand cranes, by her family's account?
Her father
Her father explained the legend after a youth club sent cranes to the patients on her ward. The best friend who tells it in the novel was real, too, and brought her paper from school.